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

Hypersonic missiles: Evolution or revolution for missile non-proliferation and arms control instruments?

After listing major programmes and key drivers beyond the acquisition of these technologies, this paper considers their development under the prism of arms control, and analyses whether current mechanisms (non-proliferation arrangements, bilateral arms control treaties and confidence-building measures) dealing with missiles are adapted to these weapons.

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Other publications

Le Code de conduite de La Haye contre la prolifération des missiles balistiques. Le régime qui n’existait pas ?

The Hague Code of Conduct against Ballistic Missile Proliferation, launched in November 2002, established itself as the first political and truly multilateral initiative on non-proliferation in the field of missiles. He succeeded in laying down principles of universal scope in a field which was totally lacking in them and in establishing confidence-building measures which could serve as a model for countries not yet signatories.

Read More »