Kim Jong Un: “Overpower nuclear blackmail and threats with force” ... declares complete overhaul of North Korea’s navy

[Financial News] North Korean State Affairs Commission Chairman Kim Jong Un threatened that the enemies’ nuclear blackmail and threats must be overcome by force. He also declared the complete rebirth of North Korea’s navy.
According to the Korean Central News Agency on the 4th, Chairman Kim made the assertion during a visit to Nampo Shipyard on the 2nd with Jo Chun-ryong, secretary of the WPK Central Committee. Kim said, “This is attributable to the circumstances that make it imperative to use force to overcome the nuclear blackmail and threats of adversaries in the region, where a new geopolitical situation is taking shape and having a real and serious impact on national security.” He also inspected the site where new warships are being built at Nampo Shipyard and once again emphasized his resolve to strengthen naval power.
Chairman Kim said, “In the maritime domain, where various threats arise, rapidly strengthening surface and underwater forces to defend national sovereignty is becoming a vital and pressing demand of the times.” He also said North Korea’s naval combat capabilities must be completely renewed.
Chairman Kim said, “To build a powerful naval force, there must be an advanced, highly technologically sophisticated shipbuilding base.” He also said the shipyard must ensure a high level of automation throughout all production processes and build one additional land-based dock so it can build and repair ships at the same time.
North Korea deployed its new 5,000-ton-class destroyers Choe Hyon and Kang Kon to the Yellow Sea and the East Sea, respectively, in June and September this year. At the commissioning ceremony for Choe Hyon, Chairman Kim announced plans to further strengthen naval power, saying that two surface vessels of the Choe Hyon class or larger would be built each year, including a 10,000-ton-class cruiser.
Nampo Shipyard was primarily used to build small and medium-sized vessels for the West Sea Fleet and merchant ships, but the visit by Kim Jong Un is seen as having shown that it has been transformed into a key production base for large combat vessels and underwater and surface strategic assets.
Professor Eul-Chul Lim of the Institute for Far Eastern Studies at Kyungnam University assessed that “the complex operational capabilities Kim Jong Un referred to, which no country in the world possesses, could mean the possibility of equipping new large warships with large numbers of strategic cruise missiles (from the Hwasal series), tactical nuclear weapons, or ship-to-ship and ship-to-ground missiles.” Lim also analyzed that preparations should be made for the possibility that North Korea may press ahead with declaring a maritime boundary it claims in the Yellow Sea and pursue a tactic of turning the maritime boundary into a point of dispute.
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