South Korea, U.S. mull deployment of nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to peninsula

North Korea

Published: 24 Feb. 2023, 16:44

South Korea, U.S. mull deployment of nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to peninsula

The U.S. Navy’s aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan, front, and South Korean Navy ships Munmu the Great and Gangwon steam in formation in waters east of the Korean Peninsula in a photograph released by the U.S. Navy on Sept. 29. [U.S. NAVY]

South Korea and the United States are mulling the deployment of a U.S. nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to the Korean Peninsula for the allies' joint exercise next month, according to military officials.

If agreed, a Nimitz-class U.S. aircraft carrier and associated strike group of U.S. Navy ships would be deployed to Busan to take part in the allies’ springtime Freedom Shield exercise, which is set to begin in the middle of March, unnamed military sources told the Chosun Ilbo and Yonhap on Thursday.

The most recent aircraft carrier deployed by the United States to South Korea was the USS Ronald Reagan, which participated in a joint naval exercise with the South Korean Navy in the East Sea in September last year.

Seoul’s Defense Ministry declined to confirm details about the U.S. aircraft carrier’s possible deployment to Korea, only saying in a Friday press statement that “the deployment of U.S. key military assets has proceeded through close consultation between South Korea and the U.S.”

The allies’ defense chiefs agreed during talks held in November last year to increase the frequency and involvement of U.S. strategic asset deployments in their joint exercises in response to North Korea’s advancing nuclear weapons and missile development programs.

North Korea’s foreign ministry upped its verbal offensive against the allies in a Friday statement, where it said it would consider “hostile action” by the United States as tantamount to a “declaration of war.”

Pyongyang’s state-controlled Korean Central News Agency quoted Kwon Jong-gun, director-general for U.S. affairs at the regime’s foreign ministry, as demanding that Washington halt its deployment of strategic assets to the peninsula and joint exercises with South Korea to forestall a “vicious cycle” of hostilities.

Kwon also denounced the allies’ table-top exercise held Thursday at the Pentagon, where they simulated their response to a hypothetical attack by North Korea using nuclear weapons, as well as the visit by the two countries’ defense officials to the Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay in Georgia, which houses several Ohio-class nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines.

Pyongyang has often bristled at joint exercises by Seoul and Washington, characterizing them as rehearsals for invasion.

But the United States issued a strongly-worded warning of its own to North Korea that the regime would not survive if it moved its previous threats to use nuclear weapons into action.

U.S. officials present at the table-top exercise “highlighted that the 2022 Nuclear Posture Review states that any nuclear attack by North Korea against the United States or its Allies and partners is unacceptable and will result in the end of that regime,” the U.S. Department of Defense said in a Friday statement announcing the conclusion of the exercise and the submarine base visit.

The statement also said that the United States “will continue to work with the ROK to ensure an effective mix of capabilities, concepts, deployments, exercises, and tailored options to deter and, if necessary, respond to coercion and aggression by the DPRK,” referring to South and North Korea by the acronyms for their official names, the Republic of Korea and Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]