This handout photo taken on November 12, 2017 and provided by the ROK Defense MinistryROK Defense Ministry in Seoul shows USS Nimitz 3 rd left USS Ronald Reagan 2nd left and USS Theodore Roosevelt left operating with ROK's destroyer King Sejong front during a joint naval drill in the waters east of ROK. AFP SEOUL - The naval forces of the Republic of Korea, the United States, and Japan will stage their major trilateral anti-submarine exercises for the first time in five years on Friday.
The drills will be held in international waters off the Korean peninsula's east coast, just a day after the Democratic People's Republic of Korea fired two ballistic missiles toward its east coast and US Vice-President Kamala Harris visited Seoul and the heavily fortified border between the two Koreas.
The exercises are intended to improve their capability to respond to increasing North Korean submarine threats, including its submarine-launched ballistic missiles SLBM at a time when it consistently poses nuclear and missile threats with a series of ballistic missile tests, the ROK navy said in a statement. North Korea is also referred to as the DPRK.
Since 2017 the one-day drills are a flagship maritime training program that has not been conducted because the former progressive ROK government tried to improve inter-Korean relations and facilitate denuclearization talks between Pyongyang and Washington, which has stalled since 2019.
The exercises will bring together the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier, the 9,800 ton guided missile cruiser USS Chancellorsville, the 6,900 ton Aegis-equipped destroyer USS Barry, ROK's 4,400 ton destroyer Munmu the Great and Japan's 5,100 ton tanker Asahi, among other warships, the ROK navy said.
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