Mr. Ri said that the question of “who would be around much longer will be answered” by North Korea. Whether that was one of his characteristic outbursts or a strategic effort to intimidate North Korea was not clear — even to some of his advisers. He also said that “all options will be on the operations table of the supreme leadership” of North Korea. In April 1969, the North shot down an unarmed United States Lockheed EC-121 spy plane on a North Korean intelligence-gathering mission over the Sea of Japan. North Korean state radio said at the time that the aircraft had penetrated “deep into the airspace” of the country.

Source: New York Times September 25, 2017 15:34 UTC