South Korea yesterday conducted a large-scale live fire exercise on the East Sea, where North Korea has been upping tensions with a series of missile and rocket launches supervised by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.
The drill involving K-9 self-propelled artillery units and 130mm multiple rocket launchers was held in the coastal county of Goseong, South Korea, which borders North Korea.
The aim of the exercise was to role play “the scenario of a possible North Korean maritime provocation,” South Korean Ministry of National Defense spokesman Moon Sang-gyun told reporters.
It comes during an extended period of elevated military tensions on the Korean peninsula, triggered by Pyongyang’s fourth nuclear test on Jan. 6.
Over the past month, Kim has personally monitored numerous rocket and missile launches into the East Sea (also known as the Sea of Japan), including the North’s first test of a medium-range ballistic missile for two years.
Late last month, Kim watched what state media called the nation’s largest-ever long-range artillery drill, involving multiple batteries of heavy-caliber units pounding an offshore island from a beach about 120km north of Goseong.
The muscle-flexing was largely a response to ongoing, large-scale military war games that South Korea and the US hold every year — much to Pyongyang’s fury.
Yesterday’s South Korean drill was focused on “mastering more efficient and accurate firing procedures at sea against enemy targets,” Moon said.
North Korea’s fourth nuclear test in January saw the UN Security Council — backed by Pyongyang’s main ally, China — impose its harshest sanctions to date over the country’s nuclear weapons program.
North Korea responded defiantly, claiming a series of key breakthroughs in its development of a long-range nuclear strike capability and threatening Seoul and Washington with nuclear attack.
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