ASIA PIVOT: North Korea fires three ballistic missiles in new show of force.

The U.S. military said it detected launches of what it believed were two Scud missiles and one Rodong, a home-grown missile based on Soviet-era Scud technology.

North Korea has fired both types numerous times in recent years, an indication that unlike recent launches that were seen as efforts by the North to improve its missile capability, Tuesday’s were meant as a show of force.

Scuds are notoriously inaccurate and based on Soviet technology dating back to the late ’50s. Firing off three, or even a dozen of them, isn’t much of a display of force. What seems more likely is that Kim wants to bait South Korea into installing US-made THAAD anti-missile systems, then using his agents, dupes, and useful idiots in the South to try and gin up enough protests to destabilize the government in Seoul.