Hwasong-18
The Hwasong-18 North Korean Intercontinental Ballistic Missile is road-mobile and carried by a 9-axles wheeled transporter erector launcher (TEL) vehicle to support the weight and size of the missile, allowing it to traverse various types of terrain. The missile is encased in a protective canister, which is mounted in the front-middle section of the TEL. This canister also serves as the launch tube when the missile is ready to be fired. To be launched, the missile is erected in a vertical position at the rear of the TEL. The use of a road-mobile TEL increases the missile's survivability and flexibility, as it is more challenging for adversaries to locate, track, and target the missile before launch. The crew cabins are located at the front of the truck on both the right and left sides of the missile, creating a U-shape around it. It is probable that the cabin also features necessary controls for operating the vehicle, as well as communication equipment to maintain contact with command centers and other units during transportation and launch operations.
Russia may have provided technical support to North Korea for its development of intercontinental ballistic missiles. The Center for Strategic and International Studies on 17 August 2023 released a report of the analysis by noted physicist Theodore Postol of the Hwasong-18, a new type of ICBM launched by North Korea in July 2023. The report said the successful launch of the solid-fuel missile occurred only months after a horizontal engine test. It said the sudden appearance of these advanced capabilities is "difficult to explain without cooperation from the Russian government and its scientists." The report said the physical dimensions and flight trajectory data of the Hwasong-18 are "nearly identical to that of the Russian Topol-M ICBM." It said the North Korean ICBM was likely developed with technical cooperation from Russia.
Theodore Postol, surely a great American and a national treasure, was a Science and Policy advisor on Strategic Nuclear issues to the Chief of Naval Operations. He is currently Professor Emeritus of Science, Technology, and National Security Policy at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a member of the New York Council on Foreign Relations.
US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan told reporters on 18 August 2023 that the intelligence community is taking a hard look at the CSIS report. He said Washington knows Russia has been seeking to obtain material for its war in Ukraine from North Korea. He added that as it has done with other countries, Russia will "usually also offer some types of security cooperation in return" and that the US is monitoring the situation closely.
Other analysts, however, said that while North Korea’s missiles showed similarities with Russian designs, they are not exactly the same and Pyongyang has several ways of gathering technical data from other countries, including computer hacking. Researchers at California’s James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS) in a draft report shared with Reuters pointed to what they called factual inaccuracies, including mistaking the Russian Topol-M and Yars ICBMs and misidentifying a spent Hwasong-18 rocket stage as a “decoy canister” designed to defeat anti-missile systems. Asked about those concerns, Postol called them “unsupported assertions”, saying in an email that his critics had not provided him with any technical evidence to comment on.
Missiles were paraded across Kim Il Sung Square during a military parade in Pyongyang, marking the 105th birth anniversary of Kim Il Sung, April 15, 2017. The procession featured an eight-wheeled Transporter Erector Launcher [TEL] vehicle bigger than anything seen on the parade route before, carrying missile canisters large enough to carry an intercontinental ballistic missiles with a range to hit the continental United States. Observers speculated about whether anything was inside the canisters or whether North Korea was merely demonstrating it could transport missiles of that size. The lack of detail on the cannisters and the TEL suggested they were early mockups. On July 4th, a similar eight-wheel launcher [minus the canister] showed up in a North Korean photo said to show Kim watching the launch of a Hwasong-14 two-stage intercontinental ballistic missile test. That missile reached an altitude of 1,730 miles, which on a different trajectory could have given it the range to hit U.S. military bases in Guam.
At a military parade in Pyongyang in February 2023, North Korea displayed a record number of nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missiles, including what analysts said was possibly a new solid-fuel ICBM. In the February 2023 military parade in Pyongyang, North Korea showcased a new, rather more detailed [and hence credible], TEL and missile cannister that could be a new solid-fuel ICBM. The mobile launcher had nine wheels on each side, one more than the eight previously seen. No launch of such a missile had been confirmed as of that date.
