SKorea, Japan, US to hold joint air drill

SEOUL, October 19 ------ South Korea, Japan and the United States will conduct a joint aerial drill this weekend involving an American nuclear weapons-capable B-52 bomber, a local media outlet reported.

The trilateral exercise on Sunday will be the first of its kind conducted near the Korean Peninsula, an unnamed military source told the Yonhap News Agency. An official at Seoul's Defense Ministry declined to confirm the reports, but said the three countries were expanding joint exercises "to counter missile and nuclear threats from North Korea." Pyongyang views all such exercises as invasion rehearsals and has repeatedly warned it would take "overwhelming" action in response. "The South Korea-US-Japan joint aerial exercise will consist of a formation flight with the US strategic bomber B-52 escorted by fighter jets of the three countries," a source told Yonhap.

The bomber landed at a South Korean airbase on Tuesday after first making a flyover at the country's largest defense exhibition. Its arrival followed the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan's visit to the southern port city of Busan, provoking an angry response from Pyongyang. B-52s, which fly at subsonic speeds, can travel more than 8,800 miles without refueling at an altitude reaching 50,000 feet. Pyongyang balks at Washington's deployment of such long-range military assets and in 2017 threatened to "shoot down" US strategic bombers even outside North Korean airspace. Sunday's exercise comes as Seoul, Washington, and Tokyo beef up trilateral defense cooperation against the North's growing missile and nuclear threats.

In August, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and US President Joe Biden met for a summit at Camp David in Maryland, where they agreed to a multiyear plan of regular joint exercises and to share real-time data on North Korea. Last week, the three countries staged a joint maritime drill in waters south of the Korean Peninsula for the first time in seven years. The two-day drill simulated intercepting North Korean smuggling vessels, Seoul's navy said.

Source: manilatimes.net