Seoul: South Korea and the United States will conduct a major joint exercise this month to strengthen their combined readiness posture, the allies said Thursday, but added that around half of some 40 planned field training exercises will be rescheduled to next month. The announcement came amid speculation that the allies may push back some field training tied to the annual Ulchi Freedom Shield (UFS) exercise until after September as South Korea seeks to mend frayed ties with North Korea.
According to Yonhap News Agency, the UFS exercise is set to take place from Aug. 18-28 and involves drills incorporating "realistic" threats aimed at enhancing the allies' capabilities across all domains, their militaries said. "The iteration of the UFS '25 will be executed on a similar scale to the previous iteration," Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) spokesperson Col. Lee Sung-jun said in a press briefing, noting some 18,000 South Korean personnel will take part in the upcoming drills. "However, the military has comprehensively assessed based on multiple factors, including ensuring training conditions, due to the recent heat wave, as well as maintaining a balanced ROK-U.S. combined readiness posture ... and made the decision to reschedule certain training events to next month," Lee said.
ROK refers to the acronym of South Korea's formal name, the Republic of Korea. The official, however, said training events linked with the combined exercise scenario or involving deployed assets or personnel to the Korean Peninsula by the U.S. military will proceed as planned. This year's exercise comes as North Korea has denounced combined South Korea-U.S. drills and accused the South of "blindly adhering" to its alliance with Washington, amid Seoul's push to ease tensions with Pyongyang.
In response, Unification Minister Chung Dong-young, South Korea's top point man on North Korea, said he will propose adjusting the combined military exercise to President Lee Jae Myung, raising views the allies may possibly push back some field training for the summertime drills. The North has long denounced the allies' joint exercises as a rehearsal for an invasion against it and has a track record of staging weapons tests in response.
In the statement released Thursday, the allies stressed the upcoming drills are "defensive in nature." Still, the allies underscored the importance of bolstering their readiness posture against all possible threats posed against the Korean Peninsula, including the North's military threats, while factoring in the regional security situation. "DPRK is certainly a key factor in our overall security environment," Col. Ryan Donald, spokesperson for the U.S. Forces Korea, said. "We remain focused on our objective, which is clear, to maintain peace and security on the Korean Peninsula."
DPRK refers to the North's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.