Why North Korea has tested Hwasong-18, a new solid-fueled intercontinental ballistic missile

This launch, the first since April, is the latest in the string of missile tests that have taken place this year.

What is the Hwasong-18 ICBM?

The Hwasong-18 is a solid-fuelled ICBM and was first unveiled at the February 8 parade earlier this year that commemorated the 75th anniversary of the founding of the Korean People’s Army in DPRK’s capital Pyongyang. Experts say that the use of solid propellants in the Hwasong-18 allows for faster deployment of missiles. Solid propellants can fire faster and accelerate more quickly at liftoff.

According to the US Centennial of Flight Commission, a government database on aerospace and aviation history, the “very first rockets, built by the Chinese at some unknown period in the first millennium, used solid propellants, a variant of black powder used in early guns… Solids were used for many military applications, such as short-range rockets, but they were not used for any long-range applications, and certainly not for spaceflight due to their comparative lack of power. Despite this, solid propellants were extremely attractive for military missile use primarily because they were storable.”

And what are ICBMs?

ICBMs are ballistic missiles that have a range of over 5,500 km and have nuclear weapons delivery technology. Presently, in addition to the DPRK, Russia, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, China, India and Israel are the only countries that are in documented possession of land-based ICBMs.

What’s the significance of DPRK’s latest ICBM test?

North Korea’s state media said the latest test fire was conducted according to the “strategic judgement and crucial decision of the Central Military Commission of the Workers’ Party of Korea, at a grave period when the military security situation on the Korean peninsula and in the region has reached the phase of nuclear crisis beyond the Cold War era as the US and its vassal forces’ unprecedented military provocations against the DPRK have been intensified.”

DPRK state media mentioned the Washington Declaration, an agreement that was signed in April this year, between US President Biden and South Korea’s President Yoon Suk-yeol during a bilateral meeting to mark 70 years of the US-South Korea alliance.

“It is openly planning to discuss the use of nuclear weapons against our state through a meeting of the US-South Korea “Nuclear Consultative Group” which will be the parent body of the US-Japan-South Korea “tripartite nuclear alliance”. It is driving the regional situation to the brink of an unprecedented nuclear war, while dispatching nuclear-powered submarines and nuclear strategic bombers to the Korean peninsula and its vicinity anytime under the pretext of increasing the “visibility” of the US strategic assets,” DPRK state media had said.

This was in reference to the Washington Declaration, which included the line: “Going forward, the United States will further enhance the regular visibility of strategic assets to the Korean Peninsula, as evidenced by the upcoming visit of a U.S. nuclear ballistic missile submarine to the ROK and will expand and deepen coordination between our militaries.”

ROK or the Republic of Korea is the official name for South Korea. In June, the United States deployed a nuclear-powered submarine capable of carrying about 150 Tomahawk missiles to South Korea, and it was stationed at the port of Busan, a port city in South Korea, the AP reported.

The DPRK state media noted this, saying, “More serious is that the US, which clings to extremely provocative aerial espionage acts even by encroaching upon the sovereign territory of the DPRK, is planning to reintroduce nuclear weapons into the Korean peninsula by sending a US nuclear submarine carrying strategic nukes to South Korea for the first time in 40 years.”

It said “these reckless military moves” of the US were “pushing the situation on the Korean peninsula to the actual situation of armed conflict” and that they had “an irreversibly negative influence on the regional military and political situation and security structure.”

In this regard, the DPRK state media framed the test fire of the Hwasong-18 ICBM as “an essential process aimed at further developing the strategic nuclear force of the DPRK and, at the same time, serves as a strong practical warning to clearly show the DPRK’s adversaries making clearer the policy of nuclear threat to the DPRK the unwavering will to overwhelmingly counter them….”.

How have other countries reacted to this test?

North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un was present during the test fire. State media said the missile travelled up to a maximum altitude of 6,648.4km and flew a distance of 1001.2km for 4,491s before landing in the East Sea, making the 74-minute flight time the longest ever for a North Korean missile test. According to a Reuters report, Japan said the missile landed about 250 km west of northern Japan’s Okushiri island.

Following the test, South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol, in Lithuania for the NATO summit, convened an emergency national security council meeting and held separate talks with his Japanese counterpart, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, a Reuters report said.

Kishida said the launch threatened peace and stability in the region and beyond, and required closer cooperation between the two neighbours and with the United States, the report added. The US issued a statement saying the launch “risks destabilising the security situation in the region.” The three countries also said in a joint statement that “The DPRK’s continued development of its nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities will only bolster the resolve of the three countries and the international community to achieve the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”