KCNA criticizes expanded command roles for South Korea, Japan
The commentary, attributed to an unnamed military commentator and carried by the Korean Central News Agency, or KCNA, responded to the 30th edition of the Rim of the Pacific Exercise held in Hawaii. RIMPAC ran from June 24 through July 31 and brought together more than 30,000 personnel from 30 countries, including South Korea and Japan, along with more than 30 surface ships, five submarines, and about 200 aircraft.
KCNA highlighted the expanded command roles played by South Korea and Japan during this year’s exercise. “This goes to prove that RIMPAC, the largest-ever naval drill in the world, is, in fact, a war rehearsal of aggression led by the U.S., Japan and the ROK,” the commentary said, referring to South Korea by its acronym ROK.
The commentary also took aim at broader military cooperation among the United States and its regional allies, including the Pentagon’s recent move to upgrade U.S. Forces Japan into a joint force headquarters with expanded operational responsibilities. It criticized recent U.S.-South Korea military activities, including last month’s Buddy Squadron air exercise and a large-scale combined logistics field training exercise.
“The threat posed by the trinity of the U.S., Japan and the ROK is being settled as a new security crisis in the Asia-Pacific region,” the KCNA commentary said. “It is the DPRK’s invariable mode of controlling situation and crisis to response to a threat of new level with a deterrence of new level,” it added, referring to North Korea by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
The statement extends a long pattern of Pyongyang denouncing joint military exercises involving the United States and South Korea. North Korea has also increasingly criticized Japan’s military buildup and expanding regional security role. In June, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un accused Tokyo of transforming itself into a “war state” and warned that it was exacerbating tensions in Northeast Asia.