The chief of Information Office at the DPRK Ministry of National Defence on Friday issued the following press statement "We will counter the enemies’ strategic threat with our strategic means":

Since the emergence of the Trump administration, the U.S. and its vassal forces are getting evermore pronounced in their military provocations threatening the security environment of the DPRK.

On Feb. 20, the U.S. staged a provocative joint air drill with the ROK by dispatching B-1B strategic bomber into the sky over the Korean peninsula. Earlier, on Feb. 19, it test-fired the ICBM Minuteman 3 at the Vandenberg Space Force Base towards the target in the Pacific.

Such military muscle-flexing of the U.S. clearly show the invariable supremacy ambition of the present U.S. administration to gain an overwhelming edge of strength through the maintenance and updating of military capabilities capable of mounting a nuclear attack on any country and region of the world without prior warning.

The U.S. provocative military moves in the vicinity of the DPRK in less than two months this year are a clear answer to where the real threat increasing the world’s concern over peace and security originates from.

Since Feb. 3, the U.S. military has waged a provocative joint live-shell firing drill with the ROK military gangsters, mobilizing thousands of troops and 150-odd pieces of military hardware of various missions in the area just 30 km away from the southern border of the DPRK.

The U.S. deployed a nuclear submarine in the Pusan operation base from Feb. 10 to 15, and on Feb. 13 in the ROK Bombardier BD-700 Global Express, the latest reconnaissance plane of a new generation which underwent a flight-test last year. It has also conducted air espionages on the DPRK’s areas from Feb. 15 with the mobilization of various tactical and strategic reconnaissance planes including P-8A sea patrol plane and RC-135V.

The U.S. is also mulling again staging the large-scale joint military exercises Freedom Shield, which includes seven rounds of brigade-level joint field maneuvers more compared to that of last year, in March in collusion with ROK in order to push the military tension in the region to an extreme phase.

The typical Yankee-style arrogance and shameless and gangster-like double-standards logic of the U.S., which brands the DPRK’s nuclear deterrence for self-defence as an injustice means and places "legality" and "regularity" on former’s moves for bolstering up nuclear force for hegemony, can never work on the DPRK.

The DPRK’s nuclear force is a means for legitimate defence to safeguard the national sovereignty and the security of the region. Its rapid and accelerated bolstering up is a realistic requirement for coping with the military threat of the U.S. and its satellite countries which are getting more rampant recently.

The adventuristic military moves of the U.S. premised on the use of nuclear strike means in an actual war are getting brisk and the hostile forces’ attempt at military confrontation is getting ever more undisguised. This reality clearly proves why the DPRK armed forces’ building up of the capability to fight a war with nuclear deterrence as a pivot is a just and inevitable option.

The DPRK’s solution to the military threat and challenge to the security being posed by the U.S. is clear and consistent.

The DPRK will counter the strategic threat of the U.S. and other enemies with strategic means and continue its responsible military activities to control and manage the unstable security environment on the Korean peninsula with powerful deterrence.

Rodong Sinmun