SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea said Thursday it had successfully tested a multiple-warhead missile, the first known launch of a weapon in development that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is seeking to overwhelm U.S. and South Korean missile defenses. South Korea quickly dismissed the claim as a hoax to cover up a failed launch.
North Korean state media said Wednesday’s launch tested the separation and guidance of individual mobile warheads to ensure the capability of multiple independent reentry vehicles. The separated warheads “were guided correctly to the three coordinated targets” and a decoy that separated from the missile was verified by radar.
If confirmed, it would be North Korea’s first public launch related to the development of a multiple-warhead missile, albeit at an early stage.
The South Korean military said later Thursday that a joint analysis by South Korean and U.S. authorities had determined that the North Korean missile launch had failed.
Joint Chiefs of Staff spokesman Lee Sung Joon told reporters that warhead separation during MIRV tests occurs in descending stages, but the North Korean missile exploded at the initial stage of its flight. He said North Korean photos of the launch showed a weapon similar to a Hwasong-17 liquid-fueled ICBM that the country tested in March 2023.
South Korean Army previous assessment On Wednesday, a solid-propellant hypersonic missile was launched and exploded off the eastern coast of the North, scattering fragments into the water. The agency said it detected more smoke than during normal launches, suggesting a possible combustion problem caused by an engine failure.
A multi-warhead missile was among the high-tech weapons systems Kim listed on his wish list at a ruling party meeting in early 2021, alongside spy satellites, solid-propellant intercontinental ballistic missiles, hypersonic weapons and submarine-launched nuclear missiles. North Korea has since conducted a series of tests to develop such weapons systems.
“I have been waiting for a MIRV test for some time now, as it was one of the last remaining items on Kim Jong Un’s modernization wish list at the 8th Party Congress in January 2021,” said Ankit Panda, a senior analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Panda said Wednesday’s test appeared to be an initial evaluation of some of the key subsystems to develop an operational MIRV. He expected successive tests of the technology to follow, leading to the launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile on an elevated trajectory. Panda said it appeared “South Korea misinterpreted the nature of this test at the outset.”
Lee Choon Geun, an honorary researcher at South Korea’s Institute for Science and Technology Policy, said North Korea appears to have begun testing individual technological elements of multiple-warhead missiles. He added that further tests are expected to improve separation and guidance control and other aspects of multiple-warhead missile technology.
Chang Young-keun, a missile expert at the Korea National Strategy Research Institute in Seoul, said the North’s test had not yet proven that it had the MIRV control technologies needed for ICBMs. He added that North Korea had not disclosed enough information to verify that its MIRVs had successfully reentered the atmosphere and hit their designated targets.
Panda said the presence of a decoy in the North Korean test is significant. But the South Korean military said it could not immediately confirm whether North Korea had the technology to build such a decoy.
“North Korea has never hidden its intention to undermine and overcome U.S. missile defenses on its territory,” Panda said. “Decoys will help it in this endeavor and will likely also be integrated into its single-warhead missiles.”
The test, the first in a month, came as the country protested the regional deployment of a U.S. aircraft carrier for an inaugural joint training exercise with South Korea and Japan. North Korean Vice Defense Minister Kim Kang Il on Monday called the carrier deployment “reckless” and threatened to retaliate without specifying the reasons.
The South Korean military announced that the three-day South Korea-U.S.-Japan multi-domain exercise kicked off Thursday. The “Freedom Edge” exercise will involve destroyers, fighter jets and helicopters from the three countries as well as the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt. The drill will include missile defense, anti-submarine warfare and maritime interdiction exercises.
In recent weeks, North Korea has also issued numerous Balloons carrying waste South Korea, in what it described as a retaliatory response to South Korean activists sending political leaflets via their own balloons. In response, South Korea briefly conducted a June 9 propaganda broadcasts over loudspeakers South Korean authorities said Thursday they would turn on loudspeakers in border areas again if North Korea continued to send up trash balloons.
Concerns about North Korea also intensified last week when Kim Jong-un and Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a peace deal. agreement requiring each country The two countries have pledged to provide assistance to each other in the event of an attack and to strengthen cooperation between them. Analysts say the agreement represents the strongest bond between the two countries since the end of the Cold War.
According to Lee, how quickly North Korea can complete the development of a multiple-warhead weapon will depend on the technological assistance Russia provides to North Korea and its scale. The South Korean military has said that no Russian assistance to North Korea’s MIRV program has been confirmed.
