NK hails advanced rocket test

Photos released by the Korean Central News Agency show projectiles being fired from a transporter-erector-launcher equipped with four launcher tubes during North Korea’s first rocket test this year on March 2. (KCNA-Yonhap)

The two short-range projectiles North Korea fired into the East Sea on Monday were super-large-caliber rockets, a test Kim Jong-un oversaw with “great satisfaction,” the North’s Korean Central News Agency said Tuesday, releasing the launch photos.

In Monday’s launch, the North revealed improved rockets in its fifth run since an initial test in September the previous year. The two projectiles were fired some 20 seconds apart, as compared with 17 minutes in September.  

The projectiles North Korea fires land in the East Sea between South Korea and Japan, March 2. (KCNA-Yonhap)

“The projectiles flew at a maximum altitude of 35 kilometers as well. South Korea’s anti-missile shield THAAD intercepts missiles flying at least 40 kilometers high or above,” said Shin Jong-woo, a senior researcher at the Korea Defense and Security Forum.

Pyongyang’s rockets, world’s largest with a caliber of 600 millimeters, could incapacitate Seoul’s counter-fire systems, Shin noted, adding the projectiles could have carried multiple warheads this time. He pointed to plumes of smoke around the place they landed in the East Sea.

Kim Dong-yub, an analyst from Seoul’s Institute for Far Eastern Studies, said the North is ready to put the advanced rockets into combat operational, or has already done so. “The last four launches since last September were ‘trial runs.’ It isn’t this time, and that is a clear danger to us,” he said.

By Choi Si-young (siyoungchoi@heraldcorp.com)