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North Korea’s state-run Rodong Sinmun reported on March 19, 2024, that leader Kim Jong-un had overseen the test of “super-large” rockets on March 18. (KCNA/Yonhap)

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un expressed “the strong will to completely remove the possibility of armed conflict and war and firmly defend the peace, stability and sovereignty of the country with [. . .] overwhelming military [might] as a deterrent,” Pyongyang’s state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper reported on Tuesday.

Kim was also quoted as saying that “it is necessary to further impress upon the enemies that if an armed conflict and a war break out, they can never avoid disastrous consequences.”

“The destructive offensive means possessed by our army should more thoroughly fulfill their missions to block and suppress the possibility of war with the constant perfect preparedness to collapse the capital of the enemy and the structure of its military forces,” Kim was quoted as saying.

The newspaper also reported that Kim “set forth important strategic tasks for bolstering up the artillery forces and rounding off the artillery war preparations.”

The Rodong Sinmun said that the gunnery exercise on Monday represented the first use of the 600 mm super-large multiple rocket launcher in a company salvo. After the company salvo, the newspaper added, “a test was conducted to simulate an air explosion of a shell of [a] super-large multiple rocket launcher at a preset altitude above the target.”

Officials from the South Korean and American militaries classified the 600 mm super-large rockets as short-range ballistic missiles.

“On March 18, we detected North Korea firing several projectiles that are presumed to be short-range ballistic missiles for around 300 km from the area around Pyongyang to the East Sea,” South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff informed the press.

In a message delivered during a ceremony unveiling 30 launchers capable of handling the 600 mm super-large rocket at the garden of the headquarters of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea on Dec. 31, 2022, Kim said the rockets “has south Korea as a whole within the range of strike and is capable of carrying tactical nuclear warhead.”

By Lee Je-hun, senior staff writer

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