SEOUL, Nov 4 – South Korea’s military said it held joint air drills Sunday with the United States and Japan, three days after North Korea fired an intercontinental ballistic missile that marked the longest-ever flight time for such a weapon from the country, Kyodo news agency reported.
In response to Pyongyang’s missile launch, the trilateral exercise took place in airspace where the air defense identification zones of Seoul and Tokyo overlap, north of South Korea’s southern island of Jeju, the military said.
At least one U.S. Air Force B-1B strategic bomber participated, the military added. It marked the fourth time in 2024 that a U.S. strategic bomber has been deployed around the Korean Peninsula. The three nations conducted similar drills once earlier this year.
Japan Air Self-Defense Force’s F-2 fighter jets and South Korean F-15s also joined Sunday’s exercise the military said, with fears growing that the North may carry out its seventh nuclear test in the near future following the latest ICBM launch.
South Korea’s military said the drills were aimed at demonstrating deepening security cooperation among Seoul, Washington, and Tokyo. Tensions have been escalating on the Korean Peninsula against a backdrop of Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile development.
Tokyo said the projectile was fired Thursday morning from near Pyongyang toward the Sea of Japan on a lofted trajectory. After flying for 86 minutes, it fell outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone west of the country’s northernmost prefecture of Hokkaido.
