Fireworks
Not that I paid much attention, but North Korea did in fact live up to expectations that it would test missiles on the 4th of July. So often, our media get excited about the testing of anti-ship missiles which probably aren’t nuclear capable and probably couldn’t do much damage to ground targets in Japan or South Korea. This time, however, the North fired off seven short-range missiles. They were SCUD-C’s or Nodong’s, which could do serious damage to a South Korean city.
More interesting to me was the failure of a rumored Taepodong ICBM test did not materialize. In response to this latest flagrant violation of three U.N. Security Council Resolutions, the United Nations issued a devastating rebuke in response. How cute.
NK’s missles are named NoDong, hehe.
I too am interested in the lack of Taepo in the latest dose of -dong.
Kinks in the missiles still to be worked out to avoid another spectacular failure? Perhaps the NorKs are running out of missile parts to test? Or perhaps they think an ICBM test over Japan (and if successful, Hawaii) would be a tad too provocative at this point in time.
If I were some guy in P’yang responsible for missile development, I’d make a deal with the Iranians to testfire the latest version of the Taepodong – call it the Shahab 6 for continuity?
Oh wait, my bad. That’s already happened….
I read in a ROK paper that these missiles were similar to the cruise missiles fired earlier; however, that is false. The missiles fired on the 4th were ballistic missiles, that exit and reenter the atmosphere. Cruise missiles usually stay under a few hundred feet, use entirely different fuel and guidance, and have much shorter ranges.