By Hyonhee Shin
SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called for strengthening the country’s war deterrence in a “more practical and offensive” manner to counter what it called moves of aggression by the U.S. and South Korea, state media KCNA said on Tuesday.
Kim made the comment at an enlarged meeting of the Central Military Commission held on Monday to discuss ongoing efforts to boost the country’s war deterrent to “cope with the escalating moves of the U.S. imperialists and the south Korean puppet traitors to unleash a war of aggression,” KCNA said.
North Korea has been reacting angrily to a recent series of the allies’ joint military exercises, which KCNA said were intended to prepare for “an all-out war” and forced Pyongyang to explore “powerful practical action”, including military options.
Kim ordered further reinforcing the country’s war deterrence with “increasing speed” and in a “more practical and offensive” manner, KCNA said.
The meeting “discussed practical matters and measures for machinery to prepare various military action proposals that no means and ways of counteraction are available to the enemy,” it added.
South Korea and the U.S. forces have conducted annual springtime exercises since March, including air and sea drills involving a U.S. aircraft carrier and B-1B and B-52 bombers, and their first large-scale amphibious landing drills in five years.
North Korea has also carried out various military activities in recent weeks, unveiling new, smaller nuclear warheads, testing what it called a nuclear-capable underwater attack drone and firing an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of striking anywhere in the United States.
(Reporting by Hyonhee Shin; Editing by Jamie Freed)
