Donald Trump has vowed to “take care of it” after North Korea claimed to have successfully tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile that it said was capable of striking any target in the United States.
According to The Telegraph, the US President was briefed while the missile was in the air, the White House said, and later declared: “It is a situation that we will handle.”
The announcement of the new “Hwasong-15” missile, made in a special broadcast at noon local time on Wednesday, came hours after a long-range missile was fired into waters off Japan in what was believed to be its longest-range test yet.
Kim Jong-un’s rogue regime launched the missile, its first for more than two months, in the middle of the night and it flew for around 590 miles, reaching an altitude of 2,781 miles – more than 10 times the height of the international space station – and splashing down 53 minutes later in the Sea of Japan.
The missile ended up within Japan’s exclusive economic zone, which extends 200 nautical miles from its coast. The dictator later declared that his country had achieved full nuclear statehood.
North Korea had carried out two tests of an intercontinental ballistic missile in July, both of which were Hwasong-14 missiles. The revelation of the new missile came as a surprise to experts.
“The ICBM Hwasong-15 type weaponry system is an intercontinental ballistic rocket tipped with super-large heavy warhead which is capable of striking the whole mainland of the US,” KCNA said.
It said the development of the weapon would defend the North against the “US imperialists’ nuclear blackmail policy and nuclear threat”.
“Kim Jong Un declared with pride that now we have finally realised the great historic cause of completing the state nuclear force, the cause of building a rocket power,” state media KCNA reported.
In response to the test, Donald Trump, the US president, said: “It is a situation that we will handle. We will take care of it.”
The missile reached a greater altitude than any North Korea has previously tested, James Mattis, the US defence secretary, said.
“It went higher frankly than any previous shot they’ve taken, a research and development effort on their part to continue building ballistic missiles that can threaten everywhere in the world, basically,” he told reporters at the White House.
Many nuclear experts say the North has yet to prove it has mastered all technical hurdles including the ability deliver a nuclear warhead reliably atop an ICBM, but likely soon will.
“We don’t have to like it, but we’re going to have to learn to live with North Korea’s ability to target the United States with nuclear weapons,” said Jeffrey Lewis, head of the East Asia Nonproliferation Programme at the Middlebury Institute of Strategic Studies.
South Korea responded by almost immediately launching three of its own missiles in a show of force. President Moon Jae-in expressed worry that North Korea’s growing missile threat could force the United States to attack the North before it masters a nuclear-tipped long-range missile, something experts say may be imminent.
“If North Korea completes a ballistic missile that could reach from one continent to another, the situation can spiral out of control,” Mr Moon said at an emergency meeting in Seoul, according to his office.
“We must stop a situation where North Korea miscalculates and threatens us with nuclear weapons or where the United States considers a pre-emptive strike.”
Mr Trump spoke to Sinzo Abe, the Japanese prime minister, after the test. The two leaders agreed that China needed to play an increased role to tackle the crisis.
In a phone call the leaders “agreed to strengthen our deterrence capability against the North Korean threat,” said Yasutoshi Nishimura, Japan’s deputy chief cabinet secretary.
Mr Abe described the launch as a “violent act” that “can never be tolerated”, while Moon Jae-in, the South Korean president, said the test was a “serious threat” to global peace.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged Pyongyang to “desist taking any further destabilising steps.”
Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary called on North Korea to “change course”.
“This is not the path to security and prosperity for the North Korean people. DPRK regime must change course,” Mr Johnson said.
The UN Security Council has scheduled an emergency meeting for Wednesday to discuss the provocation.
Japanese Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said it was judged to be ICBM class given its lofted trajectory.
“If these numbers are correct, then if flown on a standard trajectory rather than this lofted trajectory, this missile would have a range of more than 13,000 km (8,100 miles) … Such a missile would have more than enough range to reach Washington, D.C., and in fact any part of the continental United States,” the US-based Union of Concerned Scientists said.
However, it was unclear how heavy a payload the missile was carrying, and it was uncertain if it could carry a large nuclear warhead that far, the nonprofit science advocacy group added.
The test came just days after Mr Trump added North Korea to America’s list of state sponsors of terror and unveiled new sanctions targeting its shipping, moves Pyongyang had called a “serious provocation and violent infringement”.
It came weeks after Mr Trump returned from a tour of Asia where he sought to rally support for clamping down on North Korea’s economy.
Hours before the launch, officials in Hawaii said wailing sirens last heard more than 20 years ago would sound for 60 seconds at more than 400 locations on the first working day of each month, starting in December.
In the event of a real attack, the sirens would give Hawaiians 12 to 15 minutes of warning before impact. Richard Rapoza, Hawaii’s emergency management spokesman, said: “We stopped using them in the mid-Nineties after the Cold War ended.”
The new siren tests were to be accompanied by public service announcements urging residents to “get inside, stay inside and stay tuned”.
Announcing the tests, Mr Rapoza said a single 150-kiloton weapon detonated over Pearl Harbor, on the main island of Oahu, would be expected to kill 18,000 people and injure 120,000.
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