North Korea Conducts Ground-to-Sea Missile Test under Kim Jong Un’s Directive

North Korea’s Kim Jong Un has reportedly supervised a test-fire of the ground-to-sea missile Pukguksong-6, according to the Rodong Sinmun on the 15th.

“The launched missiles flew in the East Sea airspace for about 23 minutes and 20 seconds and accurately hit the target ship,” the newspaper reported.

“General Secretary Kim expressed great satisfaction with the test fire results and made important conclusions on the reorganization plan of the coastal missile battalion of the East Sea Fleet and the West Sea Fleet,” the newspaper added.

It continued, “He proposed ways to deploy ground-to-sea missile capabilities forward and strengthen them to the maximum to reliably defend maritime borders and thoroughly suppress and crush adventurous attempts by the enemy navy.”

Kim Jong Un asserted, “The South Korean traitors are seriously infringing on our sovereignty by violating our waters with various warships under the pretext of controlling fishing boats and maritime patrols without any international legal basis or legitimate justification and insisting on the Northern Limit Line, which is a ghost line.”

He emphasized, “Now is the time we should thoroughly protect our maritime sovereignty, not with some legal expressions or statements but with the actual use of force and actions.”

“He issued an important directive to strengthen the military readiness in the northern border waters of Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeong islands, where the enemy frequently invades with destroyers and escort ships,” the newspaper reported.

“It’s not important how many lines exist in the West Sea,” Kim said. “There’s no need to dispute, but it’s clear that if the enemy violates the maritime border line we recognize, we will regard it as an infringement of our sovereignty and a provocation of force.”

He also proposed a “military task that arises from faithfully defending the country’s coastline and maritime border,” stating that “the position and will of the military to defend the sovereignty and safety of the state with strong military power and to exercise the right of self-defense legally and confidently is firm and unwavering.”

On this day, Kim’s supervisor was accompanied by Pak Jong Chon, Jo Chun Ryong, the party secretary; Kim Jung Sik, the party’s deputy head; Jang Chang Ha, the head of the missile bureau (Army General); Kim Myung Sik, the commander of the navy, Park Kwang Seop, the commander of the East Sea Fleet (Navy Lieutenant General), Bang Seong Hwan, the commander of the West Sea Fleet, Kim Young Sun, the deputy commander of the navy, and the missile chief of the East Sea Fleet and the West Sea Fleet Command.

Earlier, the Joint Chiefs of Staff announced that North Korea launched several unidentified cruise missiles from the northeast of Wonsan around 9 a.m. on the 14th.

Meanwhile, the newspaper reported in a separate article that Kim supervised an important military factory on site.

On this day, Pak Jong Chon and Jo Chun Ryong, the party secretary, accompanied the on-site supervisor. Go Byung Hyun, the second chairman of the Economic Committee, and the factory’s workers in charge (executives) greeted him on site.

“General Secretary Kim highly praised the factory as a key vanguard factory in the military industry sector for innovatively transforming the factory’s appearance, drastically improving the modernization level of the production process, and vigorously pushing for the production capacity creation project,” the newspaper reported.

He further emphasized the importance of improving the quality of military supplies and decisively increasing production in line with the situation created and the demands of revolutionary development.

“He also suggested directions to start important new plan projects in the second economic committee and to push for modernization projects and expand production capacity consistently in important core factories, including this one,” the newspaper reported.

The newspaper stated that the factory has excellently completed the buildings’ renovation and modernization project and realized the modernization of the production process at a high level.