Kim Jong-un told the North Korean military to get ready for war against the United States and its allies, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP) via MSN.
Kim's call to action on Saturday followed Friday's joint naval drills conducted by the United States and South Korea. The military drills involved 10 South Korean warships and a U.S. Aegis destroyer, according to AFP.
"The prevailing situation where a great war for national reunification is at hand requires all the KPA (Korean People's Army) units to become (elite) Guard Units fully prepared for war politically and ideologically, in military technique and materially," he told the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).
Kim told the North Korean military to train even harder so they can "tear to pieces the Stars and Stripes," KCNA reported.
It isn't uncommon for rhetoric to become more hostile during times of military exercises, according to APF, and joint U.S. and South Korea military actions have turned up tensions on the peninsula.
Friday's drill was a precursor to Foal Eagle, an eight-week exercise that starts on Monday, consisting of air, ground and naval training for 200,000 Korean and 3,700 U.S. troops. A computer-simulated drill, Key Resolve, will also take place during the week.
Seoul and Washington, D.C. maintain the drills are only defense maneuvers, but Pyongyang insists the drills are preparation for invasion of North Korea.
According to KCNA, North Korea has been trying to administer peace, but the agency quotes Rodong Sinmun, the official newspaper of the Workers' Party of North Korea: "As the Obama group is escalating its smear campaign against the DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) and ratcheting up harsh sanctions and pressure upon it and the group's war maneuvers against it are gaining in scope and strength, the army and people of the DPRK will intensify their counteraction of justice without limit."
North Korea had offered a temporary suspension of nuclear tests as long as joint drills in 2015 were cancelled, but the U.S. rejected the offer seeing it as an "implicit threat" to conduct a fourth atomic drill, according to APF.
Despite North Korea's claims that it was the victor, the Korean War ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty, in 1953 - meaning, the north and south are still technically at war.
"The army of the DPRK has never pardoned the enemies trying to hurt its dignity and social system," KCNA wrote. "Nuclear weapons are not a monopoly of the U.S. The U.S. is seriously mistaken if it thinks its mainland is safe."
