North Korea Claims to Have ‘World’s Most Powerful Weapon’ at ‘Splendid’ Military Parade

The communist regime governing North Korea held a military parade Thursday, apparently featuring no social distancing or other anti-coronavirus measures, to celebrate the end of its eighth-ever Workers’ Party Congress.

Observers noted the parade appeared to feature a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) that had yet to make an appearance in North Korea’s military arsenal. The state newspaper Rodong Sinmun confirmed the SLBM’s appearance and boasted it was the “world’s most powerful weapon.”

Dictator Kim Jong-un opened the party congress, in which members of the ruling communist Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) set its future agenda and elect party leaders, on a negative note, announcing that North Korea had failed in “almost all sectors” to achieve its five-year goals. He partially blamed the failures on natural disasters and the hardships of fighting the Chinese coronavirus, which Pyongyang claims it has documented zero cases of in the country.

In his departing speech, Kim thanked the party for facing their failures and urged the expansion of the country’s “nuclear war deterrent,” by which he meant the nation’s illegal nuclear weapons program.

Following the congress, Rodong Sinmun announced Pyongyang had organized a “splendid” parade to celebrate the nation’s robust military.

“The world’s most powerful weapon, submarine-launch ballistic missile, entered the square one after another, powerfully demonstrating the might of the revolutionary armed forces,” the newspaper narrated. Along with the missiles, Rodong Sinmun listed “prototype tanks,” “ultra-modern self-propelled artillery pieces,” and “columns of rockets possessed of powerful striking capability for thoroughly annihilating enemies in a preemptive way outside the territory” as present at the parade.

“Other proud-worthy Juche-type weapons rolled past the square one after another, demonstrating to the world how our defence industry built up tremendous might since it started its first step with the production of sub-machine gun after the liberation of the country, while covering the untrodden path of army-building,” Rodong Sinmun stated.

The newspaper noted that the parade also featured copious praise for Kim.

“Cheers of ‘Hurrah!’ for Kim Jong Un and chanting shouts of ‘Kim Jong Un’ and ‘Devoted Defence’ rocked the heaven and earth and fireworks brightly decorated the nocturnal sky,” Rodong Sinmun narrated. “Children presented fragrant flowers to him and leading officials of the Party, the government and the military.”
North Korea’s defense minister, Kim Jong-gwan, spoke at the parade, not Kim Jong-un.

“The armed forces of the Republic will strictly contain any military threats in the region of the Korean peninsula,” Kim Jong-gwan reportedly said, “and preemptively use the strongest offensive power to thoroughly smash the hostile forces if they jeopardize the security of our state even a bit, and firmly defend the security of the country and the people and our socialist system.”

The South Korean news service Yonhap noted experts observing North Korean state media footage of the parade identified the SLBM as the most advanced weapon rolled out for the occasion. The military did not trot out any intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), which typically surface during periods of high tension between North Korea and the United States, as they pose a greater threat to Washington due to the distance they are believed to be able to cover. ICBMs appeared most recently in a North Korean military parade in October.

Kim did mention ongoing tensions with America — the Korean War technically never ended — during the party congress, calling America North Korea’s “foremost principal enemy,” but also striking a conciliatory tone in calling for “expanded” foreign relations in general.

Kim reaffirmed the nation’s emphasis on developing nuclear weapons in his speech closing the Party Congress on Thursday.

“We must further strengthen the nuclear war deterrent while doing our best to build up the most powerful military strength,” Kim said, according to Rodong Sinmun. “We must continue to give fresh spur to making the People’s Army elite and powerful armed forces, so that it is thoroughly prepared to fulfil [sic] its mission and role as the driving force of national defence in the face of any form of threat and emergency.”

Kim demanded that his party leaders make the next five years “an era of drastic change, in the revolution and construction and the important tasks in developing the Party, and made an in-depth discussion of them.” He also thanked them for having, “unlike the previous congresses, reviewed and analyzed its work from a critical viewpoint, not seeing only its merits.”

South Korean professor Yang Moo-jin told Yonhap that the SLBM is a show of force in light of the impending inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden, who North Korean media once said “must be beaten to death as quickly as possible.”