The United States under the Obama administration in 2014 began waging a covert cyberwar to damage North Korea's ballistic missile development program, and this secret cyberwar continues to this day. Results of this cyberwar vary but in the main appear to have been somewhat successful.

Like Us on Facebook

The program launched on orders of former U.S. President Barack Obama had spectacular initial results, report American media. Unnamed cyber warfare units of the U.S. armed forces, likely spearheaded by the U.S. Air Force, remotely struck at North Korea's missile program with the aim of sabotaging test launches of medium and intermediate range ballistic missiles soon after lift-off.

Sources in the Pentagon said a large number of North Korea's medium and intermediate range ballistic missiles exploded; swung off course; blew-up in midair or plunged into the sea after the Americans launched their cyberattacks. Proponents of the cyberattack campaign contend the program delayed the advance of North Korea's medium and intermediate range ballistic missile development program by several years.

American cyberattacks, however, failed to stop the program completely, and North Korea forged ahead to attain a number of successful launches since early 2016. North Korea conducted seven tests involving eight Musudan intermediate range ballistic missile from April to Oct. 15, 2016.

None of these tests were considered completely successful by the west. One test, a launch of two Musudans on June 22 from Wonsan, was considered a partial success.

The main goal of the U.S. effort, however, continues to be to delay, and probably stop, the development of a North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of delivering nuclear warheads to the continental United States.

U.S. military experts claim that disrupting North Korea's ICBM tests is probably the most effective way of stopping their ICBM program. But here the Americans seem to have failed.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un now boasts his country is in "the final stage in preparations" for the inaugural test launch of its first ICBM capable of delivering nuclear warheads to the continental United States.

Last month, South Korea media reported the North a test-launch a new, upgraded ICBM prototype "could be imminent."

The new ICBM will likely be a road-mobile missile similar to the Musudan. In the past, North Korea paraded dummies of a road-mobile missile believed to be an ICBM.

This missile was given the designation KN-08 by western observers. It's also believed to have an upgraded version, the KN-14.

TagsUnited States, cyberwar, North Korea, ballistic missile development program, Barack Obama, Musudan, Kim Jong Un, KN-08