Last week, North Korea launched its most ambitious missile test to date. And the response from the United States has been unambiguous. The Kim regime on Friday launched a Hwasong-14 intercontinental ballistic missile that experts say could reach the United States. American forces countered with a live-fire rocket artillery exercise with the South Korean Army, according to a statement from the Department of Defense. The American and South Korean missiles were aimed into the sea, but their placement was clearly threatening. The ATACMS missile system used has a range of 190 miles, a distance far greater than the distance between the North Korean border and the town of Pyeongtaek, where the exercise was carried out. The exercise began just hours after the North Korean missile splashed down in the Sea of Japan.
On Sunday, two American B-1B Lancer bombers flew from Guam to South Korea, picking up Japanese and Korean escort fighters along the way. The bombers made a low pass over Osan Air Base just north of Pyeongtaek, mimicking what a bombing run over North Korea might look like.
The B1-B can carry 125,000 pounds of bombs. It was originally designed as a nuclear bomber, but now carries only conventional weapons. It is the only American heavy bomber capable of supersonic flight. As with the ATACMS test, the deployment of supersonic bombers signals that American military retaliation for a North Korean missile attack would be swift.
The Air Force is also planning to test-launch an unarmed Minuteman III ICBM from Vandenburg Air Force Base in California on Wednesday. The Minuteman tests are conducted periodically, and have already been held three times this year. This will be the first test since North Korea launched its own ICBM for the first time on July 4.
The Pentagon has also showed off America’s anti-ballistic missile assets in the Pacific. A medium-range ballistic missile target dummy was shot down by an American THAAD missile over the Pacific. The THAAD system is designed to intercept and destroy a missile in its final approach. Of the last 15 tests of the system, all have been successful. THAAD systems are currently deployed in South Korea, Guam, Alaska, and Texas.
The White House released a statement warning the Kim regime that “the United States will take all necessary steps to ensure the security of the American homeland and protect our allies in the region.”
U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley did not call for a meeting of the U.N. Security Council, a contrast from past provocations from North Korea. Haley asserted that “the time for talk is over,” adding that the Kim regime “is already subject to numerous Security Council resolutions that they violate with impunity.”
Senator Lindsey Graham was even less equivocal in a television appearance Tuesday morning. “There is a military option to destroy North Korea’s program and North Korea itself,” Graham warned. “If there’s going to be a war to stop him [Kim Jong Un], it will be over there. If thousands die, they’re going to die over there, they’re not going to die here and he’s [Trump] told me that to my face.” It’s unclear if Graham meant the “thousands” of casualties would be North or South Korean, though any military conflict on the peninsula would involve mass fatalities on both sides.
Graham explained, “The only way [the Kim regime is] going to change is if they believe there’s a credible threat of military force on the table.” Based on the response from the Pentagon, that threat looks more credible than ever.
