North Korea has tested two short-range, surface-to-air missiles near the border with its chief benefactor, Communist China, according to reports yesterday.

So far there has been no word on the incident from the North Korean capital of Pyongyang or from Beijing. But yesterday White House spokesman Scott McClellan said, “Indications are that North Korea launched two short-range missiles.” The projectiles landed within North Korean territory, a senior White House official said yesterday, according to Reuters.

The alleged missile tests come less than 24 hours after American intelligence and treasury officials briefed the North Korean mission in New York on its recent efforts to prosecute Banco Delta Asia, a China-based bank the Treasury Department has said is a front for Pyongyang’s counterfeiting and money-laundering activities.

North Korea has said it will not return to the six-party talks on its nuclear program if America continues its campaign against the counterfeiting.

The news that the hermit kingdom may have fired a test missile toward China appears on the surface to defy reason. China is North Korea’s main link with the outside world and its chief source of fuel and aid, without which it would likely collapse. Chinese authorities have dutifully repatriated refugees from its neighbor, allowing them to be herded back to North Korea.

A test would be even more curious considering that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il met in January with China’s top leadership in a rare foreign visit, where he was feted as an important ally. North Korea’s state-run press also recently praised China’s economic policies.

A North Korea expert at the American Enterprise Institute, Nicholas Eberstadt, said he believed the missile test may have been a gambit from the North Koreans to strengthen their position in the nuclear proliferation talks, in which China is participating.

“If it is true that China is in a position to exert more influence, what is the DPRK’s long suit, then? It can be a military menace. You can speculate that the DPRK government may want to remind China about its threat,” he said.

Mr. Eberstadt also noted that rumors have been circulating in Seoul that China has depopulated areas on its border with North Korea to establish a free economic zone. China opened such an area in the late 1990s on its northern border with Russia.

Yesterday Mr. McClellan stressed that North Korea’s ballistic missile program could be a topic in future arms control talks with the country involving China, Japan, Russia, and South Korea. North Korea’s missile program was one reason the Bush administration has pursued its missile defense program, he said.

“We believe the six-party talks remain the way to get North Korea to abandon its nuclear ambitions and deal with the threat from its missile program and activities,” he said.

On Tuesday the Associated Press quoted the commander for American forces in South Korea, General B.B. Bell, as saying Pyongyang was preparing to field new intermediate range missiles “which could easily reach United States facilities in Okinawa, Guam and possibly Alaska.”

North Korean missiles have been a concern for America in the past. During a last minute effort to normalize ties between the two countries in 2000, then Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, visited Pyongyang expressly for discussions on North Korean missile exports and its program.

During that visit, Kim told Ms. Albright that a 1998 missile test of the Taepodong missile would be the last such test of his country. He made these remarks during a performance of some 20,000 of his people during which they re-enacted the launch of the missile.