SHOW OF AIR FORCE
US display after Kim test launch
The United States sent two B-1 bombers over the Korean peninsula and conducted a test of a missiledefense system in Alaska in a show of force against North Korea’s recent launch of an intercontinental ballistic rocket.
“North Korea remains the most urgent threat to regional stability,” Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy, the commander of the Pacific Air Forces, said in a statement on Sunday.
“If called upon, we are ready to respond with rapid, lethal, and overwhelming force at a time and place of our choosing.”
The two supersonic bombers were escorted by four South Korean F-15 fighter jets as they flew over an air base near Seoul before returning to Andersen Air Force Base in Guam, according to the Pacific Air Forces.
The US Missile Defense Agency on Saturday tested the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense System, which successfully “detected, tracked and intercepted” a ballistic missile that had been launched from the Pacific.
The test of the system will help the United States “to stay ahead of the evolving threat,” the agency’s director, Lt. Gen. Sam Greaves, said Sunday.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said that his country’s launch on Friday into the Sea of Japan “basically put all of the United States within range,” according to state-run media.
Experts have said the missile could have reached Chicago — and even New York.
North Korea’s test follows the launch of an ICBM on July 4 that had enough range to strike Alaska.
President Trump expressed his frustration with China, which he has asked to use its economic influence to persuade Kim to curb his weapons-development program.
“I am very disappointed in China,” he tweeted on Saturday. “They do NOTHING for us with North Korea, just talk. We will no longer allow this to continue. China could easily solve this problem!”
Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the United Nations, echoed the president in a tweet on Sunday.
“Done talking about NKorea. China is aware they must act. Japan & SKorea must inc pressure. Not only a US problem. It will req an intl solution,” Haley wrote.