Faced with annoyed allies and unblinking enemies, North Korea is likely to pull the plug on the current crisis by test-firing a missile or two and declaring victory ahead of a national celebration on Monday, analysts say.

After weeks of escalating tensions and threatening nuclear war, shooting off a missile that causes no damage will give Kim Jong Un the opportunity to save face with his people -- and appease his military -- without inviting serious retaliation, experts say.

"It's all a kind of Kabuki theater," said Doug Bandow of the Cato Institute, a libertarian Washington think tank.

Observers caution, however, that with so much unknown about the political situation inside the secretive rogue state, it's possible that North Korea could take more aggressive action that would goad a fed-up South Korea into a forceful reaction.

---

"That would be uncharted waters," said David Straub, associate director of Stanford's Korean studies program.

Gordon Chang, author of "Nuclear Showdown: North Korea Takes on the World," said Sunday is the most likely day for a missile launch.

Before that, Secretary of State John Kerry will be in Beijing and shooting off a medium-range missile during that visit would be seen as a slap in the face of China, which has chided North Korea for its bellicose stance.

By Sunday, Kerry will be in Japan.

"This is going to be a launch while Kerry is in Tokyo," Chang said. "Send a missile over the Ginza [Tokyo's shopping district], humiliate the U.S., please the Chinese, who will be chortling about it for weeks."

The next day, conveniently, is a day of enormous significance in North Korea -- the birth date of Kim Il Sung, the founder of North Korea and Kim Jong Un's grandfather.

Korea-watchers expect there would be a declaration of a victory unrecognized anywhere else in the world, dancing in the streets, and then quiet until the drama repeats itself at some point in the near future.

"We've been there, done that," Straub said of a possible missile launch. "Unless they lobbed these things onto Japan, there's not going to be some huge sanctions from it."

Experts agree, however, that because the leadership dynamics in Pyongyang are murky, it's impossible to know how far Kim, or whoever is running the country, will go.

Many believe Kim's incessant saber-rattling -- irritating even China and Russia -- is an effort to recompense North Korea's powerful military leaders and consolidate a weak power base.

North Korea has prepped two medium-range Musudan-1 missiles waiting on its east coast, but Chang said a bolder move would be firing longer-range missiles from deeper inside the North's territory.

Noting the hubbub in Washington over reports that North Korea may have miniaturized nuclear warheads, Chang said Kim would "roil the world" if he tested a warhead in the atmosphere.

"I think Kim Jong Un would get a lot of credit from the generals. They would just love that," he said.

Straub said his fear would be a repeat of 2010, when North Korea sank a South Korean ship without provocation, killing 46 people, and then shelled a South Korean island.

After the 2010 attacks, Seoul told Pyongyang it would not tolerate a similar act of aggression and North Korea has heeded that warning.

"But one worries that they might do that again or even something a little worse," Straub said.

Bandow said the danger of trying to predict North Korea's next move is the lack of intelligence about who holds the upper hand there: Is it the party or the military? Is it young Kim, his aunt and uncle, or the generals?

If the threats and even a test-fire are just "chest-beating" to shore up the support from the starving masses, Bandow and others aren't overly worried about the repercussions.

"The danger," he said, "is if there really is some kind of power struggle going on, if the military wants more."

Related:

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Analysis: China grows weary of North Korea

Full North Korea coverage from NBC News

 

This story was originally published on Fri Apr 12, 2013 3:08 PM EDT

The U.S. is deploying 14 new ground-based missile interceptors in Alaska to counter renewed nuclear threats from North Korea and Iran, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Friday.

The new interceptors will be based at Fort Greely, an Army launch site about 100 miles southeast of Fairbanks, Alaska, and are projected to be fully deployed by 2017, Hagel said. The additions will bring the U.S.-based ground interceptor deployment from 30 to 44, including four that are based in California.

---

That will boost U.S. missile defense capability by 50 percent and "make clear to the world that the United States stands firm against aggression," he said in a briefing at the Pentagon.

The announcement comes as North Korea has been making bellicose threats to void the armistice that ended the Korean War and launch a nuclear attack on the U.S. The U.S. and South Korea began annual military drills this week despite the North Korean threats.

Hagel said the U.S. would also shift some "resources," which he didn't specify, from the delayed Aegis anti-missile program in Europe to U.S.-based defenses, saying the Aegis program was "lagging" because of reduced congressional funding. And he reiterated previously announced plans to add a second U.S. anti-ballistic missile radar installation in Japan.

