South Korea and the United States carried out more joint air exercises involving a US B-1B bomber on Saturday, a day after North Korea tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).
The supersonic bomber flew into the South Korean air defense identification zone escorted by South Korean military F-35A fighters and US F-16 fighters, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said in a statement.
“This exercise is aimed at enhancing the combined defense capabilities of the ROK (official name for South Korea) and the US, and showing Washington’s commitment to protecting the peninsula and providing an extended deterrent,” it says. the text.
The so-called extended or expanded deterrence is a commitment made last May by Washington with Seoul that consists of sending US strategic assets to the Korean peninsula based on the actions of the North Korean regime.
South Korea and the United States will “continue to cooperate closely” to monitor North Korea’s military activities and “enhance their joint response,” the JCS added.
These maneuvers take place as a result of the launch on the eve of an ICBM by North Korea, which reported today that it was the “new Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile”, which has the potential to be the longest-range in the North Korean arsenal (about 15,000 kilometers) and which had already carried out test flights this year, but without real success, according to various analysts and Seoul.
The test of the projectile, which landed in the waters of the Sea of Japan (called the East Sea in Korea) 200 kilometers from the coast of northern Japan, has already been carried out yesterday by other aerial maneuvers in South Korea and the US. , and also from Japan and the USA.
Tension on the Korean peninsula is reaching unprecedented heights in the face of repeated North Korean weapons tests, maneuvers by allies and the possibility that, as indicated by satellites, Kim Jong-un’s regime is ready to carry out its first nuclear test since 2017.