Inter-Korean Tensions Expected to Rise as Ulchi Freedom Shield Exercise Announced to Begin on August 22nd

Mark your calendar because sometime after August 22nd when the UFS exercise begins is likely when the North Koreans will launch a major provocation such as a ICBM launch or nuclear test:

Plans to expand a combined military drill between South Korea and the United States against North Korea’s growing threats are expected to bring the Korean Peninsula back to a state of confrontation, ratcheting up cross-border tensions, Pyongyang watchers said, Monday.

The prediction comes as the allies seek to enhance their overall capabilities to deal with a possible all-out war on the peninsula through the Ulchi Freedom Shield (UFS) exercise, scheduled for Aug. 22 to Sept. 1, according to Seoul’s defense ministry. In addition, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un also threatened last week to annihilate the new South Korean administration he claimed is pursuing a U.S.-led hostile policy against the North. 

“It is inevitable that inter-Korean confrontation will deepen as North Korea has strongly responded to the combined exercise,” said Cho Han-bum, a senior researcher of the Korea Institute for National Unification.

Park Won-gon, a professor of North Korean studies at Ewha Womans University, also presented a similar view.

“North Korea has denounced the combined exercise, along with a dispatch of U.S. strategic assets, as a hostile policy toward the country, so the North is anticipated to vehemently respond to the drill in accordance with its leader’s pledge, which would greatly escalate tensions on the peninsula,” Park said.

Korea Times

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