Taking all of the moves together, "we will be able to add protection against missiles from Iran sooner while also proving protection against the threat from North Korea," he said.

Even before the announcement, Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., a member of the Armed Services Committee, criticized the news, saying it was too little and too late.

"I applaud the Obama administration's decision, but it shouldn't have taken the predictable saber-rattling from North Korea to bring this about," Ayotte said in a statement Friday. 

Pointing to Iran's nuclear program, Ayotte called on the Obama administration to "move expeditiously to construct an East Coast missile defense site."

"Americans living in the Eastern United States should have the same level of missile defense protection as those in the West," she said.

Courtney Kube and Kelly O'Donnell of NBC News contributed to this report. Follow M. Alex Johnson on Twitter and Facebook.

Watch US News videos on NBCNews.com

This story was originally published on Fri Mar 15, 2013 7:28 PM EDT

Thursday’s announcement by North Korea that it could launch a pre-emptive nuclear attack against the United States in the face of new U.N. sanctions is a predictable escalation of the isolated nation’s increasingly aggressive stance toward Washington over the past year. But experts note that Pyongyang’s recent advances in its nuclear weapons and missile programs mean that such bellicose rhetoric cannot be taken lightly.

The escalation of the North’s oratory began not long after the country’s 28-year-old leader, Kim Jong Un,  took over from his late father, Kim Jong Il, on Dec. 28, 2011. It has been accompanied by two space launches – one successful – and a third nuclear weapons test.

 It is not unusual for the North to make threats against the U.S., Japan or South Korea. And on occasion -- as in the case of the 2010 artillery barrage of Yeonpyeong Island and an earlier attack on a South Korean gunboat -- it has carried out these threats.  It has never taken any military action after threatening the United States, however.

---

Some analysts have suggested that the latest round of threats is intended to show that the young Kim will continue his father’s legacy of hostility toward the U.S.

To what end?

North Korea has long wanted the U.S. to sit down with its negotiators to hammer out an agreement to end the Korean War, which ended in 1953 not in a peace treaty but in a truce.

The North would like to gain concessions from the U.S. in such a negotiation, but its escalating threats and rhetoric have the opposite effect:  The Obama administration, like preceding administrations, has steadfastly refused to negotiate with Pyongyang.

The problem is that North Korea, which has long taken a backseat in U.S. councils to the Middle East, does have military capabilities that could at the very least threaten U.S. interests in North Asia.

According to a recent analysis, North Korea has a weapon stockpile that could threaten both Japan and South Korea and, in longer term, the United States. Some of the weapons have already been deployed, say U.S. officials, who spoke to NBC News on condition of anonymity. Moreover, the North has begun research into more advanced and dangerous weapons, possibly even thermonuclear weapons, they say. 

At the high end of the stockpile range, U.S. officials and other researchers said North Korea may already have up to "a few dozen" nuclear weapons that could be fitted atop its vast fleet of ballistic missiles. Those missiles are limited to an intermediate range, capable of hitting targets in Japan, South Korea or elsewhere in the northern Pacific, including U.S. military bases as far south as Guam, the officials believe.

Related story: UN passes sanctions despite North Korea threat of 'pre-emptive nuclear attack'

The U.S. believes the space launch tests are part of a development plan for an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of reaching the continental United States with a payload of several hundred kilotons — 10 to 20 times the size of the bombs that destroyed the Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

U.S. officials publicly express confidence that the national missile defense system based in Alaska would be able to shoot down any incoming North Korean ICBM.

“I can tell you that the United States is fully capable of defending against any North Korean ballistic missile attack,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said Thursday in response to a question about the North Korean threat.

 He also said the U.N. sanctions will make it harder for Pyongyang to continue to make progress on its weapons and missiles. 

“North Korea … will now face new barriers to developing its banned nuclear and ballistic missile programs,” he said. “Resolution 2094 increases North Korea's isolation and demonstrates to North Korea's leaders the increasing costs they pay for defying the international community.” 

