The Economist - UK (2022-04-09)

48 Asia The Economist April 9th 2022

TheKoreanpeninsula

Bursting into

Hwasong

A

t aceremonyonApril1stSuhWook,

SouthKorea’sdefenceminister,boast­

edthatSouthKoreacould“accuratelyand

swiftlystrikeanytargetsinNorthKorea”.

KimYoJong,a high­rankingNorthKorean

officialandthesisterofKimJongUn,the

country’sdictator,quicklyfiredback,ac­

cusingthe“scum­likeguy”of“senseless

bluster” for threatening a “pre­emptive

strike”.ShelateraddedthattheSouthKore­

anarmywould“facea miserablefatelittle

shortoftotaldestructionandruin”ifit

weretoattack.

The colourful exchange comes at a time

of  rising  tensions.  For  over  four  years  the

North  has  refrained  from  testing  nuclear

weapons  or  the  intercontinental  ballistic

missiles (icbms) needed to deliver them to

America’s  shores,  supposedly  because  the

weapons’ development had been complet­

ed.  Now  both  programmes  appear  to  be

coming out of hibernation. 

In late February and early March North

Korea  conducted  two  big  rocket  launches

which  it  claimed  were  to  test  reconnais­

sance  satellite  equipment.  American

spooks suspected those launches were lay­

ing  the  groundwork  for  future  weapons

tests. Then on March 24th something went

up  that  both  sides  agreed  was  an  icbm.

North  Korea  said  it  was  a  Hwasong­17,  a

previously  untested  missile  larger  than

anything  in  its  arsenal.  It  backed  up  this

claim  with  footage  of  the  launch,  which

paid homage to 1980s action movies. In it a

leather­jacketed  Mr  Kim  taps  his  watch,

dramatically tears his sunglasses from his

face  and  nods  gravely,  as  if  signalling  the

start  of  the  action.  The  launch  itself  is

filmed from several angles. 

America and South Korea said the video

was  doctored.  The  launch,  they  said,  was

probably of the smaller Hwasong­15, which

has  already  been  tested.  That  is  plausible.

North Korea has faked missile­test footage

before.  Colin  Zwirko,  an  analyst  at  nk

News, a Seoul­based outlet, thinks the re­

gime may have been trying to make up for a

launch  that  failed  on  March  16th.  Which­

ever missile it was, North Korea’s self­im­

posed moratorium on icbmtesting is over. 

More worrying still is the prospect that

nuclear tests will soon follow. Satellite im­

agery shows new activity around one of the

tunnels  at  Punggye­ri,  North  Korea’s  only

known  nuclear­testing  facility,  which  Mr

Kim  shut  down  in  2018.  Analysts  believe

that testing could resume by mid­April. 

That wouldcoincide nicely  with  the

110th anniversary, on April 15th, of the birth

of  Kim  Il  Sung:  Mr  Kim’s  grandfather  and

the  founder  of  North  Korea’s  hereditary

dictatorship.  A  large  military  parade  is

planned. Mr Kim likes to celebrate big oc­

casions  with  a  bang.  Every  nuclear  test

conducted  during  his  reign  has  fallen

within  a  week  of  his  birthday,  his  father’s

birthday  or  the  anniversary  of  the  coun­

try’s founding.

Domestic  worries  may  be  one  reason

for  the  renewed  activity.  Everyday  life  for

ordinary North Koreans has become nota­

bly grimmer since the start of the pandem­

ic.  Mr  Kim  sealed  the  country’s  borders,

causing  severe  food  shortages  and  batter­

ing the informal markets that provide ma­

ny  locals  with  a  living.  Mr  Kim  might  be

hoping  that  tests  and  martial  pageantry

will  bring  a  little  cheer.  If  indeed  the  re­

gime  did  doctor  the  footage  of  the  latest

launch,  the  intended  audience  may  well

have been viewers at home.

But Mr Kim doubtless also wants to im­

prove his military capabilities and thus his

leverage  in  negotiations  with  adversaries,

with the eventual goal of being accepted as

a  nuclear  power.  Though  he  has  already

shown that he can send icbms skyward, he

has yet to prove that the missiles can deliv­

er a payload to their targets. He may also be

trying  to  develop  low­yield  nuclear  weap­

ons.  Such  devices  could  sit  on  shorter­

ranged  missiles  aimed  at  the  South,  and

help further Mr Kim’s ambition to fire mul­

tiple warheads from a single icbm. 

Mr Suh’s term ends in May, along with

that of his boss Moon Jae­in, South Korea’s

current president, who tried to win over Mr

Kim.  The  incoming  president,  Yoon  Suk­

yeol, takes a harder line. He repeatedly en­

dorsed  the  idea  of  pre­emptive  strikes  on

the campaign trail. The noise on theKore­

an  peninsula—both  from  missiles and

rhetoric—is about to get much louder. n

S EOUL

North Korea is testing missiles again.

Nuclear weapons may be next

Highway to the danger zone

TheIndo-Pacific

AUKUS goes

hypersonic

S

ixmonthsagoAmericaandBritainsaid

they  would  help  Australia  acquire  the

crown  jewels  of  the  defence  world:  nuc­

lear­powered  submarines.  The  aukus

pact,  announced  on  September  15th,  re­

flected  Australia’s  fear  of  China’s  growing

power; America’s willingness to break old

taboos  to  counter  it;  and  Britain’s  eager­

ness  to  bolster  its  role  in  Asia.  The  three

countries  also  promised  to  co­operate  in

areas  from  cyber  capabilities  to  quantum

technologies. Now these allies are turning

their attention to hypersonic missiles.

Such  projectiles  travel  at  sustained

speeds  of  Mach  5  while  manoeuvring.

There  are  two  sorts.  Hypersonic  cruise

missiles,  like  Russia’s  Kinzhal,  employed

in Ukraine on March 18th, are powered by

air­breathing  engines.  Hypersonic  glide

vehicles,  like  Russia’s  Avangard  and  Chi­

na’s df­17, go up on rockets, but glide down

over long distances.

China  has  “outpaced  the  United  States

in  graduating  hypersonic­specialised  en­

gineers, publishing open scientific papers,

and  constructing  hypersonic  wind  tun­

nels”, noted a report by csis, an American

think­tank, in February. The Pentagon car­

ried  out  a  successful  hypersonic  test  in

mid­March (it was kept quiet to avoid rais­

ing tensions with Russia) but several previ­

ous ones failed. So it is not hard to see why

America wants to collaborate with allies.

America and Australia have been work­

ing  on  an  air­launched  hypersonic  cruise

missile under the cheesy rubric of scifire

for 15 years, taking advantage of the Woom­

era test range in southern Australia, one of

the  world’s  largest,  and  Australia’s  seven

hypersonic wind tunnels. Britain is further

behind, but gave a $12m contract to Rolls­

Royce,  an  aerospace  company,  to  work  on

suitable  engines  in  2019.  The  trio  plan  to

swap  notes  “to  accelerate  our  pro­

grammes”, says a British official.

This  evolution  of  aukus shows  that

Western allies see a pressing need to pool

their  resources  and  talents  to  keep  pace

with China. It might also future­proof the

pact. America and Britain have been shar­

ing  information  on  nuclear  propulsion

technology  with  Australia  since  February;

that sort of thing is so sensitive that it will

stay within the club of three. But collabora­

tion  in  other  areas—which  will  now  also

include  electronic  warfare—might allow

other  Sino­sceptic  partners,  like  Indiaor

Japan, to plug into aukusin the future.n

A strategic submarine pact turns its

attention to a new breed of missiles