A submarine-launched ballistic missile shown on North Korea's state television.[Yonhap News Photo]
North Korea is still years away from the operational deployment of a submarine carrying ballistic missiles for wartime missions despite last week's successful missile test launch, a US expert said.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un hailed the latest SLBM launch as "the greatest success" saying Pyongyang is now fully capable of launching a nuclear attack. The missile flew about 500 kilometers (310 miles). It was North Korea's sixth SLBM launch since May 2015 and the third this year.
Military officials in Seoul expressed concern that an advancement in North Korea's SLBM technologies would pose a grave security threat to South Korea.
John Schilling said in a contribution to 38 North, the website of a US think-tank, that the SLBM program may be progressing faster than originally expected but this does not mean it will be ready "next week, next month, or even next year".
"Rather, the pace and method of the North's SLBM testing would suggest possible deployment in an initial operational capability by the second half of 2018 at the earliest," he said.
"Rushing development almost certainly sacrifices reliability, and fielding inadequately tested or unreliable missiles could result in sunken submarines -- a high price to pay when the North has only a single ballistic missile submarine of limited capability."
Furthermore, the expert said that Pyongyang could not count on a single prototype submarine with one to two missiles to carry out wartime missions. "Such a deployment would be more of a bluff than a game-changing threat," said Schilling.
Moreover, the submarine has only been put to sea for short periods to verify basic seaworthiness and conduct a few launches, he said, adding it would need realistic testing in operational environments such as exercises with its surface fleet.
Schilling suggested that a new submarine could probably be built within a two to three-year time frame, but the likelihood of building new models without further testing and refinement of the experimental GORAE-class "seems low".
Aju News Lim Chang-won = cwlim34@ajunews.com
reporter
Park Sae-jin
swatchsjp@ajunews.com
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