North Korea’s Latest Ballistic Missile Was A “New Type” With Dramatically Longer Range

US calls for "far stronger sanctions"against N. Korea after missile test. US & S. Korea consider it a"provocation". China calls for"restraint" pic.twitter.com/NOTwoaz2wK
— Bricio Segovia (@briciosegovia) May 14, 2017

After North Korea provoked both its neighbors and the US when on Sunday morning it fired off yet another ballistic missile from Kusong near the border with China – one which this time did not explode upon launch – just days after the election of a new South Korean president who ironically advocates more engagement with Pyongyang, experts said the missile appeared to be a new type of ballistic missile, and had a far greater range than any other weapon North Korea has successfully launched.
According to Japanese Defense Minister Tomomi Inada, the missile rose to a height of about 2,000 kilometers, a much steeper trajectory than usual for a North Korean missile test. She also confirmed that officials were looking into the possibility that it was a “new type of ballistic missile.” Japan’s cabinet secretary, Yoshihide Suga, said the missile traveled for about 30 minutes and landed 700 kilometers east of the launch site. A spokesman for South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff estimated the distance at 435 miles.
Cited by the WSJ, independent experts said the missile, if fired at a conventional angle, could have flown 2,800 miles – far enough to reach the U. S. military base in Guam.
That is a ‘considerably longer range than its current missiles,’ said David Wright, co-director of the Global Security Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, in an analysis of the launch.

This post was published at Zero Hedge on May 14, 2017.