S. KOREA-U.S. JOINT MILITARY DRILLS

[Anchor Lead]

South Korea and the U.S. will conduct joint military drills starting next Monday as scheduled. But they will be scaled back due to the continuing spread of COVID-19. The allies began preliminary training on Tuesday ahead of the main drills.

[Pkg]

South Korea and the U.S have practically begun their second-half joint military drills. As a preliminary step, they will carry out crisis management staff training for four days starting Tuesday. The allies will then conduct the main drills from next Monday through August 26. For the summertime command post drills, they will hold computer-simulated training without the actual mobilization of troops, as they did in the springtime drills held in March. The exercises will still be based on the two-phase scenario of defense and counterattack. However, amid the pandemic, the drills will likely be even smaller than the springtime ones. This is because South Korea mobilizes a smaller number of forces, although the U.S.‘ participation will be maintained at a similar level of some 1,000 troops. Military officials explained that the scale-back is inevitable amid the worsening pandemic. They cited the KDCA's social distancing rules for schools, which mandates a two-meter distance between each other and a space of six square meters given to a single person. Shin Won-sik of the parliamentary defense committee said the Joint Chiefs of Staff decided to reduce South Korean participation to 30 percent of the springtime exercises. As the exercises were scaled down, the two countries are known to postpone the training to verify South Korea’s full operational capability ahead of the transfer of wartime operational control. They will hold only a preliminary drill, as they did in spring. The joint drills will take place amid restored inter-Korean communication channels and discussions on cooperation and humanitarian programs for the North. Seoul's military is keeping a close eye on how North Korea will respond to the drills. In the spring, Pyongyang fired cruise missiles and short-range ballistic missiles to protest against the joint military exercises.