Korea-U.S. drills shrink while trilateral exercise stays on course

The Donald Trump administration, which scaled back this year’s joint South Korea-U.S. military exercise, has decided to proceed with a trilateral exercise involving South Korea and Japan from next Monday to Sept. 11. The drill was agreed upon at the Camp David summit in 2023 and will take place for the fourth time.

Washington’s decision to proceed as planned reaffirms that China remains its top security priority. The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said that the exercise and continued trilateral cooperation demonstrate an “unwavering commitment” to defending the three countries and safeguarding a free and open Indo-Pacific. Last year, it emphasized strengthening forces within the first island chain — stretching from the Korean Peninsula through Kyushu, Japan; Taiwan; and the Philippines — to bolster regional deterrence. Even with a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier formerly based in Japan diverted to the Middle East because of the ongoing war, Washington and Tokyo regard the trilateral drill as indispensable.

By contrast, South Korea-U.S. exercises have become, in U.S. President Donald Trump’s words, costly drills that can be sharply reduced given his good relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. They can apparently also be curtailed or suspended when South Korea does not cooperate with Washington in the war or, as Foreign Minister Cho Hyun told the National Assembly, as leverage to accelerate South Korean investment in the United States.

The Lee Jae Myung administration, which praised Trump’s decision to reduce the bilateral exercise even though it was announced without prior consultation, must now find Washington’s determination to proceed with the trilateral drill uncomfortable. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff has stressed that the Freedom Edge exercise is defensive and intended to counter North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats, apparently to avoid unnecessarily provoking China.

North Korea’s foreign ministry responded on Sunday by citing the trilateral exercise and warning of the “toughest” countermeasures against what it called Washington’s continued hostile policy. The South Korean government, which has styled itself as a “pacemaker” for U.S.-North Korea dialogue, now finds itself caught between competing priorities.

In Sunday’s Cabinet reshuffle, Cho was retained despite speculation that he would be replaced. Kang Shin-chul, a former deputy commander of the South Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command with extensive experience working with Washington, was nominated as defense minister.

The government must remember that critical security issues — restarting U.S.-North Korea dialogue, transferring wartime operational control, or Opcon, and building nuclear-powered submarines — can advance only through a stable South Korea-U.S. alliance and smooth consultation between Seoul and Washington. Recent developments should remind us that alliance management cannot be taken for granted as regional security conditions rapidly shift.