North Korea claims it has tested its first intercontinental ballistic missile. Though there is some skepticism, the announcement signals the belligerent nation is not about to back down.
Six months ago, North Korea’s dynastic young leader, Kim Jong Un, announced in clear terms his nation’s resolve to develop a ballistic missile capable of reaching the continental United States.
Such an accomplishment would surely shift the power dynamic in northeast Asia — and help cement the regime’s long-sought status as a nuclear state.
It appears Kim Jong Un may have gotten his wish.
North Korea announced Tuesday that it had, at long last, test launched an intercontinental ballistic missile — a “glistening miracle, ” as state news described it. The news means an already intractable problem posed by the regime’s advancing nuclear and missile programs just got more difficult for the United States and its regional allies.
“It’s really, really significant from a technological and political standpoint, ” said Melissa Hanham, a senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in California, who studies the regime’s missile program.
American and South Korean officials, while confirming the event and expressing concern, said in their initial assessments that the missile appeared to be somewhat less capable than North Korea announced.
Yet the questions about North Korea’s claim appeared to be about the performance and range of the missile—not the fact that Pyongyang had significantly improved its capability. By any measure, the missile appeared to be the longest-range device North Korea has tested.
The apparently successful test wasn’ t a surprise for security analysts and military officials like Hanham, who were watching in the fall when North Korea suffered two mysterious and explosive missile failures at the same launch facility.
North Korea has also recently released images from rocket engine tests and displayed what appeared to be several intercontinental ballistic missiles at a massive military parade in Pyongyang this spring. The regime has accelerated the pace of its missile testing program in recent years under Kim Jong Un, a grandson of Kim Il Sung, the nation’s communist patriarch.
But the new capability — a clear violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions — seems to have crossed a psychological threshold. It already has led to widespread alarm that other, shorter-range ballistic missile tests this year haven’ t provoked.
“Politically, it’s a game changer, ” said Go Myong-hyun, a research fellow at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul.
Tuesday’s test, conducted at about 9: 40 a.m. from Banghyon airfield near the northwestern town of Kusong, was the regime’s 12th and most significant launch this year.
North Korean media released images of a smiling Kim Jong Un, who reportedly watched the test nearby on a panel of computer monitors. Other images showed the leader surrounded by celebrating military commanders.
The device, which North Korea called the Hwasong 14, flew on a lofted trajectory more than 1,700 miles into the atmosphere — farther than the International Space Station — for around 40 minutes. It landed more than 500 miles east, in the Sea of Japan, which Koreans call the East Sea.
In theory, the missile’s range could have allowed it to reach Alaska on a flatter trajectory, though such a flight path would have introduced other technical complexities and physical hurdles for the regime’s scientists.
Still, it’s a significant accomplishment for the regime. “When I heard it was a 40-minute flight, ” Hanham said, “my stomach just dropped.”
Newly elected South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who recently discussed North Korea at a summit meeting with President Trump in Washington, convened an emergency security meeting. He also called on the international community to “take action.”
But for South Korea and the United States, which has 28,000 troops on the Korean peninsula, a list of bad options for slowing or stopping North Korea now appear even more limited.
The regime’s nuclear and missile programs have perplexed the last three American presidents. They have tried negotiation, economic aid, international sanctions, diplomatic pressure and even covert action.
The strategies have failed. Experts now believe North Korea is an established nuclear state with more than a dozen devices. A key question had been whether the regime could deliver its weapons globally.
Experts believe North Korea needs more time to miniaturize its warheads so they can be launched on missiles. And scientists there still would need to figure out how to get the warheads to safely and accurately reenter the atmosphere en route to a target.
Still, the aim of long-range delivery now appears within sight, despite Trump’s pre-inauguration tweet, in January, vowing “It won’ t happen!”
The Trump administration has announced a new policy of imposing “maximum pressure” on North Korea, calling for sanctions but also dialogue if the regime ends its program. The administration has left open the possibility of a military strike, but that could prove catastrophic.
