South Korea's navy takes about 20 warships into combined Yellow Sea drills with US forces

South Korea's navy began large-scale combined and joint manoeuvres in the Yellow Sea, which Koreans call the West Sea, on Tuesday 20 October, working alongside the South Korean air force and the US Navy, Yonhap News Agency reported. The drills form part of this year's Hoguk exercise and are scheduled to continue until Friday 23 October.

More than 20 navy surface ships are taking part. They are led by the 7,600-ton Aegis destroyer ROKS Seoae Ryu Seong-ryong and include the 4,400-ton destroyer ROKS Gang Gam-chan and the 3,200-ton destroyer ROKS Eulji Mundeok. News1 reported that US Navy patrol aircraft are also involved in the training.

The programme covers fleet manoeuvres, live naval gunfire, maritime interdiction operations and anti-submarine warfare, together with combined maritime counter special operations forces training. According to Yonhap, the navy organised the drills to improve its ability to carry out combined and joint operations at sea, to strengthen its response to a range of possible enemy provocations and to firm up its military readiness.

Brigadier General Jeong Seung-il, who heads the navy's 2nd Maritime Combat Group and is directing the training, described the drills as realistic manoeuvres meant to ensure that sailors fully master their assigned missions across varied combat situations. He said the navy would keep a firm readiness posture through intensive training so that it would be certain to win if it ever had to fight.

Hoguk, first held in 1996, is the military's annual outdoor field exercise and is run by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The JCS said last week that this year's exercise would start on Monday 19 October for a five-day run across the land, maritime and air domains, with roughly the same number of troops as in 2025. It added opposing-force play and simulated combat training, alongside computer-simulated command post exercises, and said US Forces Korea would also take part. The military is using the same period to hold two of the seven combined field exercises with the United States that were postponed when the allies cut short their Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise in August.

On land, units have been rehearsing the defence of critical infrastructure. The army's 51st Infantry Division held an integrated counter-terrorism drill on 19 October at the Hwaseong branch of the Korea District Heating Corporation, simulating a drone attack that caused an explosion at a large energy facility, with local police and firefighters taking part. The division said its own Hoguk field training runs from 19 to 23 October across south-western Gyeonggi Province, with troops and military vehicles moving through the area.

Also on 19 October, Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power's Wolsong nuclear power site joined Hoguk training led by the Marine Corps 1st Division. The scenario assumed that an unidentified drone had penetrated the plant, followed by explosions and fires, and tested the site's security, guard and firefighting staff on initial response, recovery and protection of people.

The navy held a similar round of manoeuvres in March around West Sea Defence Day, when ships of its 2nd Fleet, including the destroyer Eulji Mundeok and the frigates Seoul and Gyeonggi, fired anti-ship rounds together in the Yellow Sea to honour 55 navy and marine personnel killed defending the area.