Report launch event: North Korea's short range systems

17 January 2023

Virtual

On 17 January 2023, FRS organised a webinar to discuss its recently published report on North Korea’s short range ballistic missiles. The authors of the study presented their main findings and Vann van Diepen assessed the contribution of this report to our understanding of North Korea’s military strategy.

North Korea’s recent flurry of missile tests, in particular of short-range missiles, has put the spotlight on its efforts to develop new capabilities in this range and to replace Soviet-inherited weapons with modern and accurate systems.

In particular, the development of the KN-23, the KN-24 and the KN-25 is bound to be significant in Pyongyang’s capabilities and strategy. 

This webinar explored the findings of a new study published by FRS, with a focus on the recently introduced systems. It assessed their potential impact as conventional and non-conventional weapons. Through an analysis of the potential capacities of these systems, the panelists examined their consequences on North Korea’s strategy and explore what it may lead to, in military and political terms, on the Korean peninsula. 

MODERATOR:

  • Emmanuelle Maitre, Research Fellow, FRS

PANELISTS: 

  • Stéphane DELORY, Senior Research Fellow, FRS
  • Christian MAIRE, Associate Fellow, FRS
  • Antoine BONDAZ, Research Fellow, FRS

DISCUSSANT: 

  • Vann VAN DIEPEN, Independent consultant, former Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Security and Nonproliferation at the US State Department 
Research Papers

Limiting the proliferation of WMD means of delivery: a low-profile approach to bypass diplomatic deadlocks

Since the creation of the HCoC in 2002, the need for more collective commitment and action to fight the proliferation of ballistic missiles has certainly not decreased. The destabilizing nature of these weapons has not changed. Non-proliferation is just less about keeping the world stable and more about not adding a risk factor to an uncertain future. The HCoC was and remains a response to that need, but certainly not the end of the quest for improvement.

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Issue Briefs

The HCoC and Southeast Asian States

Only three out of ten Southeast Asian states have joined the HCoC to date (the Philippines, Cambodia and Singapore). This limited rate is noteworthy as Southeast Asia is increasingly concerned by the ongoing ballistic missile competition in broader Asia. Moreover, the region is actively investing to benefit from space technologies.

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Issue Briefs

The HCoC and Space

The New Space trend – an ongoing innovative transformation of the space sector – has led to a rise of investment in small launch systems. While an increasing number of nations are gaining access to space, the number of private sector entities investing in this domain is also rising. Meanwhile, small space launch vehicles and ballistic missiles rely on increasingly similar technologies.

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