North Korea marked the 70th anniversary of its ruling Workers’ Party on Saturday with a massive military parade overseen by leader Kim Jong Un, who said his country was ready to fight any war waged by the United States.
“The party’s revolutionary armament means we are ready to fight any kind of war waged by the US imperialists,” Kim said in a speech strikingly more forceful than previous public comments, praising the feats of past leaders and the ruling party, Reuters reported.
He made no direct mention of the country’s nuclear program, likely a conciliatory diplomatic gesture towards China, which hosted the now-defunct “six-party talks”, also involving the United States, on giving economic incentives to Pyongyang in return for scrapping its atomic ambitions.
On Wednesday, a high-level US military official said Washington believed North Korea had the capability to launch a nuclear weapon against the US mainland and stood ready to defend against any such attacks.
Kim’s speech was followed by troops marching in formation, first by a corps of soldiers dressed in the style of the revolutionary force that fought Japan during World War Two, and then a procession of military might rolling past the square.
A battery of the North’s intercontinental ballistic missiles was the highlight of the weapons display, although they are not known to have been successfully tested.
