I’m actually really surprised they admitted it.
There’s nothing “wrong” with things like this happening, per se. All new tech has growing pains and failures. But for North Korea to actually admit failure in anything is surprising to me. I would have expected them to keep their failures quiet or to blame them on external adversaries.
It’s also common for governments to say their spy sats failed so that it’s more ambiguous what assets they have. I don’t know if someone has a telescope tracking shot though, that could probably confirm or deny.
You can almost be certain other countries’ intel agencies were watching the entire time.
Yeah, even Iran blamed the US for their helicopter crash that killed their president because of the US embargo on quality parts.