North Korea, for example, could retaliate with its masses of conventional weapons, such as artillery, along the border that is roughly 40 miles from Seoul, a metropolitan area of more than 20 million residents.
Some believe the United States and other countries that have concerns about North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs should negotiate a freeze on testing, and perhaps a return of international inspectors to North Korean laboratories.
With all the focus on missiles lately, it’s easy to forget that the North could perform its sixth underground nuclear detonation test any day — another provocation that would further increase the sense of crisis in the region, said John Delury, a North Korea expert at Yonsei University in Seoul.
“There are some diplomatic options — they’ re not great — but they’re probably what we should do, ” he said.
Trump had hoped that China — North Korea’s only significant trading partner — would help solve the problem. But in recent weeks his administration has grown frustrated with what it claims is a lack of pressure by Beijing on the regime, concerns Trump reportedly expressed in a phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week.
“Perhaps China will put a heavy move on North Korea and end this nonsense once and for all!” Trump tweeted after the launch.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang insisted China has already made “relentless efforts” to stem North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. And he repeated China’s usual refrain, calling for a stop to actions that violate United Nations resolutions but emphasizing a need for calm and restraint.
Some question whether there’s much more that can be done by China, which also fears that a regime change in Pyongyang could lead to a North Korean refugee crisis or even a unified Korea which counts the United States as an ally.
“Even if you cancel most of the trade between China and North Korea, I think Kim Jong Un would still be determined to do these nuclear activities, ” said Shi Yinhong, an international relations professor at Renmin University in Beijing. “I think the problem from China’s perspective is quite serious. And the issue is that China still can’ t find a way out of this predicament.”
China announced in February that it would ban North Korean coal imports for the rest of 2017, in line with existing United Nations sanctions. Yet visitors to the China-North Korea border have witnessed coal trucks crossing, casting doubt on the ban’s efficacy, and China’s trade with North Korea grew nearly 40% in the first quarter of the year, according to Chinese official figures.
North Korea announced Tuesday’s launch on state television, using a familiar news anchor seen in other major announcements — a middle-aged woman in a pink hanbok, the traditional Korean dress.
“The success of the last stage of becoming a nuclear power state is developing an intercontinental ballistic missile, ” she read in a booming cadence familiar to North Korea watchers.
Her report added that the test shows the “unwithering power of our state, our strong independence and defense in the world, and will be marked as a significant mark in our history.”
The announcement came after a nearly 30-minute montage featuring soaring socialist songs and patriotic imagery, including panoramas of the Pyongyang skyline and Mount Paektu, a volcano included in the country’s national emblem.
The montage also briefly included a soaring missile — a device that perhaps has now given North Korea an advantage it might retain for some time.
“At this point, it’s no longer about denuclearizing the Korean peninsula, ” Hanham said. “Now it’s just about containing North Korea as best we can.”
Stiles, a special correspondent, reported from Seoul. Kaiman reported from Beijing. Jessica Meyers, a special correspondent, contributed reporting from Beijing.
jonathan.kaiman@latimes.com
For more news from Asia, follow @JRKaiman on Twitter

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If true, the test is a potential milestone in North Korea’s campaign to develop a nuclear-tipped weapon capable of hitting the mainland United States.
BEIJING – North Korea on Tuesday claimed it had successfully tested an intercontinental ballistic missile, a potential milestone in its campaign to develop a nuclear-tipped weapon capable of hitting the mainland United States.
In a special announcement on state television, North Korea said it launched a Hwasong-14 missile that flew about 579 miles, reaching an altitude of 1,741 miles.
South Korean and Japanese authorities are now looking into whether it was indeed an ICBM; U. S. Pacific Command’s first statement on the test called it an intermediate range missile.
Tuesday’s news will no doubt renew questions about the development of weapons that President Donald Trump, as president-elect, vowed to stop. It also looks set to put North Korea back at the top of the president’s agenda, most immediately at Group of 20 meetings in Germany this week.
