Story highlights
Soldiers chant: 'We will die for you'
Kim Jong Un smiles and claps as he watches the military parade
(CNN) —
North Korea put its military might on display during a parade in the heart of Pyongyang while the regime showed off some of its latest arsenal.
Pictures on state television showed thousands of soldiers marching in formation alongside tanks, balloons and enormous crowds.
Leader Kim Jong Un was shown clapping and smiling from a reviewing box.
At one point, the soldiers directed a chant toward him.
“We will die for you!” they yelled, CNN’s Will Ripley, who was at the event, reported.
During the pomp and circumstance at Kim II Sung square, citizens showed their revolutionary fervor with choreographed performances while vehicles displaying North Korea’s military arsenal rolled by.
“We saw a submarine launch ballistic missiles, we saw missiles that are capable of being launched from a mobile launcher and just seconds before we came on the air we saw these very large what are believed to be intercontinental ballistic missiles,” Ripley said as jets tracked colors of the North Korean flag in the sky during the parade.
In a live broadcast, a newsreader from North Korea’s state-run television service called the new military hardware the country’s “modernized strategic missiles.”
“No nation in the world develops missiles and shows the real thing during a parade, it’s just too dangerous,” Markus Schiller, a weapons expert with ST Analytics, told CNN that parades always involve “mock-ups”. “If anything happens, it blows up, right next to the ‘Dear Leader’.”
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un waves during a military parade on Saturday, April 15, 2017, in Pyongyang to celebrate the 105th anniversary of Kim Il Sung's birth, the country's late founder and grandfather of current ruler Kim Jong Un.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
Soldiers in tanks take part in the military parade.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
North Korean soldiers carry flags and a photo of late leader Kim Il Sung as they march across Kim Il Sung Square.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
Female North Korean soldiers march during the parade.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
Missiles are paraded across Kim Il Sung Square.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
ED JONES/AFP/Getty Images
A rocket-themed float makes its way through Kim Il-Sung square.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
Soldiers salute while the national anthem is played during the parade.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
ED JONES/AFP/Getty Images
Women wearing traditional Korean dress wave flowers and shout slogans as they pass North Korea's leader Kim Jong-Un.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
A submarine-launched ballistic missile is displayed during the parade.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
A soldier stands guard at the Kim Il Sung Square.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Kyodo News/Getty Images
Korean citizens spell out "Day of the Sun" in Kim Il Sung Square.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
University students carry the national flag and two bronze statues of the late leaders Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
Helmeted servicemen march during the parade.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
ED JONES/AFP/Getty Images
Korean People's Army soldiers march on Kim Il-Sung square.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
North Korean men and women dressed to represent doctors and other medical workers during the parade.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
ED JONES/AFP/Getty Images
Members of the Korean People's Army ride on mobile missile launchers.
Photos: North Korea Day of the Sun parade
PHOTO:
Wong Maye-E/AP
North Korean men beat drums as they parade across the square.
For North Koreans, April 15 is an auspicious date that sees millions celebrate the birth of the nation’s founder.
Tens of thousands descended on the streets of the capital as the nation marks the 1912 birth of Kim Il Sung, grandfather of Kim Jong Un.
This year’s celebrations come at a tense time on the Korean Peninsula, days after a US strike group was deployed to the region and amid expectations of another missile or nuclear test by Pyongyang.
North Korean state media warned that such “reckless acts of aggression” would be countered with “whatever methods the US wants to take.”
Wong Maye-E/AP
North Korean soldiers carry flags and a photo of late leader Kim Il Sung as they march across Kim Il Sung Square during a military parade on Saturday.
“If the US does any reckless provocation, we will immediately apply a destructive strike with our revolutionary power. We’re prepared to respond to an all-out war with an all-out war and we are ready to hit back with nuclear attacks of our own style against any nuclear attacks,” Choe Ryong Hae, a senior member of the Presidium of the Political Bureau of the Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) said in a speech during the large military parade.
KCTV
Kim Jong Un walks on the red carpet before the parade.
Tension has been building since Kim Jong Un announced in his New Year’s message that the country was close to testing an intercontinental ballistic missile.
01:18 - Source: CNN
USS Carl Vinson heads to Korean Peninsula
It has since conducted a number of shorter-range missile tests –