South Korea and the United States kicked off preliminary military drills on Tuesday ahead of their major springtime combined training later this month, Seoul officials said. The allies began the four-day South Korea-led crisis management staff training (CMST) in the run-up to their command post training (CCPT) set to run from next Monday through April 28, according to the officials. Led by Sout...

Chair of NATO Military Committee’s visit to S.Korea marks only second time

South Korea's Defense Minister Suh Wook has reiterated Seoul's stance against the provision of any lethal arms to Ukraine during last week's phone talks with his Ukrainian counterpart, his office said Monday. Suh repeated the position in response to Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov's request for anti-aircraft weapons in their phone call on Friday. "Suh had explained that there are li...

President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol tapped retired three-star general Lee Jong-sup with expertise in the South Korea-US alliance and combined defense posture as the new defense minister. Lee served as a vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff before he retired from the army. The defense minister nominee also led a Combined Defense Transformation Group under the JCS, whose task is to prepare for the...

South Korea plans to launch its first homegrown spy satellite in 2023 atop a rocket from US commercial space firm SpaceX under a project to place five such satellites into orbit by 2025, Seoul officials said Sunday. The state-run Korea Aerospace Research Institute and Agency for Defense Development have signed contracts with the firm to use its SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket for the first 800-kilogram s...

Hanwha Systems, a South Korean defense firm, has unveiled a radar prototype for the long-range surface-to-air missile (L-SAM) interception system under development, in a sign of progress in the country's missile defense technology. The company revealed to reporters the prototype of the multi-function radar (MFR) at its research center in Yongin, just south of Seoul, on Wednesday, amid Seoul's st...

South Korea's defense ministry set in motion phased relocation work Friday to empty its main building in the central Seoul district of Yongsan for use as the country's new presidential office starting in May. President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol has decided to move the presidential office to the compound from Cheong Wa Dae in the northern part of the capital. "The relocation work for the fifth story (...

South Korea's defense ministry started full-fledged preparations Wednesday for its relocation to a nearby building and other facilities inside its compound in Seoul, as the Cabinet has approved budget spending for moving the country's presidential office. The ministry plans to sign a contract with a private relocation company as early as Thursday in line with President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol's plan...

South Korea's Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Kim Jung-soo vowed Wednesday to "proactively" push for military innovation in the midst of what he called "intense strategic competition" among maritime powers in the Indo-Pacific region. Kim made the remarks during a security forum, stressing the need for the Navy to respond to not only North Korean threats, but also to "comprehensive" security chall...

South Korea has identified the remains of another soldier killed in the 1950-53 Korean War following his excavation from a former battle site more than a decade ago, the defense ministry said Wednesday. The ministry's excavation team recently identified the remains of Noh Jae-gyun, who held the rank equivalent to the current corporal, through a DNA analysis. His remains were discovered in Chunch...

Seoul plans to transfer space technologies to private sector, but dismisses chances of dual use

S.Korean, US, Japanese JCS chiefs discuss security issues including multilateral military training

South Korea, the United States and Japan have not discussed the idea of holding a trilateral military training "at all," a Seoul official said Thursday, dismissing a new report that Seoul has recently rejected a proposal for such combined drills. The local daily, Hankyoreh, reported Washington and Tokyo had repeatedly suggested the training in waters off the Korean Peninsula during high-level th...

The US Forces Korea (USFK) has revealed it conducted a special commando training earlier this month, in an apparent show of America's military might following North Korea's intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launch last week. In a Facebook post Wednesday, the Special Operations Command Korea (SOCKOR) showed a set of photos depicting commandos engaging in what it termed "special forces rea...

Launch marks ‘important milestone’ in enhancing the military’s space-based ISR capabilities