South Korean Military Claims That North Korea’s Missile Launches Are for Developmental Testing Purposes

North Korea is conducting tests of a large-scale combat cruise missile and a new anti-aircraft missile in the West Sea on the 2nd. Korean Central News Agency · Yonhap News

On the 5th, the military authorities stated about North Korea launching a cruise missile four times this year, “We believe it is for performance testing for the development of new weapons.”

Lee Sung-jun, Head of the Public Affairs Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, answered this way when asked about the background of North Korea’s concentrated test launch of cruise missiles in a short time at the Ministry of National Defense’s regular press briefing on the day.

In response to a question about whether North Korea has often launched cruise missiles like this time in the past, the head of the office Lee said, “I understand that there is no such case.”

He added, “Ballistic missiles and cruise missiles have different uses and purposes, so more analysis is needed on their purposes and intentions.”

North Korea fired several new strategic cruise missiles “Bulhwasal-3-31” from near Pyongyang to the West Sea on the 24th of last month, followed by two ‘Bulhwasal-3-31’ from the sea near Sinpo, Hamgyongnam-do on the 28th. On the 30th of the same month, it also launched the existing strategic cruise missile “Hwasal-2 type” into the West Sea, and on the 2nd of this month, it also launched several cruise missiles into the West Sea.