Kim Jong-un tests underwater nuclear attack drone

Claims by North Korea that it could unleash a radioactive tsunami have been met with scepticism

KIM JONG-UN personally tested a clandestine underwater nuclear attack drone capable of unleashing a radioactive tsunami on enemy naval ships and ports, Pyongyang has claimed. State media outlet KCNA said the “secret weapon” had been put into position and tested this week and that it could be deployed in the future at “any coast and port or towed by a surface ship for operation”.

It named the unmanned underwater nuclear attacking vessel “Haeil” and said it had been under development since 2012. Mr Kim personally guided tests of the weapon 29 times and its operational deployment had been given the green light by the ruling party’s leadership, it added. It said its mission was to stealthily enter waters where adversaries were operating to create “superpower radioactive tidal waves with underwater explosion”, adding that tests had been conducted over 59 hours before hitting a mock enemy port near Hongwon Bay on the east coast.

Experts urged caution in response to the claims, which come at a time of heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula and coincide with joint Us-south Korea military drills, which the North has denounced as a rehearsal for war.

“Pyongyang’s latest claim to have a nuclear-capable underwater drone should be met with scepticism,” said Leif-eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul.

“But it is clearly intended to show that the Kim regime has so many different means of nuclear attack that any preemptive or decapitation strike against it would fail disastrously.”

Ankit Panda, a nuclear policy expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, tweeted: “I tend to take North Korea seriously, but can’t rule out the possibility that this is an attempt at deception/psyop [psychological operations].”

Pyongyang has claimed the test, and also the launch earlier this week of “Hwasal-1” and “Hwasal-2” strategic cruise missiles “tipped with a test warhead simulating a nuclear warhead” are in response to “intentional, persistent and provocative war exercises” south of the border.

Yoon Suk Yeol, the South Korean president, said yesterday he will make sure North Korea pays a price for its “reckless provocations”. South Korea and US forces kicked off their largest joint drills in five years on March 13. Several have been conducted at the Rodriguez Live Fire Complex within a few miles of the North Korean border. Seoul and Washington insist they are defensive in nature.

On Wednesday, hours after Pyongyang’s cruise missile launch, the two allies blasted a mountain near the South Korean city of Pocheon using M-777 and K-9 howitzers and K1A1 battle tanks in a live fire exercise involving 800 US and 400 South Korean soldiers.