Days after Donald Trump’s much-discussed crossing into North Korea at the demilitarised zone, a little-noticed report from United States Forces Korea confirmed what some analysts had suspected: North Korea’s latest intercontinental ballistic missile has the range to reach all parts of the US.
The new estimate is based on a test flight of the Hwaseong-15 ICBM in November 2017. Because the North Koreans can’t shoot their missiles over their maximum range without hitting other countries, they test-fire the weapons at very high angles, demonstrating the likely range by the altitude reached. The Hwaseong-15 reached an altitude of 4,475 kilometres and covered a distance of 950 kilometres on the ground; US analysts used this information to calculate an estimated full linear range of 12,875 kilometres. The distance from Pyongyang to New York is 10,900 kilometres.
This compares with a range of 10,000 kilometres for the missile’s immediate predecessor, the Hwaseong-14, which put much of the continental US within range, and 5,500 kilometres for the earlier Hwaseong-13. At the time of the Hwaseong-15 launch the North Korean Central News Agency claimed that it could carry a super-large heavy warhead, implying that it would be well able to carry a substantial nuclear bomb.