For the past several years, the U.S. also has been monitoring North Korean research into thermonuclear weapons — hydrogen bombs and bombs known as boosted-fission weapons, in which plutonium and uranium are combined for a higher energy yield. (The problem is that if the North conducted a test and claimed that it was thermonuclear, the U.S. would have difficulty determining if the North was telling the truth. The test site at Kilchu is far enough inland that the U.S. would not have access to the particulate matter needed to make an accurate determination, experts say. )

David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, or ISIS, a nonpartisan nuclear arms research group, said last year that any tests in the future may also be about ensuring the reliability of North Korea's current weapons design.

"Once you get beyond a dozen, it makes sense to test type and reliability of your weapons," he said. Albright said then that his group's estimate of North Korea's weapons stockpile is a bit less than those provided by the U.S. officials, but that ISIS, too, believes Pyongyang has "missile-deliverable weapons."

The design of the weapons is believed to be based on Chinese models (as were the first generation Pakistani nuclear weapons). The design is basic, and was developed in the 1960s with help from the Soviet Union, which used it to produce a whole line of nuclear warheads.

While some analysts suggested that the North planned its December rocket launch to gain attention ahead of the presidential election in South Korea , some in the U.S. non-proliferation community think otherwise. They expect that once the North feels comfortable with its ICBM technology, it will deploy the missiles.  They point to the Musudan intermediate range missile which was tested in middle of the last decade, then deployed — presumably with nuclear warheads — and aimed at Japan.

Once the North has confidence in the long-range missile based on the space rocket, U.S. officials believe they will deploy it as well, making North Korea the third nation to have nuclear weapons targeted at the United States, after Russia and China.

Many in the Obama administration see that as a more frightening prospect than Iran gaining nuclear weapons, believing that Tehran is a rational actor that will serve its own national interest and preserve the regime, compared to successive generations of North Korean leaders who have shown that they are unpredictable and erratic.

But would it force the U.S. to conduct face-to-face talks with the North? State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said in December that the North has a better option.

Referring to Kim Jong Un, Nuland said: "He can plot a way forward that ends the isolation, that brings relief and a different way of life and progress to his people, or he can further isolate them with steps like this. He can spend his time and his money shooting off missiles, or he can feed his people, but he can't have both."

NBC News' Shawna Thomas contributed to this report; this piece is an updated version of a post originally published on Dec. 13, 2012.

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North Korea does not appear to be making preparations for a nuclear weapons test following Tuesday’s test of a space launch vehicle, which was believed to be cover for a long-range missile test, U.S. intelligence analysts told NBC News.

South Korean and Japanese officials had feared that a nuclear weapons test — its third after previous detonations in in October 2006 and May 2009 — would quickly follow the launch.

But word that the North isn’t thought to be preparing for a test is providing little solace for Seoul or Tokyo, mainly because recent intelligence suggests that the North has made significant advances in its nuclear weapons program.

---

According to a recent analysis, North Korea has a weapon stockpile that could threaten both countries and, in longer term, the United States. Some of the weapons have already been deployed, say U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity. Moreover, the North has begun research into more advanced and dangerous weapons, possibly even thermonuclear weapons, they say.  

 

At the high end of the stockpile range, U.S. officials and other researchers said North Korea may already have up to "a few dozen" nuclear weapons that could be fitted atop its vast fleet of ballistic missiles. Those missiles are limited to an intermediate range, capable of hitting targets in Japan, South Korea or elsewhere in the northern Pacific, including U.S. military bases as far south as Guam, the officials believe.

'Highly provocative'
The U.S. believes the space launch test is part of a development plan for an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of reaching the continental United States with a payload of several hundred kilotons — 10 to 20 times the size of the bombs that destroyed the Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland hinted about that Wednesday, calling the launch "highly provocative" and a "threat" to regional security. The U.S. is "concerned that all of this launching is about a weapons program and is not about peaceful uses of space," she added.

More North Korea coverage from NBC News

For the past several years, the U.S. also has been monitoring North Korean research into thermonuclear weapons — hydrogen bombs and bombs known as boosted fission weapons, in which plutonium and uranium are combined for a higher energy yield. (The problem is that if the North conducted a test and claimed that it was thermonuclear, the U.S. would have difficulty determining if the North was telling the truth. The test site at Kilchu is far enough inland that the U.S. would not have access to the particulate matter needed to make an accurate determination, experts say. )

David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, or ISIS, a nonpartisan nuclear arms research group, said earlier this year that any tests in the future may also be about ensuring the reliability of North Korea's current weapons design.

