US, Japan Conduct Military Drills After N. Korea's Test Launches

MOSCOW (Sputnik) - Japan and the United States have conducted joint military drills near the northwest of Kyushu island, deploying fighter jets and strategic bombers after recent test launches by North Korea, the Japanese Joint Staff said on Saturday.

"Japan Self-Defense Forces and U.S. Armed Forces conducted a bilateral exercise on Friday, Nov 19 amid an increasingly severe security environment surrounding Japan, following North Korea's ICBM-class Ballistic Missile launch that landed within Japanese Exclusive Economic Zone in the Sea of Japan," the statement read.

The military exercises involved five Japanese Mitsubishi F-2 fighters, the 8th Air Wing tactical fighter squadron, two US Rockwell B-1 Lancer heavy bombers and the 28th Bomb Wing air force unit.

On Friday, North Korea launched what was preliminarily identified as a Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile, capable of reaching the US mainland. The South Korean military reported that the missile flew about 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) and reached an altitude of 6,100 kilometers at a maximum speed of Mach 22, which is 22 times faster than the speed of sound. According to the Japanese officials, the missile fell about 200 kilometers west of Hokkaido's Oshima Island within Japan's exclusive economic zone.

The new launch came a day after North Korea fired a short-range ballistic missile toward the Sea of Japan and warned the US and its allies that Pyongyang would respond proportionally to Washington's bolstering of extended deterrence.

North Korea has conducted dozens of missile test launches since the start of 2022, several missiles at once on some occasions. On November 2, Pyongyang launched more than 20 short-range missiles. North Korea said its military-related activities came in response to provocations by South Korea, the United States, and Japan.