Stronger, faster, higher: How North Korea built a fearsome missile arsenal

North Korea could hit almost anywhere on earth with a ballistic missile, analysts say, a capability it has honed alongside a wide variety of shorter-range weapons with comprehensive testing that includes a record-setting number of launches in 2022.

In March and November, North Korea sent ballistic missiles soaring more than 6,000km into space. The high-flying trajectories showed a weapon designed to hit another continent, or even deliver multiple warheads.

Pyongyang has also test-fired at least three intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) over Japan, including an Oct 4 flight where the missile – possibly a variant of the intermediate-range Hwasong-12 – landed about 3,200km beyond Japan in the Pacific Ocean.

There are many questions over just how reliable and capable the North’s biggest missiles are: It has yet to fully demonstrate some key technologies for ensuring a nuclear warhead survives its fiery decent through the atmosphere and at least some launches appear to have ended in failure.

But analysts say North Korea’s flurry of testing shows it is fine-tuning missiles that could be used in a war, and that it has little interest in giving them up.

North Korea says its ballistic missile development is a legitimate exercise of its right as a sovereign state to defend itself from external threats, including hostile US policy

It has said it rejects UN Security Council resolutions banning missile and nuclear programmes as an infringement of its sovereign rights. It has also said it has the right to space exploration as a sovereign country.

Although long-range weapons get more attention, North Korea has been pouring resources into shorter-range systems too, analysts say.

After historic denuclearisation talks between leader Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump fell apart in 2019, Pyongyang rolled out new and increasingly capable short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs), many of which can manoeuvre to confound missile defences.

Short-range weapons help it prepare for a potential confrontation with its neighbours, especially South Korea, analysts say, which hosts about 28,500 American troops. In North Korea’s testing programme, short-range missiles seem to have been the most successful.