US says that its missile defense is focused on North Korea

A high-ranking official at the U.S. Department of Defense expressed concerns on North Korea’s missile advancement and stressed that it must continue to advance to meet evolving threats from the North.

"Our national missile defense capability is clearly focused on North Korea right now, not on China, Russia and Iran," Gen. John Hyten told a webinar hosted by Washington-based think tank Center for Strategic & International Studies, on Tuesday (local time).

"Without going into the classified details...I'll just say...go and look at the video of the North Korean parade, and you will just see different missiles coming through on that parade," he said, commenting new missiles recently displayed at the 8th Labor Party parade. Gen. John Hyten explained that there had been a chance of North Korea aiming to fire nuclear warheads to the U.S. in 2017 and that U.S. stationed missile intercepters in Alaska and California to address the threat.

Gen. Hyten described “Next Generation Interceptor,” which is currently under development by the U.S., and underlined the need to continue maintaining and developing defense capabilities against North Korea.


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