North Korea satellite images reveal Kim Jong-un's rocket engine factory
CHILLING satellite images of a North Korea explosives factory show how the regime’s missile capabilities have become more sophisticated under Kim Jong-un’s leadership, as a CIA director warns the secretive state could be able to hit the US with a nuclear weapon in a “handful of months”.
CIA director warns North Korea could hit US 'within months'
The images show two mixing and casting facilities that were completed in the regime’s No.17 Explosives Factory in 2014, after construction work began two years earlier.
The site has allowed the secretive regime to expand its solid-propellant missile force, the North Korea analysis site 38 North reported.
Kim Jong-un, who came into power in 2011, has been working on developing solid propellant missiles because they can be transported, stored and launched more quickly than liquid-fuelled systems.
United Nations satellite images have indicated buildings associated with the production of solid fuel.
Kim Jong-un has been developing North Korea's missile capabilities
An aerial image highlights two facilities used in producing solid fuel
A satellite image identifies the different facilities in Hungnam-guyok
North Korea has been expanding its missile capabilities since the Korea War that ended in 1953
It is the largest producer of explosives in the country.
In the early 1990s production slowed due to the collapse of North Korea’s economy and a famine known as the Arduous March.
The satellite images have emerged as Kim Jong-un announced North Korea would “smash” the USA if it continued to interfere in the region.
Kim said Donald Trump’s sabre-rattling is “driving the situation to the brink of war”.
A new facility is said to be under construction in the missile development area