NORK Solid Fuel SRBMS?

Today, I came across this declassified document with what must be the worst illustration in the history of intelligence community products (above).

Yikes.

The recent stuff by NASIC is much better, though not exactly Bonestell

Anyway, I came across this little pic while modeling some NORK ballistic missiles with MIT’s Geoff Forden and David Wright.

In a strange coincidence, Yonhap reports that General Burwell Bell, Commander of US Forces Korea, has confirmed that North Korea’s recent tests again included short-range solid fueled ballistic missiles.

Bell’s remarks are posted on the USFK website, but they don’t include that remark, which may have been made in response to a question.

I don’t doubt, of course, that Bell said it—he told Congress in March 2006 that North Korea had been testing solid-fueled SRBMs:

Only in the last couple of days they’ve again tested short-range ballistic missiles that are in fact a quantum leap forward from the kinds of missiles that they’ve produced in the past, solid fuel missiles that have great reliability, are easy to move around a battlefield, have higher accuracy potential, et cetera, et cetera.

They’re routinely testing these.

Dan Pinkston’s March 2006 write-up has the essential details.

Name: KN-02
Provenance: SS-21
Range: 100-120 km
Payload: 250 kg
Turn-ons: Targeting data, Men with Personality Cults
Turn-offs: Stuck Up ICBMs, Airstrikes