North Korean leader Kim Jong Un attended a ceremony at Nampho port where his government commissioned a new 5,000-ton destroyer armed with nuclear weapons, the Choe Hyon. Kim announced that the country’s plan to give its navy such arms is advancing as scheduled, describing the step as a way to permit the nation’s nuclear forces to carry out a broad variety of streamlined missions. He added that future work includes a nuclear-powered submarine, larger surface vessels, and submarine-based intercontinental ballistic missiles over a five-year period. Pyongyang frames these moves as a deterrent against possible invasion by the United States, Japan, and South Korea. The commissioning occurs while North Korea insists on its status as an irreversible nuclear power and while no formal peace treaty exists to conclude the 1950–53 conflict.