"Once you get beyond a dozen, it makes sense to test type and reliability of your weapons," he said. Albright said then that his group's estimate of North Korea's weapons stockpile is a bit less than those provided by the U.S. officials, but that ISIS, too, believes Pyongyang has "missile-deliverable weapons."

The design of the weapons is believed to be based on Chinese models (as were the first generation Pakistani nuclear weapons). The design is basic, and was developed in the 1960s with help from the Soviet Union, which used it to produce a whole line of nuclear warheads.

ANALYSIS: 'Spoiled child' North Korea snubs key ally China with rocket test

While some analysts suggest that the North is using its space rocket launch to gain attention ahead of next week’s presidential election in South Korea -- and possibly to force talks with the U.S. — some in the U.S. non-proliferation community think otherwise. They expect that once the North feels comfortable with its ICBM technology, it will deploy the missiles.  They point to the Musudan intermediate range missile which was tested in middle of the last decade, then deployed — presumably with nuclear warheads — and aimed at Japan. 

Once the North has confidence in the long-range missile based on the space rocket, U.S. officials believe they will deploy it as well, making North Korea the third nation to have nuclear weapons targeted at the United States, after Russia and China.

Many in the Obama administration see that as a more frightening prospect than Iran gaining nuclear weapons, believing that Tehran is a rational actor that will serve its own national interest and preserve the regime, compared to successive generations of North Korean leaders who have shown that they are unpredictable and erratic.

But would it force the U.S. turn to conduct face-to-face talks with the North? Nuland said Wednesday that the North has a better option.

Speaking of the North’s 27-year-old leader Kim Jong Un, Nuland said: "He can plot a way forward that ends the isolation, that brings relief and a different way of life and progress to his people, or he can further isolate them with steps like this. He can spend his time and his money shooting off missiles, or he can feed his people, but he can't have both."

Robert Windrem is a senior investigative producer for NBC News.

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DUBAI -- Iran has threatened to destroy U.S. military bases across the Middle East and target Israel within minutes of being attacked, Iranian media reported on Wednesday, as Revolutionary Guards extended test-firing of ballistic missiles into a third day.

Israel has hinted it may attack Iran if diplomacy fails to secure a halt to its disputed nuclear energy program. The United States also has mooted military action as a last-resort option but has frequently nudged the Israelis to give time for intensified economic sanctions to work against Iran.

"These bases are all in range of our missiles, and the occupied lands (Israel) are also good targets for us," Amir Ali Haji Zadeh, commander of the Revolutionary Guards aerospace division, was quoted by Fars news agency as saying.

---

Haji Zadeh said 35 U.S. bases were within reach of Iran's ballistic missiles, the most advanced of which commanders have said could hit targets 1,300 miles away.

"We have thought of measures to set up bases and deploy missiles to destroy all these bases in the early minutes after an attack," he added.

It was not clear where Haji Zadeh got his figures on U.S. bases in the region. U.S. military facilities in the Middle East are located in Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Turkey, and it has around 10 bases further afield in Afghanistan and Kyrgyzstan.

NYT: US sends ships, planes to Persian Gulf as tension mounts

Defense analysts are often skeptical about what they describe as exaggerated military assertions by Iran and say the country's military capability would be no match for sophisticated U.S. defense systems.

'Great Prophet 7' tests
Iranian media reported that this week's three-day "Great Prophet 7" tests involved dozens of missiles and domestically built drones that successfully destroyed simulated air bases.

Iran has upped its fiery anti-West rhetoric in response to the launch on Sunday of a total European Union embargo on buying Iranian crude oil - the latest calibrated increase in sanctions aimed at pushing Tehran into curbing nuclear activity.

Revolutionary Guards commanders have also threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz, through which more than a third of the world's seaborne oil trade passes out of the Gulf, in response to the increasingly harsh sanctions.

Danger zone then and now: Strait of Hormuz

Major powers have said they would tolerate no obstruction of commercial traffic through the Strait, and the United States maintains a formidable naval presence in the Gulf region.

Iran accused the West of disrupting global energy supplies and creating regional instability and says its forces can dominate the vital waterway to provide security.

"The policy of the Islamic Republic is based on maintaining security in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz for all ships and oil tankers," Iranian English-language state Press TV quoted the chairman of parliament's national security and foreign policy committee, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, as saying.

