North Korea Calls US Strategic Assets Deployment to Korean Peninsula a "Nuclear War Provocation Attempt"

'Nuclear-Armed Capable' B-52 to Land on Korean Peninsula Soon
North Korea Blames Deteriorating Situation on 'Strategic Asset Deployment'

North Korea condemned the deployment of U.S. strategic assets on the Korean Peninsula as a "provocation of nuclear war," arguing that the United States is worsening the regional situation. The North advanced a brazen logic, claiming that it is merely strengthening its self-defensive military capabilities to safeguard peace and stability.

According to the Korean Central News Agency on the 17th, Kim Kwang-myung, a researcher at North Korea's Ministry of Foreign Affairs' Institute for Disarmament and Peace, referenced a report by the U.S. House Strategic Posture Committee that pointed out the dangers of North Korea's development of nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). He stated, "For the United States to talk about anyone's 'nuclear threat' is a perversion of black and white and the height of impudence," and claimed, "The U.S. efforts to build a homeland missile defense system under the pretext of the so-called 'North Korean nuclear threat' are in fact part of a thoroughly aggressive nuclear force enhancement aimed at making a nuclear preemptive strike against our country easier."

The South Korean and U.S. Air Forces conducted joint air training over the West Sea in March. The largest aircraft in the center is the U.S. strategic bomber B-52 Stratofortress.
[Photo by Ministry of National Defense]

Kim Kwang-myung emphasized, "What is more serious is that the United States is recklessly deploying nuclear strategic assets in hotspot regions including Northeast Asia and handing advanced military equipment to its junior allies, deliberately escalating tensions," adding, "The reality urgently demands a qualitative and quantitative leap in self-defensive military capabilities to deter nuclear war." He further stated, "We will fulfill our mission as a responsible nuclear-armed state to reliably protect regional and global peace and security."

According to military sources, the U.S. strategic bomber B-52 Stratofortress is scheduled to be deployed to the Korean Peninsula soon and will land at a U.S.-South Korea airbase. Although the B-1B, which has restrictions on nuclear armament, landed at Osan Air Base in 2016, this will be the first time a B-52 capable of dropping nuclear missiles lands on the Korean Peninsula. The B-52, B-1B, and B-2 are representative strategic bombers of the U.S. Air Force and are considered the strategic assets that Kim Jong-un, Chairman of the State Affairs Commission of North Korea, fears the most. The domestic landing of the B-52 is interpreted as a warning message to North Korea, which is focused on advancing its nuclear and missile capabilities.

North Korea continued its criticism of the deployment of U.S. strategic assets on the Korean Peninsula in an article issued under the name of Kim Dong-myung, a researcher at the Institute of International Political Studies. Kim Dong-myung stated, "The United States constantly deploys various nuclear strike means on the Korean Peninsula and shamelessly conducts large-scale unilateral and joint exercises that assume a nuclear preemptive strike against the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and neighboring countries," and "Due to the United States' dangerously reckless nuclear provocation, this planet is becoming not a nuclear-free zone but a hot nuclear zone, moving ever closer to the abyss of war and confrontation."

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un watching the test launch of the intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) 'Hwasong-18'

North Korea's outpouring of such criticism is interpreted as an attempt to check the deployment of U.S. strategic assets on the Korean Peninsula and to shift the responsibility for the worsening situation onto South Korea and the United States. Despite the U.S. and South Korea cooperating to respond to North Korea's nuclear and missile threats, North Korea brazenly claimed it is the one being threatened, thereby seeking justification to accelerate its nuclear and missile development by blaming external factors. North Korea also enshrined its "nuclear force policy" in its socialist constitution at the Supreme People's Assembly (equivalent to the National Assembly) held on the 26th-27th of last month.

Meanwhile, North Korea reaffirmed its existing stance of not giving up nuclear weapons on the international stage. Kim In-chul, a secretary of the North Korean Mission to the United Nations, said on the 16th (local time) at the First Committee (Disarmament and International Security) of the UN General Assembly held at the UN Headquarters in New York, "As long as the imperialists' nuclear weapons exist, we will neither give up nor change our current status as a nuclear-armed state." Although diplomats from various countries expressed concern about North Korea's nuclear weapons development and urged dialogue and negotiations for denuclearization, North Korea effectively denied the possibility of denuclearization itself.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.