North Korean leader Kim Jong-un expressed “great satisfaction” over the latest test of a large multiple-rocket launcher, state media said yesterday, a launch that experts said showcased improving performance by the system and its crews.
On Thursday, North Korea fired two short-range projectiles into the sea off its east coast in a fourth test of its new “super-large multiple-rocket launcher,” South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said told a briefing.
The latest test of the so-called KN-25 missile came as a Thanksgiving Day reminder to the US of a year-end deadline that Kim has set for Washington to show flexibility in their stalled denuclearization talks.
The series of tests since the KN-25 was first unveiled in August show that the North Koreans are steadily improving their ability to quickly fire multiple rockets from their mobile launch vehicles.
That capability makes it more likely that in case of a war, North Korean rocket crews could speedily deploy, fire and move before being targeted by South Korean or US forces, experts said.
“The faster it fires, the quicker it can [get] out of Dodge, before counterfire arrives,” James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies missile researcher Jeffrey Lewis said on Twitter.
In the first two KN-25 tests in August and September missiles were fired 17 minutes and 19 minutes apart, respectively, the JCS said.
By the end of October, crews had narrowed that interval to three minutes, while on Thursday the gap between the two missiles was only about 30 seconds.
“The latest test indicated that the system was ready for mass production and deployment,” said Kim Dong-yub, a former South Korean Navy officer who teaches at Kyungnam University in Seoul.
Kim has set an end-year deadline to restart the talks with the US.
The year-end deadline was an artificial one, but could mean a return to “provocative” steps that preceded the past two years of diplomacy, US Special Representative to North Korea Stephen Biegun said last week.
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