North Korea: new air-defence system and a cruise missile in a strike drill on a mock airfield, the fourth test in a week

North Korea announced on Thursday, November 5, that it tested a new anti-aircraft missile system and that, in parallel, a long-range cruise missile unit “struck” a mock airfield in a strike drill. The two tests took place on Wednesday, November 4 and are Pyongyang’s fourth weapons test in a week.

The announcement by the official KCNA agency confirms what South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff had detected on Wednesday: multiple missile launches towards the Sea of Japan from the Sondok area, in South Hamgyong province; see our report on the launches. The missiles flew less than 300 kilometres, and Seoul had not ruled out that it was a very short-range ballistic missile. A South Korean Defense Ministry official said on Thursday that the first detection data point to different types of missiles.

“Intelligent” guidance and new materials

The anti-aircraft system was tested by the Missile Command, in order to confirm its technical capabilities, and was overseen by Kim Jong Sik, a member of the Central Military Commission of the ruling Workers’ Party. KCNA claims the firing confirmed the technical specifications and reliability of the missile’s new materials and its “intelligent” multi-mode guidance system, and that the system and the detection data-processing unit recognise and track targets. Shin Jong-woo, secretary general of the Korea Defense and Security Forum, assesses that this is the missile first unveiled in November 2025 and that its guidance section resembles the missiles of Russia’s S-400.

Cluster munitions on the runway

The strike drill was carried out by a subunit of the strategic long-range cruise missile unit in the east of the country, against a mock airfield. In KCNA’s photos the missile appears to drop cluster submunitions on a landing strip. The specialist outlet NK News notes the images have been heavily doctored and that the two tests together look like a simulation of neutralising South Korean and American air power in the early stages of a conflict. These are North Korean claims and outside assessments.

Pyongyang had already tested a cluster warhead on a strategic cruise missile on Monday and a cluster bomb for tactical ballistic missiles on Saturday. The series opened last Thursday with firings from a 600mm multiple rocket launcher, which North Korea calls “super-precision”, in the presence of Kim Jong Un. The last three tests were not covered by Rodong Sinmun, the party’s official newspaper.

The link to Freedom Flag

Analysts link the series of tests to Freedom Flag, the South Korea-US air exercise now under way. Earlier in the week Kim Jong Sik had condemned the joint exercises, accusing “enemies” of stepping up their “military moves, openly or covertly”. Wednesday’s launches coincided with the US midterm elections and came after successive statements by Kim Yo Jong, the North Korean leader’s sister, rejecting Washington’s finding that North Korea is behind the theft of more than $6 billion in cryptocurrency from Binance; see our report on her denial.