North Korea claims that more than 800,000 of its citizens have volunteered to join or reenlist in the nation's military to fight the United States, according to North Korea's state newspaper on Saturday.
On Friday alone, around 800,000 students and workers in the country expressed a desire to enlist or reenlist in the military to counter the United States, according to the Rodong Sinmun newspaper.
The paper said that the soaring enthusiasm of young people to join the army is a demonstration of the unshakeable will of the younger generation to wipe out the war maniacs who try to eliminate our precious socialist country and to achieve the great cause of national reunification without fail and a clear manifestation of their ardent patriotism.
The North claimed after the secretive communist state launched its Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile ICBM on Thursday, in response to ongoing U.S. South Korea military drills.
Pyongyang fired the ICBM into the sea between the Korean peninsula and Japan on Thursday, hours before South Korea s president flew to Tokyo for a summit that discussed ways to counter the nuclear-armed North.
The launch of the North's ballistic missiles was condemned by governments in Tokyo, Washington and Seoul and Washington under the United Nations Security Council resolutions.
South Korean and American forces began 11 days of joint drills dubbed Freedom Shield 23 on Monday and held on a scale not seen since 2017 to counter the North's growing threats.
North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Un, accused the United States and South Korea of increasing tensions with military drills.