[Asia Economy Yang Nak-gyu, Military Specialist Reporter] The trilateral defense ministers' meeting between South Korea, the United States, and Japan is expected to resume as early as next month. The last trilateral defense ministers' meeting was held in November 2019 in Bangkok, Thailand, on the sidelines of the ASEAN Defense Ministers' Meeting-Plus (ADMM-Plus). If held this year, it will be the first in two years.
On the 14th, the Ministry of National Defense announced that South Korea and the U.S. reaffirmed their shared goal of complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the establishment of lasting peace at the 19th Korea-U.S. Integrated Defense Dialogue (KIDD) meeting, and agreed to proceed accordingly. The KIDD meeting was held on the 12th and 13th in Washington D.C.
At this meeting, South Korea and the U.S. agreed on the importance of joint exercises to maintain the combined defense posture and decided to promote the trilateral defense ministers' meeting between South Korea, the U.S., and Japan as soon as possible. There is a possibility that it will be held on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue, an Asian security conference scheduled for April 4-5 in Singapore.
Both sides reaffirmed that the Korea-U.S. alliance is a key pillar of peace and security on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia, emphasizing the importance of maintaining a combined defense posture with a "Fight Tonight" readiness. This reflects the U.S. position emphasizing the normal implementation of Korea-U.S. joint exercises and ensuring training conditions.
South Korea and the U.S. also noted progress made toward the wartime operational control (OPCON) transfer to the future combined command but agreed that the conditions specified in the pre-transfer plan must be fully met before the transfer.
Additionally, both sides shared assessments of North Korea's recent nuclear and missile threats and agreed to closely monitor North Korean developments and cooperate closely going forward.
The meeting was attended by Kim Man-ki, Director General of Defense Policy, Kim Sang-jin, Director of International Policy, and Cho Yong-geun, Director of North Korea Policy from South Korea's Ministry of National Defense; and from the U.S. Department of Defense, Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs David Helvey and Deputy Assistant Secretary for East Asia Siddhartha Mohandas. The two countries plan to hold another KIDD meeting in Seoul around September and submit the discussion results to the 53rd Security Consultative Meeting (SCM) scheduled for October.
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