The rocket explosion that ended North Korea’s latest effort to launch a spy satellite means the authoritarian regime has failed in three of its four attempts to put a military satellite into orbit.
After two failed attempts delivered only international embarrassment in 2023, North Korea finally launched a spy satellite late that year, though experts have cast doubt on its ability to produce useful images.
North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un admitted in late May 2024 that his regime’s latest launch failed after the rocket carrying the satellite exploded shortly after liftoff. North Korea’s aerospace technology administration blamed the explosion on a newly developed rocket engine fueled by petroleum and liquid oxygen. Petroleum likely means kerosene, analysts told the Nikkei Asia news service, even though United Nations Security Council resolutions restrict shipments of kerosene and other petroleum products to North Korea.
“Developing a new rocket takes at least two to three years,” Chang Young-keun, a professor at Korea Aerospace University, told the news service. “North Korea likely acquired this engine from Russia and conducted several test firings prior to the launch.”
Russian experts have been helping guide North Korea’s aerospace program, South Korean news agency Yonhap reported before the latest failed launch. The United States and its Allies and Partners have accused Russia of illicitly swapping raw materials, food and technical expertise for North Korean ammunition and missiles for Moscow’s illegal war in Ukraine.
Prior to the latest botched attempt, North Korea notified Tokyo of a planned missile launch within eight days, drawing rebukes from Japan, South Korea and others. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the launch as violating the U.N. ban that prohibits nuclear-armed North Korea from conducting satellite launches, which are viewed as a cover for testing long-range missile technology. The launch notification came as Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Li Qiang, the second-ranking member of the Chinese Communist Party, gathered for a trilateral meeting in Seoul.
“Any launch using ballistic missile technology would directly violate U.N. Security Council resolutions and undermine peace and security of the region and the world,” Yoon told reporters. “If North Korea presses ahead with its launch despite the international warning, I think the international community must sternly deal with it.”
Kishida urged Pyongyang to cancel the launch and South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which deals with North Korean affairs, said a satellite launch would be “a provocation that seriously threatens our and regional security.” Prior to the North’s failed launch, South Korea mobilized 20 fighter jets for a drill near the nations’ border.
The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) called the launch a “brazen violation of multiple unanimous U.N. Security Council resolutions … [that] risks destabilizing the security situation in the region and beyond.”
USINDOPACOM reiterated that the U.S. commitment to defend Japan and South Korea remains ironclad.
