North Korea Suspected of Spying on THAAD

Dennis Rodman has a new subject to broach with his "friend for life": North Korea is suspected of spying on America's Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense system hosted by Pyongyang's neighbor to the south, reports Reuters. Not far from its border with North Korea on Friday, South Korea's military came across a drone—almost eight feet wide with twin engines—carrying a Sony camera that had snapped roughly 10 photos of the THAAD anti-missile system, a South Korean defense official tells Yonhap News. "The pictures don't have high resolution, though," the official says. The camera had also taken hundreds of additional photos, but they mostly show "forest land and residential areas" from one to two miles away, the official adds.

It isn't clear if the drone was able to transmit the photos of THAAD before it crashed in Inje after apparently running out of fuel, reports the AP. If it did indeed come from North Korea, it would've traveled close to 300 miles roundtrip to reach the THAAD site in Seongju. Some are wondering how the drone was missed earlier, but a rep for South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff says it will "come up with measures to deal with North Korean drones." On Monday, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis addressed North Korea's "provocative actions" and nuclear weapons program, noting the country is "the most urgent and dangerous threat to peace and security," per Reuters. In warning of a possible war, he added, it would be "like nothing we have seen since 1953." (More North Korea stories.)