North Korea today pledged a “sustained, vigorous and overwhelming” military response to joint military exercises between the United States and South Korea. The warning, in a report by North Korea’s state news agency KCNA, comes after a record string of North Korean missile launches this week in response to joint air exercises by the two countries.
In a statement, the general staff of the Korean People’s Army said it would “continue to respond” to all anti-North Korean warfare exercises “by the enemy with persistent, determined and overwhelming practical military measures,” KCNA reported.
The North’s recent ballistic missile tests are a “clear response” to joint exercises between the US and South Korea, the statement said. “The longer the enemy’s military provocations continue, the more thoroughly and ruthlessly the Korean People’s Army will fight them,” the statement warns.
North Korea launched dozens of missiles into the sea, including an intercontinental ballistic missile that triggered evacuation warnings in northern Japan, and piloted combat aircraft on its territory.
These military actions were described by the country’s authorities as the correct response to a combination of air exercises between the United States and South Korea, which they called a display of “military confrontation hysteria” by the US.
As part of those exercises, the United States flew two B-1B supersonic bombers over South Korea in the final days of the joint exercises, in a display of force intended to intimidate North Korea over its test-intensive activity.
North Korean senior military officer Pak Jong Chon has expressed a thinly veiled threat of nuclear conflict with the United States and South Korea over their joint exercises, which the North says are rehearsals for a possible invasion.
Source: DN
