N.Korea Practices Occupying S.Korea

North Korea has been staging a command post exercise to practice occupying South Korean territory in an all-out war, state media said Thursday.

The drill seems to be a computer-simulated war game rather than a field exercise. It is the first time the regime has publicly announced such a drill.

The announcement came in an apparent response to the joint South Korea-U.S. Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise that had been conducted from Aug. 21 to Thursday.

The official [North] Korean Central News Agency reported that the drill was launched Tuesday in response to a "treacherous" situation, referring to the joint exercise.

During his visit to a command post on Tuesday, North Korean leader Kim was briefed by the chief of the Army General Staff on hour-by-hour and stage-by-stage possible movements of enemy forces in the event of war, it added.

The drill was "aimed at occupying the entire territory of the southern half by repelling the enemy's sudden armed invasion and switching over to an all-out counterattack," state media said.