The statement came just days after the U.S. said it had deployed nuclear-capable strategic bombers on the island of Guam.
Advertisement
The United States landed a B-1B Lancer in South Korea for the first time in 20 years Wednesday, labeling it the “closest flight ever to North Korea” by the supersonic bomber.
The South’s Yonhap news agency said the aircraft flew over a US live-fire training site in the Pocheon area bordering the North.
The announcement comes on the heels of two demonstrations of military unity between the US and South Korea against the Kim Jong Un regime.
The peninsula faces a “grave security crisis” because of the North’s defiance, said Lt. Gen.
“What we are showing today is just one tool we have to choose from a wide array of options”, Bergeson said in a US Forces Korea statement, as cited by Stripes. Lee Wang-keun, South Korea’s Air Force Operations Commander. One of the bombers landed at the base; U.S. Forces Korea declined to say how long it would remain there.
Originally developed for nuclear capacities, the bomber was converted to its exclusively conventional combat role in the mid-1990s.
One of the bombers returned to a United States base in Guam while the other touched down at Osan which USA military officials said was created to send a message.
The U.S. also sent two of the bombers, each accompanied by four South Korean and U.S. fighter jets, in a flyover of Osan four days after the most recent nuclear test. Each Boeing-made B-1B bomber costs $317 million and the US military has 62 of them.
According to Euan Graham, director of the International Security Program at the Lowy Institute in Sydney, the most noteworthy aspect of the flights was not the nearness to the North Korean border, but rather than a nonnuclear jet is now being tasked with the role of nuclear reassurance.
“These extremely reckless provocations of the United States imperialist warmongers are pushing the situation on the Korean Peninsula to the point of explosion hour by hour”, the agency stated, noting that the South “had better stop their rash actions” as the North is perfectly capable of “beat [ing] back any aggression and provocation at a single blow.” .
The B-1B doesn’t now carry nuclear weapons under a disarmament treaty, and some US experts do not consider them as nuclear capable in their current configuration.
The North conducted its fifth underground atomic blast on September 9, ignoring worldwide condemnation and sanctions imposed after the previous nuclear test in January.
The government has stepped up monitoring of North Korea on concerns that it may carry out another nuclear test or a missile launch in the weeks to come.
The flyover by the B-1B Lancer bombers hours after North Korean state media reported that its leader, Kim Jong-un, had supervised a ground test of a new rocket engine, which will be used to launch satellites. In February, the North launched a satellite that was widely seen as a test of long-range ballistic missile technology.
Critics, however, believe is a cover for a nuclear weapons program, the New York Times reported.
Washington, meanwhile, has pressed Beijing, Pyongyang’s most important diplomatic backer and trading partner, to do more to rein in the country.
Advertisement
US President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping of China both condemned the latest nuclear tests.
