The South Korean Air Force conducts aerial refueling drills, involving a KC-330 refueling tanker and F-35A stealth jets on Feb. 21, 2023, in this photo released by the armed service.
SEOUL, Feb. 21 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea’s Air Force staged aerial refueling drills, involving F-35A stealth fighters, on Tuesday, a day after North Korea fired two rockets, which it claimed can be mobilized to “destroy an enemy operational airfield.”
The armed service deployed a KC-330 refueling tanker and an unspecified number of F-35A jets for the drills, officials said. It has conducted such drills regularly but disclosed them to the media for the first time.
“Especially with its stealth function that enables (the F-35As) to avoid detection by the enemy’s radar system, it can infiltrate stealthily into enemy areas and strike core targets,” the Air Force said in a statement explaining the combat capabilities of the F-35As.
Confirming Monday’s launches, the North’s official Korean Central News Agency reported its 600-mm multiple rocket launcher is a “tactical nuclear attack means boasting of the great might powerful enough to assign only one multiple rocket launcher with four shells so as to destroy an enemy operational airfield.”
The South Korean military said the North’s latest saber-rattling involved two short-range ballistic missiles, which flew some 390 kilometers and 340 km, respectively.
Given their flight distances, the missiles can cover a key South Korean air base in Cheongju, home to F-35A jets, as well as an American air base in Gunsan, which operates F-16 fighters and other air assets, according to observers.
Cheongju and Gunsan are located 112 km and 179 km south of Seoul, respectively.
(Yonhap)
