North Korea test-fires new intermediated ballistic missile carrying hypersonic warhead

TOKYO (TASS/) -- North Korea test-fired on April 2 a new intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) Hwasongpho-16B equipped with ‘hypersonic gliding warhead,’ the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported on Wednesday.

According to the agency, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un personally guided the test launch of the new missile, which covered a distance of 1,000 kilometres reaching the maximum altitude of 101.1 kilometres before dipping and flying at an altitude of 72.3 kilometres.
KCNA reported in particular that “The test-fire was aimed at confirming the designed technical specifications of the new-type intermediate-range hypersonic missile as a whole and verifying the reliability of this weapon system.”
“It was conducted in the way of verifying the characteristics of gliding-skip flight orbit and cross-range maneuvering capability of the hypersonic glide vehicle (warhead) while confining its range to less 1,000 kilometres, in consideration of safety, and forcibly controlling the speed and altitude by means of delaying the start-up of the second-stage engine and rapidly changing the flight orbit in the active region,” the agency stated.
Following the test-launch on Tuesday Kim Jong Un announced that North Korea’s all tactical, operational and strategic-level missiles would be equipped with solid fuel engines and would be capable of carrying maneuverable nuclear warheads.
“He said with pride that another powerful strategic offensive weapon was developed to demonstrate the absolute advantage of our defense science and technology and thus we came to successfully implement the Party Central Committee’s three principles of building missile armed force for rapidly, accurately and powerfully striking any target in the enemy side worldwide by perfecting the project for putting all the tactical, operational and strategic missiles with various ranges on solid-fueled, warhead-controlled and nuclear warhead-carrying basis,” KCNA added.

(Latest Update April 4, 2024)