SEOUL, Dec. 14 (UPI) — North Korea is likely to test another submarine-launched ballistic missile and conduct additional nuclear tests in 2016, South Korea said.
Defense Minister Han Min-koo said Monday Seoul’s military sees a need to pay attention to North Korea’s strategic, tactical provocations in light of recent events, Yonhap reported.
“We cannot rule out the possibility China-North Korea relations could become distant again after the cancellation of North Korea’s Moranbong Band concert tour,” the defense official said.
Han also said Kim Jong Un is “unpredictable” and that his leadership is unstable.
“North Korea’s Kim continues to show a commitment to a politics of fear, unpredictable courses of action and military provocations,” Han said.
During the bi-annual meeting of military commanders, the Defense Ministry also said the missile-response system that is part of the U.S.-South Korea joint defense strategy, operating under the 4D, or “detect, defense, disrupt and destroy” plan, needs to be developed.
The ministry official also said defense officials and South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff maintain military readiness for North Korea nuclear tests and missile launches.
During the same hearing, deputy Defense Ministry spokesman Col. Na Seung-yong said South Korea’s fighter-bombers, the F-15K, were not fitted with air-to-surface missiles in 2010, when they scrambled in response to North Korea’s bombardment of Yeonpyeong Island.
News 1 reported Na said South Korea’s air-to-ground firepower is “limited,” but a Defense Ministry official said that the aircraft was not equipped with air-to-surface missiles for the sake of operational efficiency.
Lee Dong-kwan, a former senior public relations secretary at the presidential Blue House under President Lee Myung-bak, had written in his memoir that the former South Korean leader had instructed the deployment of the F-15K aircraft to attack the North, but held back because it was a military matter that required consultation with the United States.
