Pentagon: U.S.-Korean war game remains unset
Published: July 1, 2010
The Pentagon has delayed the expected June announcement of a joint U.S.-South Korean military exercise, a spokesman said, just weeks ahead of a cabinet-level U.S. delegation visit to Seoul.
The decision comes as U.S. commanders try to set up new talks with North Korea counterparts.
Defense Department spokesman Bryan Whitman had said an announcement on the exercise would occur in late June, but on Thursday he told reporters he no longer has a crystal ball on the event, perhaps not until the end of month. “I amended the last part of June to now July. I expanded the window,” he said, “...leaving open always the possibility that on the 31st of July it could be [delayed further into] August.”
The previously unplanned war game had been expected in response to the March sinking the South Korean naval ship Cheonan. South Korean defense ministry officials had indicated the event would include the U.S.S. George Washington aircraft carrier, according to media reports, but Pentagon officials have said no plans had been made.
“Certainly that incident has highlighted our challenged on the peninsula,” Whitman said.
Sliding the exercise forward puts it smack in the middle of some complicated diplomatic maneuvers. Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are scheduled for a “2+2 Meeting” in Seoul in July, according to the State Department and media reports, and a war game at this stage could be perceived as unnecessarily provocative.
But a show of force would fall in step with a series of other public Pentagon reactions to the Cheonan incident that extends or retains U.S. command over the Korean peninsula. The chairman of South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Lee Sang-eui, resigned in June over his handling of the fallout, and Korean officials have agreed the moves. Then the U.S took back control of a regularly planned exercise, Ulchi Freedom Guardian.
Over the weekend Pyongyang rejected an olive branch offering by Gen. Walter “Skip” Sharp, commander of United Nations Command forces in South Korea. Sharp sought a meeting of colonels to set up new higher-level officer meetings.
Stars and Stripes’ Ashley Rowland reported: “Sixteen rounds of general officer talks have been held at Panmunjom since 1998, most recently in March 2009 at North Korea’s request to talk about reducing tensions on the peninsula.”
And confirming what observers have assumed was coming, President Barack Obama announced this weekend the delay by three years of the planned 2012 transfer of operational wartime control, or OPCON, to the South Korean military. As late as May, top U.S. commanders has said OPCON transfer was on track.
At the Pentagon, Whitman said, “There is still a desire to do an additional bilateral exercise with the Republic of Korea to continue to broaden and strengthen our relationship with mil to mil there. And I know that I talked about some naval exercises and some Maritime Proliferation Initiative type activities that we were going to embark on together.
“And I, quite frankly I had expected to be able to give you something more specific by July 1st.”
Asked for a concrete reason for the delay, Whitman said, “I think that as they plan these exercises they’re looking for the right – or the opportunities that present the greatest means by which to collaborate on important military-security initiatives. And to that point, we have not yet set a date.”
Related:
North Korea passes on UN command meeting
US to retake command of South Korea exercise
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