South Korea launches missile drill after North’s nuclear test
South Korean soldiers ride on a military truck in the border county of Hwacheon on September 4, 2017. The South Korean military said on September 4, it conducted a ballistic missile exercise of a simulated attack on the North’s nuclear test site, in response to Pyongyang’s sixth nuclear test a day earlier. / AFP PHOTO / YONHAP / STR
South Korea’s military launched a volley of ballistic missiles simulating an attack on the North’s nuclear test site Monday, Seoul said, in an exercise responding to a test of what Pyongyang says was a hydrogen bomb.
Pictures showed South Korean short-range Hyunmoo ballistic missiles roaring into the sky in the pale light of dawn from a launch site on the country’s east coast.
Authorities released video showing South Korean F-15K fighter jets firing air-to-ground missiles.
The weapons accurately hit their targets in the East Sea — the Korean name for the Sea of Japan — the South’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement.
The exercise “was carried out as a strong warning” to the North for conducting its sixth nuclear test, it added.
Article continues after this advertisementThe range to the simulated targets was equivalent to the distance to the North’s Punggye-ri nuclear test site, where Sunday’s test was conducted, it said.
Article continues after this advertisementNorth Korea on Sunday triggered global alarm with by far its most powerful atomic test to date, claiming it was a hydrogen bomb that could be mounted onto a long-range missile.
Following the test, South Korean President Moon Jae-In called for the “strongest punishment” while top military officers in Seoul and Washington vowed a joint “military counteraction” at the earliest date.
In a series of tweets posted hours after Sunday’s test, US President Donald Trump denounced the North but also criticised Seoul.
South Korea, Trump said, “is finding, as I have told them, that their talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work, they only understand one thing!”
The United States warned it could launch a “massive military response” to threats from North Korea.
