North Korea’s Newest Missile Test | God's World News

North Korea’s Newest Missile Test

10/04/2022
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    Elementary school students find shelter near a building on their way to school soon after a report of North Korea’s missile launch, in northern Japan on Tuesday, October 4, 2022. (Toonippo/Kyodo News via AP)

North Korea conducted its longest-ever weapons test on Tuesday. The nuclear-capable missile, which flew over Japan, forced the Japanese government to issue evacuation alerts and halt trains. The launch was the communist country’s most provocative weapons demonstration this year. North Korea’s goal seems to be gaining a reprieve of sanctions from the United States and its allies.

North Korea has test-fired about 40 missiles over about 20 different launch events this year.

Tuesday’s launch is the fifth round of weapons tests by North Korea in the past 10 days. The testing spree seems to be a response to two sets of military drills—one between Washington and Seoul and the other involving Washington, Seoul, and Tokyo—off the Korean Peninsula’s coast last week.

The United States strongly condemned North Korea’s “dangerous and reckless decision” to launch what it describes as a “long-range ballistic missile” over Japan.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida calls the launch “a reckless act and I strongly condemn it.”

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol says North Korea’s “nuclear provocations” will meet a stern response from the South and the broader international community.

Japanese authorities alerted residents in its northeastern regions to evacuate to shelters, in the first “J-alert” (the country’s instant warning system) since 2017. That year, North Korea fired an intermediate-range Hwasong-12 missile twice over Japan in a span of weeks during previous weapons tests.

According to estimates, the North Korean missile traveled about 2,800 miles, landing about 1,990 miles off the northern Japanese coast. There were no reports of damage to Japanese aircraft or ships.

The flight distance shows the NK missile has enough range to hit Guam, home to U.S. military bases.

The U.S. and South Korean militaries both responded to the test by launching fighter jets of their own.

Earlier in the day, four U.S. F-16 fighter jets and four South Korean F-15s conducted a joint strike drill in which a South Korean plane fired two precision-guided bombs into an island target. The exercise demonstrated the allies’ ability to accurately strike North Korean targets with “overwhelming force,” says the South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Some foreign experts say North Korea needs to master only a few remaining technologies to acquire functioning nuclear-armed missiles. Each test pushes the country closer to being able to reach the U.S. mainland and its allies.

Some experts say North Korean leader Kim Jong-un will eventually return to diplomatic talks. They believe he’ll use his enlarged weapons stash to pressure Washington to accept his country as a nuclear state. Kim seems to see U.S. acceptance as necessary to win the lifting of international sanctions and other concessions.

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? — Romans 8:31

(Elementary school students find shelter near a building on their way to school soon after a report of North Korea’s missile launch, in northern Japan on Tuesday, October 4, 2022. Toonippo/Kyodo News via AP)