US military helicopters, including a Chinook and an Apache, sit in Camp Humphreys in Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province, on Aug. 19, 2026. (Yonhap)
South Korean and US military authorities decided Wednesday to scale back Ulchi Freedom Shield (UFS), a joint exercise based on the scenario of a full-scale war on the Korean Peninsula. The two countries will end their exercise early, after just half its planned duration, and also reduce field training exercises held during the period.The decision followed US President Donald Trump’s sudden order two days earlier to reduce the exercise, prompting both concerns that it could undermine readiness against North Korea and preparations to transfer of wartime operational control (OPCON) of South Korean forces, as well as hopes that it could mark a turning point in US-North Korea dialogue and inter-Korean relations.South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff announced in a press release on Wednesday that the duration and scale of the exercise would be adjusted as proposed by the US.More specifically, the Joint Chiefs announced that the exercise, which began on Aug. 17, would end on Aug. 21 rather than Aug. 27; that some of the 14 joint field training exercises would be scaled back; and that the Combined Forces Command’s wartime command post would be divided between CP Tango (at Mount Cheonggye in Seongnam) and Camp Humphreys (at Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi Province).Theater-level joint exercises covering the entire Korean Peninsula, such as Ulchi Freedom Shield, are held after months of close coordination between Seoul and Washington on detailed plans and participating forces. This is the first time such an exercise has been drastically shortened at one side’s unilateral request while already underway.Following Trump’s directive, officials with the Korean Ministry of National Defense had assumed that only some field drills would be scaled back, with the overall schedule left intact, but instead both the schedule and scale were sharply reduced.In separate appearances before the National Assembly’s Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee and Legislation and Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said Korea had “not been notified in advance,” while Defense Minister Ahn Gyu-back said “no officials in either the Korean or American governments had known about it,” referring to Trump’s order. Concerns have been raised that repeated reductions or cancelations of joint exercises at the unilateral decision of the US could erode trust in its alliance with South Korea and weaken their combined defense posture at a time when North Korea is upgrading its nuclear weapon and missile capabilities.Ahn, the defense minister, responded to concerns about weakened readiness against North Korea in a meeting with reporters at the ministry on Wednesday. “All 159 joint field training exercises scheduled for this year will be conducted as planned,” he said.Ahn explained that the exercises originally scheduled for UFS had merely been postponed and that the total number of field training exercises for the year remained unchanged.
