In a written statement to the Senate Committed on Armed Services, Gen. Gregory Guillot, commander of U.S. Northern Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command, claimed North Korea "probably can deliver a nuclear payload to targets throughout North America," citing Pyongyang's test-launch of an ICBM with solid fuel in October last year.
Solid-propellant missiles are more threatening than liquid-fuel ones as they need less time to prepare for launch, making surprise launches possible.
According to Guillot, Kim appears to be shifting from missile development to mass production and deployment, which could rapidly expand North Korea's ICBM arsenal.
Amid such a move from the North, U.S. President Donald Trump issued an executive order late last month, instructing officials to develop a multilayered defense shield against emerging missile threats within 60 days, modeled after Israel's "Iron Dome."
The order suggests that previous U.S. missile defense policies primarily focused on rogue states, failing to address the growing threats posed by advanced state-of-the-art missiles.
The U.S. currently operates around 40 Ground-Based Interceptors (GBIs) to counter incoming ICBMs in Alaska and California, with the Pentagon planning to procure 20 Next-Generation Interceptors (NGIs) by 2028.
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