Trump officials chafe at second-guessing of North Korean missile sites

WASHINGTON - When workers at North Korea's Sohae rocket facility began rebuilding the dormant site's launch pad and engine test stand this month, U.S. spy satellites orbiting overhead quickly detected the construction.

So did Joe Bermudez, a freelance North Korea military expert who keeps close tabs on unclassified overhead photos of the country's scattered missile and nuclear weapons facilities.

Unlike U.S. intelligence agencies, Bermudez immediately went public.

"North Korea is pursuing a rapid rebuilding of the long-range-rocket site at Sohae," Bermudez and Victor Cha, a former U.S. National Security Council official, warned in a March 5 analysis published by a Washington think tank that included satellite images of the hilly