SEOUL, Aug. 29 (Xinhua) -- South Korea's military on Tuesday unveiled a rare footage of ballistic missile tests after the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) fired a missile over Japan.
The 86-second-long video clip showed the three tests of a ballistic missile with an improved warhead power and a range of 500 km and two ballistic missiles with a range of 800 km, according to South Korea's defense ministry.
The tests were carried out on Aug. 24 as a final flight test, before deploying the homegrown ballistic missiles. Their developments were led by the state-run Agency for Defense Development (ADD).
The rare release of the missile test footage by South Korea followed the DPRK's launch of an unidentified missile that flew over the northernmost Japanese island of Hokkaido.
The DPRK missile, which was fired from an area near the capital Pyongyang, passed over the Japanese territory and landed in the Pacific Ocean, after a flight of about 2,500 km. It was lofted as high as 550 km.
The ADD said in a statement that it had developed new ballistic missiles with extended range, improved precision and diversified warheads to build the so-called three pillars of the Korean version to counter the DPRK's threats.
The three pillars refer to the Kill Chain, the Korea Air and Missile Defense (KAMD) and the Korea Massive Punishment and Retaliation (KMPR) systems.
The ballistic missile of a 500-km range was at the core of the Kill Chain and the KMPR systems to target the entire territory of the DPRK, the ADD noted.
The Kill Chain is designed to preemptively strike the DPRK's missile launch sites when signs of the first strike are spotted. The KMPR is a project to preemptively strike the DPRK's leadership and headquarters with massive missile attacks when Pyongyang's first strike signs are detected.
The KAMD is a project to develop its indigenous missile defense system to shoot down incoming DPRK missiles at multiple layers. The project includes the development of interceptors such as medium-range surface-to-air missiles (M-SAM) and long-range surface-to-air missiles (L-SAM) that can intercept missiles at an altitude of less than 100 km.
