JCS chief stresses allies' readiness to hit enemy facilities

Defense

Published: 02 Mar. 2023, 18:09 Updated: 02 Mar. 2023, 18:43

JCS chief stresses allies' readiness to hit enemy facilities

South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Kim Seung-kyum (center) carries out an inspection of Exercise Teak Knife by South Korean and U.S. special operations forces at an undisclosed location on Monday. [JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF]

Seoul's Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) Chairman Gen. Kim Seung-kyum encouraged the South Korean and U.S. militaries to maintain their readiness to “strike the enemy's critical facilities without fail” during an inspection of the allies’ ongoing combined special operations exercise, the JCS said Thursday.

The U.S. Special Operations Command Korea earlier issued a rare acknowledgement that the allies were conducting Exercise Teak Knife, a close-air-support training exercise, with the involvement of special operations forces from both countries’ militaries, as well as AC-130J and MC-130J combat transport aircraft flown in from U.S. air bases in Florida and Japan.

Kim’s visit to the exercise took place on Monday and followed warnings by Pyongyang’s state media on Sunday that joint military exercises by the South and the United States, like the larger springtime Freedom Shield exercise set to begin later this month, are “dangerous” provocations aimed at preparing for an invasion of the North.

The JCS said in its Thursday press release that Kim’s visit was intended to emphasize the allies’ joint capabilities to cripple the North should war break out.

“Kim stressed the importance of harnessing the capability to strike the enemy’s critical facilities without fail and establishing a wartime combined operations posture by enhancing interoperability between the allies through realistic combined special operations training,” the JCS said.

According to the press release, the JCS chairman also highlighted the North’s escalating threats of provocation as driving the need for South Korea and the United States to establish “capabilities and a posture that can inflict critical damage on the enemy and force a victorious resolution to the conflict.”

South Korean Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Kim Seung-kyum poses with South Korean and U.S. special operations forces for a photo in front of a Lockheed AC-130J Ghostrider on Monday. [JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF]

The exercise marks the first time a Lockheed AC-130J Ghostrider, a heavily armed, long-endurance, ground-attack transport aircraft, has been deployed to Korea, according to both the JCS and U.S. Special Operations Command Korea.

The AC-130J is equipped with various advanced weapons, including the GBU-39 small-diameter bomb, a precision-guided glide bomb that provides aircraft with the ability to carry a higher number of more accurate bombs.

Greater numbers of U.S. strategic and military assets have been deployed to South Korea to support Washington’s extended deterrence commitment to Seoul in the past year as the North has upped its missile testing ante and threatened the use of nuclear weapons in cases where it perceives the survival of its leadership to be under threat.

Extended deterrence refers to the U.S. pledge to use all of its military capabilities, including nuclear, to defend South Korea if it comes under attack.

The AC-130J was flown from Hurlburt Field in Florida, while the MC-130J multi-mission combat transport aircraft was dispatched from the 353rd Special Operations Wing based in Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, Japan.

On Saturday, the U.S. Navy’s Seventh Fleet posted pictures of the 6,000-ton Los Angeles-class submarine arriving in Busan. The submarine was said to be carrying dozens of Tomahawk cruise missiles with a range of 1,700 nautical miles (1,956 miles).

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