A photo released by North Korean news agency KCNA shows what is billed as a hypersonic missile launch on January 6, 2025 from an unspecified location (KCNA VIA KNS/STR)
North Korea said Tuesday it had successfully tested a new “hypersonic missile” intended, according to leader Kim Jong Un, to deter “all rivals” of the country in the Pacific region.
This test took place Monday in the middle of a visit to South Korea by American Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and two weeks before the inauguration of Donald Trump as president of the United States.
This “intermediate-range hypersonic ballistic missile” is intended to “gradually strengthen the country’s nuclear deterrence,” said Kim Jong Un, who attended the launch with his teenage daughter Ju Ae.
This new weapon “will reliably deter all rivals in the Pacific region who can affect the security of our state”, he added, quoted by the official North Korean agency KCNA.
According to KCNA, a “new carbon fiber compound” was used for the missile's engine body, and “a new method… was introduced into the flight control and guidance system.”
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his daughter Ju Ae witness a missile launch on January 6, 2025, from an unspecified location (KCNA VIA KNS/STR)
The use of carbon fiber in the manufacture of a missile makes it possible to reduce its weight, and therefore increase its range and maneuverability. But the technology is difficult to master due to the low resistance of this composite material to high temperatures.
A missile is qualified as hypersonic when it can reach more than five times the speed of sound, or more than 6,000 km/h.
– Mach 12 –
“What is alarming about this missile is that this technology is currently only possessed by Russia, China and the United States,” Yang Moo-jin, president of the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.
“To achieve such speeds, you need materials capable of withstanding extreme conditions,” he emphasizes.
A photo released by North Korean news agency KCNA shows what is billed as a hypersonic missile launch on January 6, 2025 from an unspecified location (KCNA VIA KNS/STR)
According to KCNA, the missile was fired from the Pyongyang region and traveled 1,500 kilometers, at 12 times the speed of sound (Mach 12), before crashing into the Sea of Japan, called the East Sea by the Koreans.
“This is clearly a plan and an effort to defend ourselves, it is not an offensive plan and action,” assured Kim Jong Un.
He nevertheless added that “the world cannot ignore” the performance of this missile, believing that it was able to “deal a serious military blow to a rival by effectively breaking any defensive barrier”.
This is the first missile launch carried out by North Korea in 2025. The last one took place on November 6, a few hours before the presidential election in the United States.
Antony Blinken condemned this launch, ensuring that Pyongyang was receiving “military equipment and training” from Russia.
The current interim South Korean president, Choi Sang-mok, spoke on Tuesday of a “serious threat” to regional security.
Analysts see in this show of force, and in Kim Jong Un's words, a signal addressed to the future American president.
– “Message clair” –
“It sends a clear message to the Trump administration that in order to engage in dialogue, North Korea's strategic position must be recognized,” said Hong Min, an analyst at the Korea Institute for National Unification.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump meet in Panmunjom, south of the inter-Korean dividing line, on June 30, 2019 (AFP / Brendan Smialowski)
During his first term, Donald Trump made very personal attempts at rapprochement with Kim Jong Un, whom he met three times.
Although he had failed to get North Korea to renounce its nuclear weapons program, for which the country is heavily sanctioned by the UN, this rapprochement had still reduced tensions between the two Koreas. .
Since then, in 2022, North Korea declared its status as a nuclear power “irreversible”, and even engraved it the following year in its Constitution. Its army has carried out numerous tests of weapons banned by the United Nations, including that of a solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).
According to Hong Min, Monday's missile launch is intended to show Washington that Pyongyang's nuclear arsenal is now much more advanced than during Trump's first term (2017-2021). And that the country, which signed a mutual defense treaty with Russia, is in a strong position for a possible resumption of negotiations with the United States.
It is also possible that Pyongyang received “technical” assistance from Moscow for the development of this missile, explains this expert.
Kim Jong Un “seems to want to change the framework of the negotiations, the objective of which would be control of nuclear weapons to reduce threats, rather than denuclearization”, he notes.
The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff, for its part, affirmed that several details of the launch communicated by North Korea were inaccurate, in particular the distance traveled by the missile (1,100 kilometers according to it, instead of 1,500 kilometers according to KCNA).
“North Korea is very good at propaganda, agitation and deception. It has often made exaggerated statements and announcements,” Joint Chiefs spokesman Lee Sung-joon told reporters. .
