North Korea announced last week that it tested a nuclear-capable underwater attack drone, a weapon that could potentially destroy entire port cities.
“The Underwater Weapon System Institute under the DPRK Academy of Defense Science conducted an important test of its underwater nuclear weapon system ‘Haeil-5-23’ under development in the East Sea of Korea,” Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported.
“Haeil” is allegedly the name North Korea assigned to a series of undersea drones it has been working on since 2012.
“Our army’s underwater nuke-based countering posture is being further rounded off and its various maritime and underwater responsive actions will continue to deter the hostile military maneuvers of the navies of the U.S. and its allies,” KCNA wrote, quoting an unnamed North Korean military official.
Friday’s test supposedly involved the Haeil-5-23 drone “cruising along an oval and pattern-8 course at an underwater depth of 80 to 150 meters in the East Sea of Korea for 59 hours and 12 minutes” before detonating a non-nuclear warhead against a mockup of an “enemy port.”
U.S. Deputy Ambassador to the U.N. Robert Wood noted that North Korea’s provocative weapons tests “are of great concern.”
