US, South Korea launching massive war games
Iran Press TV
Thu Mar 27, 2014 12:6PM GMT
South Korea and the United States are staging a 12-day military drill amid rising tensions on the troubled Korean Peninsula.
The US and South Korea have started a joint military drill, the largest in two decades that would likely infuriate the neighboring North.
The military exercise is the largest joint drill of its kind over the past 20 years.
"The scale of this year's Ssang Yong (double dragon) is greater than any others in the past," a US military spokesman said.
More than 15000 South Korean and American forces are taking part in the amphibious landing war games.
The new war games come a day after North Korea launched two mid-range ballistic missiles.
Pyongyang views the drills as an act of provocation.
Last year's drill fuelled tensions, with Pyongyang threatening a pre-emptive nuclear strike and US stealth bombers flying over the peninsula.
North Korea has always slammed such war games as rehearsals for an invasion. Yet Seoul and Washington reject the idea, saying the military maneuvers are of defensive nature.
Tensions have been escalating between the two Koreas over the past few months.
North Korea says it will take additional measures to demonstrate its might as long as threats from the US persist.
Pyongyang has recently announced that it would strengthen its nuclear deterrence for self-defense in the face of US threats.
Rail lines and other contacts between the two sides were first severed during the 1950-53 Korean War. No peace deal has been signed since then, meaning that Pyongyang and Seoul remain technically at war.
JR/AB/SL
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