North Korea fired multiple ballistic missiles into its eastern waters on Monday, the latest in a streak of weapons tests that keeps getting louder. This comes roughly two months after Donald Trump unilaterally scaled back a major US-South Korea military exercise, with the president citing his "very good relationship" with Kim Jong Un. Kim, apparently, did not get the memo about the relationship.
Monday's Launch, By The Numbers We Actually Have
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said the missiles were fired from the area around Pyongyang, where North Korea has been using its airport as a major launch site in recent years. Yes, the airport. Somewhere there is a flight to Vladivostok sitting on the tarmac while a ballistic missile gets the runway, according to CBS News.
Seoul did not immediately say how many missiles were detected or how far they flew. Japan's Defense Ministry said it spotted at least two and assessed that they landed in waters outside Japan's exclusive economic zone. So nobody got hit. That is the good news, and it is also the entire list of good news.
A Streak, Not A Blip
Monday was not a one-off. Just nine days earlier, on Oct. 3, North Korea tested what it described as a hypersonic intermediate-range missile, designed to evade missile defenses in South Korea and Japan. Pyongyang has also run other missile tests and live-fire drills and commissioned a new warship.
The point of all this hardware is not subtle. Kim wants a bigger arsenal of nuclear-capable systems, and he wants everyone watching to know it. He is flaunting the program while rejecting every US and South Korean offer to restart the long-stalled diplomacy.
South Korea is not exactly sitting still either. On Friday it flight-tested its first domestically developed hypersonic weapon, built to fly at least five times the speed of sound and slip past missile defenses. President Lee Jae Myung called it an important step in strengthening the South's conventional defense. Two Koreas, two hypersonic programs, one very bad week for anyone who likes the word "stability."
Land Mines And Nonexistent Apologies
Last month, three South Korean soldiers were injured in land mine explosions near the heavily armed border between the two Koreas. South Korea's military and the US-led United Nations Command concluded the blasts came from devices planted by North Korea.
Pyongyang denied it. Then it ridiculed Seoul for demanding an apology. Read that again. Soldiers got hurt, the investigators pointed at the North, and the North's response was to mock the people asking for accountability.
Public anger in the South is growing, and it should be. Nobody gets maimed by a mine they didn't plant themselves and then gets laughed at for asking why.
Kim Has Closed The Diplomacy Shop
Kim has halted all diplomacy and cooperation with South Korea and now calls it a permanent enemy. That is not a negotiating posture. That is a funeral announcement for the entire idea of talking.
He has also brushed off Trump's repeated calls to revive their diplomacy, which collapsed in 2019. His government's terms are blunt: Washington must abandon its "hostile" policy and drop its demand for denuclearization as a precondition for talks. In other words, the US would have to give up the thing the talks are supposed to be about before anyone sits down.
So the offer on the table from Pyongyang is this: concede everything first, then we'll consider chatting. Good luck with that.
The Trump Detour: Goodwill As Foreign Policy
Here is where the story gets properly ugly. In August, Washington unilaterally decided to scale back a major military exercise with South Korea. Trump's stated reason was his "very good relationship" with Kim.
A personal rapport with a dictator was apparently enough to shrink a joint drill with an ally, on the American side, without a corresponding gesture from Pyongyang. The reward for that gesture has been a hypersonic missile test, a warship, mine blasts on the border, and Monday's launches.
Meanwhile, Lee Jae Myung, who favors engagement with the North and has tempered his rhetoric even as his public seethes, is the one absorbing the political damage. His outreach is in tatters. He is now also pushing to strengthen South Korea's conventional forces and lean less on the United States. Honestly, after the August drill decision, you can see why a South Korean president might start doing the math.
The Dingo Take
The official line from the White House is that Trump has a "very good relationship" with Kim Jong Un. The facts say Kim tested a hypersonic missile on Oct. 3, fired more ballistic missiles on Monday, got caught planting land mines that wounded three South Korean soldiers, and told Washington to drop denuclearization before he'll even take a meeting. That is not a good relationship. That is a man getting a free concession and sending back a missile.
The August drill decision is the part that should make your teeth hurt. An ally got its joint exercise trimmed because the American president feels warmly toward the guy pointing rockets at that ally. Warmth is not a strategy. Warmth is what you feel toward a dog that hasn't bitten you yet, and Kim has been biting the entire time.
None of this means the answer is a shooting war. It means the answer is not vibes. Real diplomacy involves leverage, allies who trust you, and a counterpart who has any reason to show up. Right now Kim has no reason, Seoul is quietly planning to need America less, and the president is still telling anyone who'll listen how well he and Kim get along. Somebody should tell the missiles.
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