US-South Korea Joint Military Exercise: Largest to Date

South Korea and the United States began their largest joint military exercise in five years yesterday, despite threats from North Korea, which had announced hours earlier that it had launched two cruise missiles from a submarine. Pyongyang announced that the launch of the two missiles was aimed at testing “nuclear deterrence in various areas”, while criticizing the “Freedom Shield” maneuvers between US and South Korean forces, which should last ten days to deal with growing threats from Pyongyang. The South Korean military said the exercise “includes wartime exercises to repel possible North Korean attacks and conduct a stabilization campaign in the North.” The South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff emphasized that these maneuvers are “defensive in nature and based on a joint operations plan.” Exercises of this nature anger Pyongyang, which sees them as an imitation of an invasion of its territory and regularly threatens to retaliate with “crushing” actions. “North Korea is using missiles to (denounce) joint maneuvers,” said Cho Myung-hyun, a researcher at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul. “He wants to confirm that the reason for his development of missiles is for self-defense,” he added. For its part, North Korea’s foreign ministry yesterday issued a statement criticizing “the vicious blackmailing of Americans over ‘human rights’ after Washington announced it would convene a United Nations meeting this week on human rights violations in North Korea. North Korea said “two cruise missiles accurately hit their intended target in the East Sea of ​​Korea,” according to the official North Korean news agency, citing a body of water known as the Sea of ​​Japan. Existing UN sanctions do not actually prohibit Pyongyang from launching cruise missiles. However, it is not allowed to conduct tests related to its nuclear arsenal. North Korea’s official news agency said the test is as Seoul and Washington are “more and more clearly moving forward in the context of their military maneuvers against” North Korea. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said at least one unidentified missile was recovered from a North Korean submarine on Sunday, adding that U.S. and South Korean intelligence agencies were reviewing the facts. Footage released by North Korean state media shows a Yeongong 8.24 submarine and a missile flying in the sky, along with white smoke and flames. However, experts expressed “great doubts” about the development of Pyongyang’s submarine program. Park Won-joon, a professor at Ewha University in Seoul, said the images being broadcast indicate that the rocket was fired above the surface of the water.