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Korea, U.S. to hold regular KIDD defense talks at Pentagon next week: Spokesperson

Published: 25 Apr. 2025, 09:05

A view of the Pentagon, the headquarters building for the U.S. Department of Defense, in Washington on August 13. [AFP/YONHAP]

South Korea and the United States plan to hold their key regular defense talks in Washington next week, a Pentagon spokesperson said Thursday, in a sign that the allies are maintaining close security cooperation under the Trump administration to counter evolving North Korean threats.

The spokesperson said that the Korea-U.S. Integrated Defense Dialogue (KIDD) is set to take place at the Pentagon on Thursday and Friday. The upcoming meeting will mark the first KIDD gathering since U.S. President Donald Trump took office in January.

"The Korea-U.S. Integrated Defense Dialogue will occur next week and there will be a joint press statement release after the meeting," the spokesperson told Yonhap New Agency via email.

Launched in 2011, KIDD is a comprehensive senior-level defense meeting between the allies.

When held, the KIDD meeting is expected to touch on a range of bilateral security policy cooperation issues, including reinforcing deterrence against evolving North Korean nuclear and missile threats, and the allies' combined defense posture.

Under a working-group session, the two sides could also take stock of progress in the allies' joint efforts for the conditions-based transfer of wartime operational control from the United States to South Korea.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth speaks during a bilateral meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia on April 24. [AFP/YONHAP]

The forthcoming KIDD meeting is expected to help ease lingering concerns that a political transition period in Seoul following the ouster of President Yoon Suk Yeol could have a negative effect on the allies' security policy coordination.

Stoking worries over defense collaboration, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth skipped South Korea in his recent trip to the Indo-Pacific that included stops in Japan and the Philippines. His predecessor, Lloyd Austin, also canceled the Korea portion of his Asia swing in December.

Asked to comment on the future operation of the Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG), the allies' key nuclear deterrence body, the spokesperson said that "NCG deliberations are ongoing."

Earlier this week, an official in Seoul said that Seoul and Washington will keep the NCG running under the Trump administration with its next meeting set to take place as early as June.

The NCG was launched by former President Yoon and former U.S. President Joe Biden following their April 2023 summit to strengthen the U.S. "extended deterrence" commitment to defending its ally South Korea with all of its military capabilities, including nuclear weapons.

Yonhap