North Korean Air Force Receives Modern Air-to-Air Missiles with Active Radar Guidance

 

Fighter Fleet Revolution: North Korean Air Force receives first modern air-to-air missiles

The North Korean leadership has unveiled a new air-to-air missile. For the first time, the Korean People's Army has received air-to-air missiles with active radar guidance, which were installed on a MiG-29 squadron and launched into a test flight. The MiG-29s, which were purchased from the Soviet Union in the 1980s and subsequently produced under license domestically in the 1990s, were previously equipped only with relatively obsolete semi-active R-27 guided missiles for aerial combat beyond visual visibility. Although the Cold War-era P-27 variants were cutting-edge when they were introduced in the early 1980s, they are considered several generations behind the most effective modern missiles such as the Chinese PL-15 or the American AIM-260. North Korea's new class of air-to-air missiles appears to benefit from active radar guidance and closely resembles modern classes of missiles in service abroad, such as the PL-15. The missile class was first introduced at the National Defense Development Exhibition Self Defense 2021 in October 2021 and could potentially be integrated into the country's MiG-23ML and MiG-21bis fighters along with its MiG-29. The complexity of North Korea's surface-to-air missile classes, demonstrated by tests of systems such as Pyongae-6 provides an important indication that many of the technologies needed for the advanced class of long-range air-to-air missiles are already in mature stages.