North Korea tests massive new ICBM for 'long' confrontation with US

SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea's latest launch was a huge, new intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), state media reported on Friday, in a test leader Kim Jong Un said was designed to demonstrate the might of its nuclear force and deter any US military moves.

It was the first full ICBM test by nuclear-armed North Korea since 2017, and flight data indicated the missile flew higher and longer than any of North Korea's previous tests before crashing into the sea west of Japan. 

Dubbed the Hwasong-17, the ICBM is the largest liquid-fueled missile ever launched by any country from a road-mobile launcher, analysts said.

Kim ordered the test because of the "daily-escalating military tension in and around the Korean peninsula" and the "inevitability of the long-standing confrontation with the US imperialists accompanied by the danger of a nuclear war," state news agency KCNA reported.

"The strategic forces of the DPRK are fully ready to thoroughly curb and contain any dangerous military attempts of the US imperialists," Kim said while personally overseeing the launch, according to KCNA. DPRK are the initials of North Korea's official name.

"The emergence of the new strategic weapon of the DPRK would make the whole world clearly aware of the power of our strategic armed forces once again," Kim said, adding that the test would help convince the world of the modern features of the country's strategic forces.

"Any forces should be made to be well aware of the fact that they will have to pay a very dear price before daring to attempt to infringe upon the security of our country," he said, according to KCNA.

Kim said North Korea was preparing for long confrontation with US imperialism and was steadfast in its determination to further strengthen its nuclear deterrent, North Korean media said.

North Korea's return to major weapons tests capable of potentially striking the United States poses a direct challenge to US President Joe Biden as he responds to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and raises the prospect of a new crisis as South Korea elected an incoming conservative administration.

The launch drew condemnation from leaders in the United States, Japan, and South Korea.

But responding to North Korea's first ICBM launch since 2017 through the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) will be far more difficult now than it was then.

World powers on the council are currently at odds over the Ukraine war, making the kind of sanctions that were imposed on North Korea by the UNSC after the 2017 test a far more complicated process.

The United States, Britain, France, Ireland, Albania and Norway have asked for the United Nations Security Council to hold a public meeting on Friday to discuss North Korea's latest ballistic missile launch, diplomats said.

New missile

Photos released by state media showed a massive missile, painted black with a white nosecone, rising on a column of flame from a launch vehicle.

The Hwasong-17 flew for 1,090 km (681 miles) to a maximum altitude of 6,248.5 km (3,905 miles) and precisely hit a target in the sea, KCNA reported. Those numbers are similar to data reported by Japan and South Korea.

KCNA called the successful test a "striking demonstration of great military muscle," while Kim said it was a "miraculous" and "priceless" victory by the Korean people.

North Korea first unveiled the previously unseen ICBM at an unprecedented pre-dawn military parade in October 2020, with analysts noting it appeared "considerably larger" than North Korea's last new ICBM, the Hwasong-15, which was test fired in November 2017.

It was displayed a second time at a defense exhibition in Pyongyang in October 2021.

Officials in Seoul and Washington have previously said launches on Feb. 27 and March 5 involved parts of the Hwasong-17 ICBM system, likely in preparation for eventually conducting a full test like the one on Thursday. -- Reuters