Images of 16 missile bases suggest N. Korean deception
Experts believe Kim is advancing nuclear weapons at hidden sites
WASHINGTON — North Korea is moving ahead with its ballistic missile program at 16 hidden bases that have been identified in new commercial satellite images, a network long known to U.S. intelligence agencies but left undiscussed as President Donald Trump claims to have neutralized the North’s nuclear threat.
The satellite images suggest the North has been engaged in a great deception: It has offered to dismantle a major launching site — a step it began, then halted — while continuing to make improvements at more than a dozen others that would bolster launches of conventional and nuclear warheads.
The existence of the ballistic missile bases, which North Korea has never acknowledged, contradicts Trump’s assertion that his landmark diplomacy is leading to the elimination of a nuclear and missile program the North had warned could devastate the United States.
“We are in no rush,” Trump said of talks with the North at a news conference Wednesday, after Republicans lost control of the House. “The sanctions are on. The missiles have stopped. The rockets have stopped. The hostages are home.”
His statement was true in one sense. Trump appeared to be referring to the halt of missile flight tests, which have not occurred in nearly a year. But U.S. intelligence officials say the North’s production of nuclear material, of new nuclear weapons and of missiles that can be placed on mobile launchers and hidden in mountains at the secret bases has continued.
Sanctions ineffective
And the sanctions are collapsing, in part because North Korea has leveraged its new, softer-sounding relationship with Washington, and its stated commitment to eventual denuclearization, to resume trade with Russia and China.
Moreover, a U.S. program to track those mobile missiles with a new generation of small, inexpensive satellites, disclosed by the New York Times more than a year ago, is stalled. The Pentagon once hoped to have the first satellites over North Korea by now, giving it early warning if the mobile missiles are rolled out of mountain tunnels and prepared for launch.
But because of a series of budget and bureaucratic disputes, the early-warning system, begun by the Obama administration and handed off to the Trump administration, has yet to go into operation. Current and former officials, who said they could not publicly discuss the program because it is heavily classified, said there was hope of launching the satellites, but they offered no timeline.
The secret ballistic missile bases were identified in a detailed study to be published Monday by the Beyond Parallel program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a major think tank in Washington.
The program, which focuses on the prospects of North-South integration, is led by Victor Cha, a prominent North Korea expert whom the Trump administration considered appointing as the ambassador to South Korea last year. His name was pulled back when he objected to the White House strategy for dealing with Kim Jong Un, the North Korean leader.
40 to 60 warheads
A State Department spokesman responded to the findings with a written statement suggesting the government believed the sites must be dismantled: “President Trump has made clear that should Chairman Kim follow through on his commitments, including complete denuclearization and the elimination of ballistic missile programs, a much brighter future lies ahead for North Korea and its people.”
A spokesman for the CIA declined to comment.
The North Korea experts who have examined the images believe the North’s motivations are fairly easy to interpret.
“It looks like they’re trying to maximize their capabilities,” Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., a co-author of the report and a veteran analyst of satellite images of North Korea, said in an interview. “Any missile at these bases can take a nuclear warhead.”
Weapons experts, as well as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, say North Korea, despite engaging in denuclearization talks, continues to produce the fissile material that fuels nuclear arms. The North is believed to have about 40 to 60 nuclear warheads.
If tensions rose, the report says, the missiles would be transported from the base to prearranged launching sites — often no more than a wide spot in a road. The mobile launchers can move quickly — they can be ready to fire in under an hour — which is why the United States has been trying to get the small satellites into the sky for early warning. The satellites have a special kind of sensor using “synthetic aperture radar” that cuts through clouds.
The current, multibilliondollar constellation of large satellites that keep an eye on North Korea is often out of position, and officials say the country’s ballistic missile sites are under surveillance less than 30 percent of the time. (The exact figure is classified.)