United States of America and South Korea they will conduct simulation training to deal with the threat of attack from nuclear weaponThis was announced today by US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin.

Washington and Seoul will conduct “exercises based on the increasingly complex nuclear threat scenarios facing the peninsula,” Mr. Austin said in an article for South Korea’s national Yonhap news agency.

Mr. Austin is visiting Seoul for the third time since becoming Secretary of Defense. He met with his colleague Lee Jong Sup and was also scheduled to be received by President Yoon Suk Gil.

“Unwavering” Commitment to Contain North Korea

His visit is aimed at deepening cooperation between the two countries, discussing security issues, and reaffirming the “American commitment to contain” North Korea, which is “expanded” and “unwavering,” according to Mr. Austin’s article in Yonap.

Tensions on the Korean Peninsula soared in 2022 when North Korea conducted an unprecedented number of weapons tests, including the launch of an ICBM capable of hitting the US mainland in defiance of international sanctions.

Kim Jong-un announced in 2022 that his country aims to have the most powerful nuclear arsenal “in the world”, and in September he called North Korea’s nuclear status “irreversible”.

Seoul and Washington have been warning since last year that Pyongyang has nearly completed preparations for a new nuclear test, its seventh in its history and the first since 2017.

^{Source: APE-MEB, AFP, Reuters.}