By Lukas Ponte, Video Editor
On Monday, March 2, North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles into its eastern sea. South Korean officials believe that the resuming of these tests after a month-long hiatus was caused by the coronavirus outbreak in Asia.
These launches came just two days after North Korea’s media showed Kim Jong Un supervising an artillery drill. This drill aimed at testing the combat readiness of the units in the front-line and eastern areas.
South Korea’s joint chiefs of staff stated that the projectiles were fired from an area near the town of Wonsan and that the missiles flew about 150 miles northeast at 22 miles per hour. South Korea later told officials the missiles were presumed to be short-range ballistic missiles.
“Experts say such weapons can potentially overwhelm missile defense systems and expand the North’s ability to strike targets in South Korea and Japan, including U.S. bases there,” Associated Press columnists Kim Tong-Hyung and Hyung-Jin Kim wrote.
At the beginning of the year, Kim Jong Un said that North Korea would soon reveal a “strategic weapon” and that the country would no longer be “unilaterally bound” to a self-imposed suspension on testing of intercontinental and nuclear ballistic missiles.
President Donald Trump was reluctant to criticize North Korea in their missile launch debate in 2019. This reluctance is a product of Trump’s hope to make a deal with Kim and have a political victory to claim.
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