North Korea defiantly launches missile test
Launch, though failed, shows Kim’s defiance after U.N. meeting
North Korea fires a ballistic missile that exploded within seconds, just hours after Secretary of State Rex Tillerson demanded “new pressure” and further sanctions against Pyongyang at a U.N. Security Council meeting.
TOKYO — North Korea fired another ballistic missile early Saturday morning but it exploded within seconds of being launched, American and South Korean defense officials said.
Coinciding with renewed diplomatic and military pressure on North Korea from the Trump administration, this latest launch underscores both Kim Jong Un’s determination to make technical progress on his weapons programs and his defiance amid international pressure.
President Donald Trump, who was briefed on the launch soon afterward, took to Twitter to reiterate his expectation that Chinese President Xi Jinping use his leverage to make Kim stop.
“North Korea disrespected the wishes of China & its highly respected President when it launched, though unsuccessfully, a missile today. Bad!” he tweeted.
Trump has repeatedly called on China, North Korea’s neighbor and largest trading partner, to punish the regime in Pyongyang, and has warned Xi that if he doesn’t act, the United States will.
The timing of the North’s test was striking: Only hours earlier the U.N. Security Council held a ministerial meeting on Pyongyang’s escalating weapons program. North Korean officials boycotted the meeting, which was chaired by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
Tillerson called for new economic sanctions on North Korea and other “painful” measures over its nuclear weapons program.
“Failing to act now on the most pressing security issue in the world may bring catastrophic consequences,” Tillerson said. “The more we bide our time, the sooner we will run out of it.”
All options on the table
American and South Korean defense officials said the missile, likely a medium-range KN-17 Scud-type missile, appeared to have exploded soon after being launched.
“The missile did not leave North Korean territory,” U.S. Pacific Command spokesman Dave Benham said in a statement.
But analysts said not to be consoled.
“This test may have failed, but Kim Jong Un’s overall missile test record is 58 successful flight tests and 17 failures,” said Shea Cotton
of the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation, who compiled the Nuclear Threat Initiative database. It was Kim’s 75th missile test since becoming leader of North Korea at the end of 2011.
Stepping back from suggestions of U.S. military action, Tillerson even offered aid to North Korea if it ends its nuclear weapons program.
Tillerson said all options “must remain the table.”
His ideas included a ban on North Korean coal imports and preventing its overseas guest laborers, a critical source of government revenue, from sending money home. And he warned of unilateral U.S. moves against international firms conducting banned businesses with Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile programs, which could ensnare banks in China, the North’s primary trade partner.
The range of Tillerson’s suggestions reflected America’s failure to halt North Korea’s nuclear advances despite decades of U.S.led sanctions, military threats and stop-and-go rounds of diplomatic engagement. As the North approaches the capability to hit the U.S. mainland with a nucleartipped missile, the Trump administration believes it is running out of time.
Steep learning curve
Ralph Cossa, president of the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Pacific Forum, said the Trump administration appeared to be struggling to figure out how to deal with North Korea.
“When it comes to foreign policy, and Korea policy in particular, the Trump administration has had a pretty steep learning curve, and it has been a lot more curves than learning,” Cossa said.
A U.S. Navy strike group, led by the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, will be in the waters around the Korean Peninsula this weekend, and one of the Navy’s largest submarines has been in port in South Korea this week.