The United States and its allies accuse Iran of using its nuclear program to covertly develop all the components required to produce nuclear weapons, accusations the Iranian officials have repeatedly denied.

The world's No. 5 oil exporter maintains that it is enriching uranium for nuclear fuel only to generate more energy for a rapidly growing population.

Oil deal axed
Meanwhile, Kenya on Wednesday canceled a deal to import Iranian oil hours after the U.S. warned the country that it risked being penalized if it sees through the deal which would breach U.S. and European union sanctions, a government official said.

Kenya's Energy Permanent Secretary Patrick Nyoike said Kenya had not signed an agreement but had a memorandum of understanding with Iran to import its oil and was complying with international sanctions on Iran.

The U.S. announced in December that it would penalize banks that do oil deals with Iran, giving countries and the oil markets until the end of June to adjust.

A statement from the U.S. State Department said Wednesday that sanctions will be implemented fully, and they include sanctions against financial institutions from any country, without an exception, if they are found to conduct sanctionable transactions, including those with the Central Bank of Iran.

Nyoike had been quoted this week saying that Kenya has signed an agreement to buy millions of barrels of Iranian oil.

He said he was not aware of the U.S. warning to Kenya about oil deals with Iran.

Nyoike said the cancellation of the memorandum with Iran had nothing to do with accusations that two men believed to be agents of a secretive unit in the Iranian armed forces were planning to bomb American, Israeli, British and Saudi Arabian targets.

Kenyan security forces arrested the Iranians on June 19 and were then led to 33 pounds of RDX, a powerful explosive that could have been used against multiple targets or concentrated in one large bomb. If used together, the explosives could have leveled a medium-sized hotel, officials told AP.

The two suspects — Ahmad Abolfathi Mohammad and Sayed Mansour Mousavi — appeared in a Kenyan court last week, where Mohammad said he had been interrogated by Israeli agents. Israel's embassy said it had no comment.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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LONDON - Britain's government confirmed on Tuesday that air defense systems would be stationed at six London sites during the Olympics, including on the rooftops of two apartment blocks, despite fervent opposition from some residents.

"It's a disaster because understandably most people in the area believe it is a bad idea to put surface-to-air missiles on building blocks," said Chris Nineham, who lives near one of the sites. 

---

The 49-year-old member of campaign group "Stop the Olympic Missiles", which gathered more than 1,000 signatures to oppose a local missile presence, added that any fired missiles could explode over some of the most densely populated areas of London. 

Missiles on my apartment? London resident balks at Olympics security measures

Nineham, who lives near one of the buildings housing the weapons, said he will be "in the line of fire" during the games.  

In an email to msnbc.com, Ministry of Defense spokeswoman Jenny Dickens wrote, "Nobody has ever suggested that the use of GBAD [Ground Based Air Defense] would not have implications on the ground but the point is that these systems are proposed as an absolute last resort option, as part of a much broader, layered air security plan aimed at protecting all of those involved in the Olympics, including local residents."

Defense Secretary Philip Hammond earlier touted the importance of air security.

"While there is no reported threat to the London Olympics, the public expects that we put in place a range of measures aimed at ensuring the safety and security of this once-in-a-generation event. Ground-based air defence systems will form just one part of a comprehensive, multi-layered air security plan which, I believe, will provide both reassurance and a powerful deterrent," he said in a statement.

Brits revel in gloom ahead of London Olympics, but don't believe the gripe

The issue of security is a particularly relevant one to Olympics organizers. The decision to award the Olympics to London was announced on July 6, 2005.  Just a day later, London suffered its worst peacetime attack when four suicide bombers killed 52 commuters.

The games will see the country's largest peacetime security operation and involve tens of thousands of security officials, with 13,500 military personnel, 12,000 police and 10,000 private contractors. 

Other defenses on hand for the games will include a Royal Navy helicopter carrier moored in the River Thames, Typhoon jets, and Puma helicopters, the Ministry of Defense said.  The government was yet to decide whether to keep the defense systems in place throughout the Paralympics.

London beefs up security before Olympics

The Ministry of Defense said it was confident it would defeat "the small number of activists" who launched legal proceedings against the proposed missile placement and are seeking an injunction to prevent the missiles from being deployed. 

Meanwhile, East London resident groups challenging the decision promised a protest in front of London's Royal Courts of Justice on Monday, July 9, when the hearing about the ground-based air defense system takes place. 

