The warning came as the U.S. navy planned to deploy a destroyer equipped with the advanced Aegis anti-missile system to Japanese waters off the Korean peninsula in September as part of a ballistic missile defense system.

"The U.S. is frantically pushing ahead with its moves to establish the MD (missile defense) in order to mount a preemptive attack on the DPRK (North Korea) under the pretext of its 'ballistic missile threat,'" the North's state-run Minju Joson newspaper said Tuesday.

"(North Korea) is compelled to increase its capability for self-defense to cope with those moves," said the newspaper, quoted by the official (North) Korean Central News Agency.

The U.S. Navy announced last week that it would deploy the high-tech warship in the Sea of Japan as part of efforts to build a missile defense network to protect against possible missile attacks mainly from North Korea.