North Korea Conducts Testing Spree Launches Additional Cruise Missiles

North Korea is escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula by launching cruise missiles on multiple occasions. A cruise missile with a thick warhead soars into the sky in a photo released by North Korea on the 4th, by which they say they conducted a power test of a cruise missile with an ultra-large warhead and a test launch of a new anti-aircraft missile over the western sea on the 2nd. This is believed to be a demonstration of the capability to equip the nuclear onto the warhead.Cruise missiles, which can fly at low altitudes, have been perceived as less threatening than ballistic missiles because they do not violate the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions.

However, if a nuclear warhead can be mounted on a cruise missile, which is slower and therefore less threatening, it becomes a significantly threatening missile. This is because cruise missiles can penetrate at very low altitudes and have the ability to change altitudes considering terrain such as mountains or coastlines, known as “terrain-following flight.” They can also perform evasive maneuvers to bypass air defense networks.

If the test launch of a “strategic cruise missile,” a medium to long-range cruise missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, comes successful, it could render the “Korean Triad System” helpless.

It’s been suggested that North Korea, which is investing in the development of new weapons systems, may have received technical support from Russia. Since Chairman Kim Jong-un’s visit to Russia for the North Korea-Russia summit last year, there have been suspicions of arms trade and military cooperation between North Korea and Russia, but both sides deny these suspicions. Any arms trade, including ballistic missiles between North Korea and Russia, is a clear violation of multiple UNSC resolutions.

Pranay Vaddi, Senior Director of the National Security Council (NSC) at the White House, criticized the unprecedented level of military cooperation between Russia and North Korea at a talk hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a think tank in Washington DC, on January 18 (local time). Director Vaddi suggested that the military cooperation between North Korea and Russia has emerged as a new variable in the extended deterrence (nuclear umbrella) cooperation between South Korea and the U.S.

Meanwhile, Chairman Kim has been escalating provocations since he defined the Korean relationship as an “antagonistic relationship between two countries,” not a “kinship relationship,” at the Workers’ Party Plenary Meeting in December last year and stated that unification with South Korea could not be achieved. Experts on the North Korean issue predict that provocations will continue ahead of the general elections in April and the U.S. presidential election in November.