Opposition to the missiles is part of a more general feeling of ambivalence towards the London games.

At London Olympics, dogs have sniffed out a key anti-terror role

Prominent conservative journalist Charles Moore recently criticized how the games were being handled in news weekly The Spectator:

"For anyone unOlympic living, working in or visiting London between now and September, there is nothing but boredom, inconvenience and officially sanctioned insolence on offer. Thanks to the loathsome ideology of the Olympics, which manages somehow to be fascist and internationalist at the same time, free expression has been banned, and anyone using the Games symbol or the word 'Olympic' in any way is threatened with arrest."

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LONDON - Brian Whelan, a 28-year-old journalist living in London, was probably expecting traffic chaos, hordes of tourists and seriously beefed-up security ahead of this summer's Olympics.

High velocity surface-to-air missiles perched atop his apartment building he did not foresee.

"People are quite shocked. I don't think anybody expected that the price you pay for hosting the Olympics is militarizing residential communities," he told msnbc.com.

---

Britain's military has told the 700-odd residents of Whelan's apartment development near the Olympic Park in east London that it is considering installing a missile battery on top of a tower within their housing complex to defend the 2012 Games this summer.

On Friday, residents in the private, gated flats in Bow, east London, got a leaflet warning them that along with the missiles, a team of 10 soldiers and police could be stationed at the building.

Images: When the Olympics is your neighbor

The rooftop missile battery would be one of a number of extraordinary measures Londoners can expect during the high-profile sporting festival, including restrictions on road lanes for Olympic use and a security bill of more than a billion pounds ($1.6 billion).

It would be the first time such anti-aircraft weapons are deployed in London since the end of World War Two, shocking some in the Bow Quarter housing development, sited in a converted red-brick Victorian match factory.

"There was no consultation, no one knocked on the door," Whelan said. "You just wake up one morning and there's a leaflet telling you they are going to put missiles on the roof."

The defense ministry told Reuters in a statement it had chosen the former water tower because it offered "an excellent view of the surrounding area and the entire sky above the Olympic Park."

The tower was in fact "the only suitable site in this area for the HVM (High Velocity Missile) system," it added.

Al-Qaida to Occupy: UK preps Olympics security

Defense secretary Philip Hammond first announced the plans in November, saying Britain would follow the precedent set by previous Olympics such as the Beijing games in 2008 where surface to air missiles were stationed about half-a-mile south of its showpiece stadiums.

"As announced before Christmas, ground-based air defence systems could be deployed as part of a multi-layered air security plan for the Olympics, including fast jets and helicopters, which will protect the skies over London during the Games," a Ministry of Defence spokesman told Sky News.

Whelan said the the government had yet to get back to him about his concerns, and no one was answering the Ministry of Defence telephone number provided on the leaflet dropped off at the building.

"The (Ministry of Defence) is not answering the mobile number. The consultation meant to meet with us is coming three days after troops arrive," he said. 

Reuters contributed to this report.

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SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea fired two short-range missiles off its west coast on Thursday believed to be part of a test to upgrade capabilities, said news reports published on Friday, quoting South Korean military officials.

North Korea has raised tensions in recent weeks by announcing it would launch a rocket to put a satellite into orbit, but regional powers are urging Pyongyang to drop the plan, saying it would violate U.N. Security Council resolutions.

---

North Korea launched two short-range missiles believed to be surface-to-ship missiles from its west coast Thursday morning, South Korea's Chosun Ilbo newspaper quoted government officials as saying.

"The launch is believed to be to upgrade missile capabilities and not related directly to the North's long-range missile launch," the newspaper quoted a military official as saying.

Another mainstream newspaper JoongAng Ilbo published a similar report.

South Korea's office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff declined to confirm the reports, citing its policy of not speaking publicly on matters involving intelligence activities.

Reclusive North Korea has said it is merely sending a weather satellite into space, but South Korea and the United States say it is a disguised ballistic missile test.

The secretive North has twice tested a nuclear device, but experts doubt whether it yet has the ability to miniaturize an atomic bomb to fit inside a warhead.

The North has said the launch would take place between April 12 and 16. The planned launch, which has even drawn criticism from ally China, will mark the 100th birth anniversary of state founder Kim Il-sung.

Copyright 2013 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.