As news of the test broke, but before North Korea claimed it was an ICBM, Trump took to Twitter, calling out North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and appearing to once again urge China to do more to pressure him.
“North Korea has just launched another missile. Does this guy have anything better to do with his life?” Trump wrote.
“Hard to believe that South Korea and Japan will put up with this much longer, ” he continued. “Perhaps China will put a heavy move on North Korea and end this nonsense once and for all.”
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe appeared to share Trump’s frustration, if not his tone. In remarks to the press, he vowed to work closely with the United States and South Korea, but called on China and Russia to do more.
“I’d like to strongly urge international society’s cooperation on the North Korea issue and urge China’s chairman, Xi Jinping, and Russia’s President Putin to take more constructive measures.”
In a daily press conference, Geng Shuang, a spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry, condemned the test but countered that Beijing had “spared no effort” in its fight.
Analysts are still looking for clues about the missile and parsing what those clues might mean, both in terms of North Korea’s capability and the international community’s response.
The launch was made from a site in North Korea’s Phyongan province and the missile flew more than 500 miles before landing in waters off Japan’s coast, U. S., South Korean and Japanese officials said.
U. S. Pacific Command said the missile was in the air for 37 minutes. As with other recent launches, the missile appears to have been fired at a very steep trajectory in an effort to avoid flying over neighbors like Japan.
Using those number, David Wright, a physicist at the Union of Concerned Scientists, calculated that the missile could have traveled more than 4000 miles if it was fired at a normal-that is, less steep-trajectory. That means this type of missile could potentially fly as far as Alaska, he said.
Melissa Hanham, a North Korea expert at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, called Tuesday’s test a “huge milestone” for North Korea. Still, she stressed, is only a theoretical possibility-for now.
Hanham said North Korea is not known to have tested components necessary for such a hit, but may do so in the future. The point is that they are moving quickly. “Is this particular ICBM going to hit (Washington) D. C.? No. But are they working toward it? Yes, ” she said.
The launch comes after a string of recent moves, including a salvo of missiles last month and three tests in May alone. Kim has now launched more missiles in one year than his father did in 17 years in power.
The North’s ICBM claim adds a new complication to the relationship between the United States and China under Trump.
Since taking office, Trump has made North Korea’s weapons program a priority, focusing his efforts – and tweets – on getting China to pressure North Korea to back down, in part by choking of the regime’s access to resources.
In recent weeks, there have been signs that he is frustrated with China’s progress. On June 21, Trump tweeted that, although he appreciated Beijing’s efforts, “it has not worked out.”
China insists it is doing all it can and seems angry about being singled out.
“The United States itself should take actions, not always depend on China for everything, ” said Zhang Liangui, a retired professor from Communist Party’s Central Party School.
Beijing last week condemned U. S. sanctions that target Chinese business, warning of consequences to U. S.-China ties. They maintain the issue should be handled by the United Nations, not the United States.
It is not yet clear how the latest news will shape this diplomatic impasse. John Delury, an Asia expert at Seoul’s Yonsei University, said there maybe a political imperative for Trump to downplay the significance of the test.
Trump “set an implicit red line, ” Delury said, “and it doesn’t look good if the North Koreans skipped across the line when he wasn’t looking, especially after a tweet that played it down.”
Kim, meanwhile, will want to play up the test to bolster his domestic credibility and send a signal to the United States, South Korea and Japan.
Unsurprisingly, in North Korean, the launch was indeed hailed as a historic triumph.
“The success in the test-fire of intercontinental ballistic rocket Hwasong-14 is a powerful manifestation of the invincible state might and the tremendous capability of the self-reliant national defense industry of the DPRK, ” read one North Korean account, according to Chinese state media.
“It is also a great auspicious event to be specially recorded in the history of the DPRK.”
—
Shirley Feng and Yang Liu reported from Beijing.

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