Asia | Return to form

America and South Korea restart their big military drills

Donald Trump’s talks with Kim Jong Un, and the pandemic, had put them on hold

United States Marines take part in an annual KOR-USA combine military drill near Yeongil Bay in Pohang, South Korea on August 12, 2021. North Korea's top envoy in Russia has called for the U.S. troops' withdrawal from South Korea and called the allies' joint military exercise a ''war rehearsal,'' a Russian news agency said Thursday. (Photo by Seung-il Ryu/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
|SEOUL

After donald trump met Kim Jong Un in Singapore in 2018, he appeared sympathetic to the North Korean position. Having secured from his counterpart a commitment to the “complete denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula”, and feeling well on the way to a “comprehensive and complete deal”, Mr Trump called for an end to joint military drills between America and South Korea, which started in the 1950s. Not only were they expensive, he claimed, but they were “very provocative”, echoing North Korea’s propagandists.

This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline “Return to form”

Walkies

From the August 20th 2022 edition

Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents

Explore the edition

More from Asia

Protesters wear Taiwan People's Party former chairman Ko Wen-je's masks to protest against the perceived judicial injustice

Taiwan’s political drama is paralysing its government

Domestic dysfunction plays right into China’s hands

A man wears a Australian flag and a cork hat on Australia Day

An angry culture war surrounds Australia Day

Conservatives claim that wokeness is destroying the national holiday


Stills from Gayrat Dustov's video tirade on social media

The fate of a ranting driver raises doubts about the “new” Uzbekistan

It seems free speech is not so guaranteed after all


Indian politicians are becoming obsessed with doling out cash

Handouts are transforming the role of the state—perhaps for the worse

How to end the nightmare of Asia’s choked roads

The middle classes love cars but hate traffic

Can Donald Trump maintain Joe Biden’s network of Asian alliances?

Discipline and creativity will help, but so will China’s actions