North Korea Fires Two Missiles, Second Test in 3 Days

Facts

• South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a statement that North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles on Tuesday, which landed in the sea off the country’s east coast. The missiles reportedly traveled about 385 miles.¹
• This marks Pyongyang’s second launch in three days and the first since Seoul and the US began their largest joint military drills in five years, having ramped up defense cooperation in the face of expanded missile launches from the north in recent months.²
• Japanese PM Fumio Kishida said that Japan was collecting information regarding the launch and no damage has been confirmed within the country. The missiles reportedly did not trespass into Japanese territory or exclusive economic zones.³

Sources: ¹Associated Press, ²Guardian and ³Reuters.

Narratives

• Pro-establishment narrative, as provided by Wall Street Journal. It's time to acknowledge that the strategy of persuading Pyongyang to make concessions through a policy mix of negotiation and deterrence has failed. Instead, Washington should resort to a strategy that has already proven successful and aim to collapse the regime from within via a media campaign to educate North Koreans about the country's desolate human rights situation. A rising population is the best way to achieve complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization.