On June 2nd, the Defense Chiefs of the Republic of Korea (South Korea), Japan, and the United States held a trilateral meeting during the IISS Shangri-La Dialogue 2024 in Singapore. During this meeting, the three countries released a joint statement announcing they will conduct a tri-nation exercise named “Freedom Edge” this summer, Naval News reports.
This exercise will involve simultaneous drills in various domains, including surface, underwater, air, and cyber warfare. As the first joint combined exercise that these three nations will conduct together, it demonstrates the growing cooperation between them and the improved relationship between South Korea and Japan.
The name of this new exercise, “Freedom Edge,” is a combination of two existing exercises: “Freedom Shield” (FS), an annual joint exercise conducted by South Korea and the United States simulating a North Korean invasion, and “Keen Edge,” a joint exercise conducted by the United States and Japan to respond to regional threats, including those from North Korea. The exact date and location of the “Freedom Edge” exercise have not been decided yet, but a local news outlet reported that the USS Ronald Reagan (CVN 76) will take part in the upcoming exercise before its scheduled turnover with the USS George Washington (CVN 73).
The three Defense Chiefs agreed to conduct the “Trilateral Tabletop Exercise” (TTX) to discuss effective deterrence and response measures for various threats on the Korean Peninsula and in the Indo-Pacific region. Additionally, to institutionalize trilateral security cooperation, including high-level consultations, information sharing, trilateral exercises, and defense exchanges, they decided to establish the “Trilateral Security Cooperation Framework” by the end of the year.
Through this meeting, the ministers reaffirmed their commitment to trilateral security cooperation to deter North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats and to achieve the complete denuclearization of North Korea in accordance with relevant UN Security Council resolutions.
Prior to the trilateral meeting, the Defense Chiefs of the Republic of Korea and Japan held a bilateral meeting on June 1st and reached an agreement on measures to prevent the recurrence of the 2018 patrol aircraft dispute that was considered a major obstacle to strengthening trilateral military cooperation among the Republic of Korea, the United States, and Japan. The measures to prevent the recurrence of the dispute included the prioritization of ten radio communication frequencies to ensure smooth communication between the naval vessels and aircraft of both nations during encounters at sea.
In a related development, with North Korea’s ever-growing nuclear capabilities, illegal arms trade, constant threats of sending balloons filled with waste and unidentified objects over the DMZ, and GPS disruptions, the Korean government has decided to suspend the ‘September 19th Military Agreement,’ which bans all hostile acts on the ground, sea, and air between the two Koreas. By officially strengthening military cooperation against the North Korean threat through combined military exercises, the security partners surrounding the Korean Peninsula will affirm their dedication to ensuring stability and peace in East Asia and the broader Indo-Pacific region.
