Kim Jong Un announces the advancement of North Korea’s navy with nuclear weapons and 10,000-ton warships

Kim Jong Un said that North Korea is moving forward with its plan to equip its navy with nuclear weapons, while state media reported on Tuesday that the leader also aims to build warships with a capacity of 10,000 tons.

According to the official KCNA agency, he made these remarks on Tuesday in Nampo during the commissioning ceremony of the Choe Hyon, one of the two 5,000-ton warships that North Korea launched last year.

During the ceremony, Kim said that “the program to equip the Navy with nuclear weapons is proceeding according to plan without deviating from the planned course.”

According to him, this represents a strategic direction of decisive importance, as it will enable the state to keep its nuclear forces ready to carry out various and effective operations.

Pyongyang had previously announced that the Choe Hyon is armed with “the most powerful weapons,” while this year Kim has carried out several inspections, including overseeing a test in April involving the launch of a cruise missile from the ship.

He said that after the Choe Hyon, the destroyer Kang Kon will also soon enter service. After that, according to him, 10,000-ton strategic warships will be launched one after another. Kim also said that North Korea will build every year two surface ships of a higher class than the Choe Hyon, one of which will be 10,000 tons.

In general, a 10,000-ton destroyer, such as the Arleigh Burke class, of which the United States has dozens, or South Korea’s Sejong Le Grand, is between 150 and 170 meters long, roughly the length of one and a half football fields.

Professor of military studies at Changji University, Choi Gil-il, assessed that the 10,000-ton threshold will have symbolic significance for North Korea. According to him, such a ship would demonstrate Pyongyang’s determination not to fall behind Seoul’s naval power.

Currently, South Korea has more than ten ships measuring over 5,000 tons, while North Korea has two such vessels.

Kim Jong Un said that the period when his country’s navy was merely a force tasked with defending waters near the coast now belongs to the past.

At a plenary session of the Workers’ Party of Korea, which ended on Monday, he pledged to increase the country’s defense capabilities, arguing that the military modernization of South Korea and the United States was pushing the region “to the brink of nuclear war.”

After the failure of the 2019 summit between Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump, due to disagreements over the country’s denuclearization and the lifting of sanctions imposed on it, North Korea has repeatedly described itself as an “irreversible nuclear state.”

North Korea and South Korea are still technically at war, since the 1950-1953 conflict ended with an armistice rather than a peace treaty. The two countries are separated by a demilitarized zone along their border.