{"id":130181,"date":"2026-08-24T11:36:06","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T11:36:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/130181\/"},"modified":"2026-08-24T11:36:06","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T11:36:06","slug":"us-cancels-south-korea-marine-drill-amid-iran-war-raising-concerns-among-allies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/130181\/","title":{"rendered":"US cancels South Korea marine drill amid Iran war, raising concerns among allies"},"content":{"rendered":"

The decision comes days after Washington also scaled back another major military exercise with Seoul, raising questions about how the US is balancing its commitments in West Asia and the Indo-Pacific. <\/p>\n

The United States has cancelled a major joint amphibious exercise with South Korea, citing limits on the availability of its forces because of the war with Iran.<\/p>\n

The decision comes days after Washington also scaled back another major military exercise<\/a> with Seoul, raising questions about how the US is balancing its commitments in West Asia and the Indo-Pacific.<\/p>\n

South Korea said on Monday, as reported by newsy agency AFP, that the biennial Ssangyong exercise, scheduled for next month, had been called off after the US Marine Corps informed Seoul that its ability to deploy forces was constrained by the situation in West Asia.<\/p>\n

The exercise normally involves warships, aircraft and ground forces practising amphibious landings and other combined operations.<\/p>\n

The move comes as the US military continues to deal with the demands of the Iran war. According to Pentagon casualty data, 756 US service members have been wounded<\/a> in action since the start of the conflict, while 18 have been killed, taking the combined number of US military deaths and injuries to 774.<\/p>\n

Iran war puts pressure on US force availability<\/p>\n

South Korean Marine Corps spokesman Han Seung-jeon said the US had notified Seoul in June about restrictions on its ability to deploy forces for this year’s Ssangyong exercise.<\/p>\n

\"world\"More from World<\/p>\n

Seoul and Washington are continuing discussions on whether the amphibious drill can be held at a later date. The Pentagon had not immediately commented on South Korea’s announcement.<\/p>\n

The cancellation comes against the backdrop of growing US military demands in West Asia. The latest casualty figures also highlight the human and operational costs of the conflict, with the Pentagon recently adding 50 wounded personnel to its database.<\/p>\n

The situation has fuelled wider questions about whether Washington’s military commitments in West Asia could affect its ability to maintain the same level of presence and readiness in other regions.<\/p>\n

Trump also cuts key Korea exercise<\/p>\n

The Ssangyong cancellation follows President Donald Trump’s decision to substantially reduce the annual Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise with South Korea.<\/p>\n

The drills, which were scheduled to run for 11 days, ended after only five days. Trump argued that the exercises were expensive and sent an “inappropriate and hostile” message to North Korea.<\/p>\n

The decision also fits into Trump’s efforts to revive the engagement with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un that began during his first presidency. Trump recently said it was important for Washington to maintain a relationship with Kim and claimed North Korea now possesses 57 nuclear weapons. South Korea estimates that Pyongyang has between 80 and 120 nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n

US allies watch the changes closely<\/p>\n

For South Korea, the immediate concern is not simply the cancellation of one exercise but the broader pattern of changes to joint military activities.<\/p>\n

The scaling back of Ulchi Freedom Shield reportedly caught Seoul off guard. South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun described the decision as a mutual arrangement but acknowledged that Seoul had not been informed beforehand about Trump’s intention to reduce the exercise.<\/p>\n

The developments are also being watched in Japan and Taiwan, which depend heavily on US security commitments in the region. Any sustained reduction in US military exercises or deployments could raise questions among its Asian allies about Washington’s ability to respond simultaneously to security challenges in different theatres.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The decision comes days after Washington also scaled back another major military exercise with Seoul, raising questions about…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":130182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[8013,89,31,33,66356,57101,11602,59903,35276],"class_list":["post-130181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-korea","tag-indo-pacific","tag-iran-war","tag-korea","tag-south-korea","tag-ssangyong-exercise","tag-ulchi-freedom-shield","tag-us-military","tag-us-south-korea-military-exercises","tag-west-asia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=130181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=130181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=130181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=130181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}