Fox-
North Korea has fired what is believed to be a submarine-launched ballistic missile off the east coast of the Korean peninsula, the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff said Saturday.
The missile was fired at 6:30 p.m. local time (5:30 a.m. ET), South Korean officials said, and appears to have flown for about 30 km (about 19 miles) — well short of the 300 km (roughly 186 miles) that would be considered a successful test.
One U.S. official said Saturday the launch “was provocative but not a threat to the U.S. and the missile was fired away from South Korea and Japan.” But another U.S. official noted that after previous launch attempts by Pyongyang that didn’t appear to be successful, this one seems to have gone much better.
“North Korea’s sub launch capability has gone from a joke to something very serious,” this official said. “The U.S. is watching this very closely.”
Launching a missile from a submarine has always been a military priority for North Korea, CNN’s Barbara Starr reports, and if this test was successful, it would be a military victory for Pyongyang.
But such a launch is in violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions, the U.S. State Department said.
“We have seen the reports that North Korea launched what appeared to be a ballistic missile from a submarine in the Sea of Japan,” State Department spokesman John Kirby said in a statement. “Launches using ballistic missile technology are a clear violation of multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions.”
Will be interesting to see if the Clinton’s sold the technology to North Korea or the Obama’s gave it to them.
Russians sold the NoKos a Golf-class missile sub for “scrap” as well as the SS-N-6 SLBMs used by the Golfs. The NoKos have been reverse engineering the equipment for 20 years.
I’m sure Jaws Kerry will send L’il Jung a strongly worded letter of disapproval.
Hmm. . . North Koreans . . . would it be? (could it be?) a YELLOW SUBMARINE?
The big question is “Did North Korea end the day with as many submarines as it started with?”
Maybe they, instead of us, should name THEIR fleet after leftist American democrat traitors.
A thank you note is due Bubba Clinton and Peanut Carter!
I hear they honored the captain of the vessel with a one-gun mortar salute–his head was ground zero.