North Korea Plans World's Strongest Nuclear Force as Kim Jong Un Makes Another Appearance with Daughter, Heating Up Succession Debate

The discussion about whether North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is raising his daughter to succeed him has heated up after he once again took her out in public to celebrate the launch of a nuclear-capable missile.

The daughter, whose age is estimated to be between nine and ten, goes by the name Ju Ae, and was first made public to the outside world last weekend in state media images of her watching the North's intercontinental ballistic missile launch the day before with her parents and other senior officials.

North Korea's Goal is to Have World's strongest Nuclear Force

Ju Ae was shown walking beside Kim Jong Un past a massive missile loaded onto a launch vehicle and admiring a flying weapon while donning a white puffy coat and red sneakers.

This past Sunday, she was referenced by the North's official Korean Central News Agency for the second time, claiming that she and Kim Jong Un had taken a group photo with the scientists, officials, and other participants in what it said was the test launch of its Hwasong-17 ICBM.

In contrast to her prior identification of her as "Kim Jong Un's beloved" child, KCNA referred to her as Kim Jong Un's "most beloved" or "precious" child on its November 19 dispatch, as per Daily Mail.

Images from the state media showed the daughter holding her father's arm while the two posed for pictures. The daughter was wearing a long, black coat. The news accords with Kim Jong Un's statement that his Hwasong-17 ICBM is the "strongest strategic weapon in the world" and his promise to build the most powerful "strategic" missile arsenal possible.

Kim Jong Un said that North Korea has shown the rest of the world through the development of the new ICBM "the confident, ever-victorious future of our state progressing toward the objective of developing the world's greatest army."

North Korean Academy of Defense Science experts claimed in a letter to Kim Jong Un that the test firing was a "great historic victory" for the nation and proved North Korea's sovereignty.

Ankit Panda, senior fellow in the nuclear policy program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, notes that Pyongyang also made a video of the missile launch, just the third time it has done so since 2017.

While the test did indicate Pyongyang can launch a sizable ICBM and maintain it in the air for more than an hour, North Korea has yet to prove it can mount a warhead on a long-range ballistic missile, which are space-launched projectiles that can survive the violent descent into Earth's atmosphere.

However, analysts assert that North Korea is honing its capabilities through repeated testing, according to CBS News.

Will Kim Jong Un's Daughter Ju Ae Will be His Successeor?

The Hwasong-17 is North Korea's longest-range missile and is still in development, , according to experts. It is intended to target the US mainland. Pyongyang was one of several missile tests that North Korea claims were conducted in response to military exercises between the US and South Korea, which it perceives as a practice invasion.

If Kim Jong Un believes his son lacks leadership, he cannot choose him as his successor, according to analyst Cheong Seong-Chang of the private Sejong Institute in South Korea.

Kim Jong Un likely invited his daughter to a successful ICBM launch ceremony to ensure that public support for him is seamlessly passed on to his daughter, according to Cheong, who said that Kim Jong may be trying to avoid potential backlash for picking a daughter as a fourth-generation leader.

Per NBC News, foreign specialists were completely taken aback by the revelation of the child Ju Ae since Kim Jong Un and his father Kim Jong Il were only ever mentioned in state media reports when they were adults. Cheong, however, said that when Kim Jong Il's son was 8 years old, he had Kim Jong Un in mind as his heir. Cheong referred to his talks with Kim Jong Un's aunt and her American defector spouse.

The country's age-calculating mechanism, which normally makes people's ages one or two years older, may be the reason why Ju Ae's age was estimated by the South Korean espionage agency to be about 10 years old despite being believed to have been born in 2013.