Solid propellants are a mixture of fuel and oxidiser. Metallic powders such as aluminium often serve as the fuel, and ammonium perchlorate, which is the salt of perchloric acid and ammonia, is the most common oxidiser. The fuel and oxidiser are bound together by a hard rubbery material and packed into a metal or fiber casing. When solid propellant burns, oxygen from the ammonium perchlorate combines with aluminium to generate enormous amounts of energy and temperatures of more than 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit (2,760 degrees Celsius), creating thrust and lifting the missile from the launch pad.
Solid fuel is dense and burns quite quickly, generating thrust over a short time. Separately, it can remain in storage for an extended period without degrading or breaking down – a common issue with liquid fuel. solid-fuel missiles are easier and safer to operate. They also require less logistical support, making them harder to detect and more survivable than liquid-fuel weapons.
One of the key advantages is that solid-fuelled missiles can be “fuelled from the point of manufacture”. “They, therefore, allow operators to maintain a high state of readiness and the potential to launch within minutes, depending on basing,” Joseph Dempsey, a researcher at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, wrote in an analysis in early 2023. In contrast, a liquid-fuelled ICBM would need to undergo a fuelling process before launch, said Dempsey. That could take hours, giving an adversary time to identify, react and neutralise it before its launch. In contrast, a liquid-fuelled ICBM would need to undergo a fuelling process before launch, said Dempsey. That could take hours, giving an adversary time to identify, react and neutralise it before its launch.
“This is a significant breakthrough for the North Koreans, but not an unexpected one,” said Ankit Panda, an expert with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “Because these missiles are fuelled at the time of manufacture and are thus ready to use as needed, they will be much more rapidly useable in a crisis or conflict, depriving South Korea and the United States of valuable time that could be useful to preemptively hunt and destroy such missiles.”
Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul, said the days of North Korea disguising ICBM activity as satellite launches were long-gone and that Kim’s “blatant violations” of UN Security Council resolutions showed that his goal was to “make North Korea a full-fledged nuclear power and demand concessions from other countries”.
North Korea's state-run television carried coverage of North Korea's largest-ever military parade held in Pyongyang on 08 February 2023. New types of missiles on large mobile launchers were seen. Analysts say these may include a new solid-fuel ICBM. what stole the show were the large missile canisters atop five new 18-wheel launch vehicles. They're believed to contain new solid engine ICBMs under development. Those canister ICBMs are probably just for the moment prototypes. They're probably not anywhere near deployable. And maybe not even operational, but they're showing the direction that they're going in. And given the fact that it, we are relatively certain that North Korea's had at least two and possibly even more solid fuel static engine tests that they're moving towards accomplishing their task at some point. The canisterised ICBM might be the one seen during a 2017 parade, which has so far not been tested. It is unclear how close the suspected new solid-fuel ICBM could be to testing. North Korea has sometimes displayed mockups of missiles at parades.
Both the first and second Hwasong-18 launches were conducted from the same spot outside Pyongyang, in a field that Colin Zwirko, senior analytic correspondent for NK PRO, noted commercial satellite imagery showed had been purpose built and likely reinforced with concrete beneath the grass. The greenery observed in the second launch was far more verdant and photogenic than in the first launch, suggesting that the garneders had been called in to reinforce the area with a multitude of large and small trees being planted all around the launch site. By the second launch, the whole area resembled nothing so much as a golf course, replete with water hazards, missing only putting greens.
The 18-wheeled vehicle transporter erector launcher (TEL), providing the ability to fire missiles from unpredictable locations, is a bit smaller in size to the Russisan MAZ-7917 chassis with a wheel formula of 14x12. Equipped with a 710-strong diesel, it is intended for a mobile complex equipped with intercontinental ballistic missiles "Topol" and "Yars". This giant, so beloved of Victory Day parades, Red Square, develops a road speed of up to 40 km/h.
