Kim Yo Jong Vows Countermeasures Over Japan Tomahawk Test
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- Kim Yo Jong warned on August 5 that the DPRK would set up additional military options against Japan, calling Tokyo a "war criminal state" and condemning its July 29 first live-fire test of a U.S.-supplied Tomahawk cruise missile launched from the Aegis destroyer Chokai in the Pacific Ocean.
- Japan's Tomahawk test, along with its participation in a U.S.-led joint military drill in the Philippines in May, proves that Tokyo's push for preemptive strike capability has entered "the stage of the actual act," according to Kim's statement published by KCNA.
- Japan adopted its "counterstrike capability" in December 2022 by revising three key security documents, opening the way for its purchase of 400 Tomahawk missiles from the United States, with deliveries beginning this year.
- Kim accused the United States of enabling the test by handing over Tomahawks, remodeling a warship for their operation, and providing the place of launch, declaring the DPRK "will never remain a passive onlooker" to Japan's military evolution.
- Japan's latest defense white paper warns that "North Korea's military activities pose an even more grave and imminent threat to Japan's national security than ever before," a justification Kim dismissed as "a camouflaged tactic to cover up its ambition for a military giant."
- Kim argued that Japan's preemptive strike capabilities are "contrary to international law and its constitution, which disallowed the possession of war potentials, the right to participate in a war and the right to belligerency," without disclosing specifics of the planned countermeasures.
Why it matters: Japan's first live-fire Tomahawk test from the destroyer Chokai on July 29 marks the operational debut of the 400-missile purchase authorized after its December 2022 security overhaul — a shift Kim labeled a transformation into a "war state." Her simultaneous blame-shifting to Washington exposes a three-way diplomatic fracture: Japan invokes North Korean threats to justify the very capabilities North Korea now cites as grounds for new military options.
