North Korea jump-starts naval buildup by commissioning its largest-ever warship

By Brad Lendon, Yoonjung Seo, CNN

Seoul (CNN) — North Korea on Tuesday commissioned its largest-ever warship, a 5,000-ton destroyer that military analysts say could give Pyongyang’s adversaries something more to think about in a time of crisis.

In a speech at Nampho Shipyard on the country’s west coast, leader Kim Jong Un said the introduction represented a new chapter in its military history, declaring that its navy has “put an end to over 70 years of its stagnation.”

“In terms of military hardware, the navy was the weakest of all the services of our armed forces,” Kim said, according to a report from the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

“Things have changed obviously now,” Kim said.

“The combat capability of our navy will grow to be admirable beyond imagination.”

The North Korean naval fleet has long been eclipsed by South Korean and United States naval forces, which field modern warships and submarines with sophisticated electronics and powerful missile launch capabilities.

The destroyer commissioned Tuesday, the Choe Hyon, is expected to have anti-ship and land-attack missile capabilities, although neither can be confirmed to date, analysts said.

The new ship is a step up from North Korea’s traditional naval set-up, which has relied heavily on “asymmetric coastal forces such as submarines, fast-attack craft, coastal artillery, mines, and special forces infiltration,” said Yu Ji-hoon, research fellow at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses.

“The North Korean navy is moving away from its existing coastal-defense-centered structure towards extending its nuclear and missile threat into the maritime domain,” Yu said.

In his speech, Kim said the Choe Hyon will be the first ship of a modern North Korean fleet, with even bigger vessels coming.

He alluded to difficulties along the way, saying the country’s naval buildup “is never plain sailing,” perhaps referring to the troubles of the Choe Hyon’s sister ship, the Kang Kon, which capsized during its launch in May 2025.

The Kang Kon was refloated and launched again about a month later, and began sea trials earlier this month. Kim said it would also be commissioned “soon.”

He called for North Korean shipyards to turn out two new surface ships a year, including cruisers double the size of the Choe Hyon.

Though Kim stressed the new warship was a completely domestic product, Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul, said the pace of shipbuilding could indicate otherwise.

“The speed and intended scale of Kim Jong-un’s naval buildup suggest North Korea may be receiving significant material and technological assistance from Russia,” to which Pyongyang has sent troops and weapons to support its war in Ukraine, Easley said.

Still, analysts noted North Korea has a long way to go match South Korea and its US ally, which between them have dozens of destroyers armed with the latest missiles and combat systems.

“I don’t think (the Choe Hyon) directly adds a new threat to South Korea,” said Carl Schuster, a former director of the US Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Center.

“The ship’s survivability is limited during a conflict,” he said.

But he said it’s something that has to be accounted for in mission planning.

“North Korea has potentially forced the US, Japan and South Korea to expand their monitoring of North Korea’s navy,” he said.

And the fact that, at 5,000 tons, it is North Korea’s first true ocean-going warship, adds a new calculus to enforcement of United Nations arms sanctions on the Kim regime.

For example, a “warship escorting a maritime arms shipment complicates an intercept and boarding operation,” Schuster said.

Yu, the South Korean analyst, also said Seoul can’t dismiss North Korea’s new ship.

“Even if it falls short of being a fully modern destroyer, it could still pose a real burden to South Korean security if it’s used as a missile-launch platform or a means of escalating crises,” Yu said.

The-CNN-Wire
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