Trump says US will reduce military exercises with South Korea, citing lack of help with Iran

By Aileen Graef

(CNN) — President Donald Trump announced Sunday that the United States would reduce military exercises it conducts with key regional ally South Korea, citing his positive relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Seoul’s lack of assistance with Iran.

“Based on my very good relationship with Kim Jong Un, of North Korea, I am not happy with the fact that the United States has, long ago, agreed to participate in Joint Military Exercises with South Korea. These exercises are not only costly, with much of these costs paid for by the United States of America (as usual!), but send a signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile, to a Country that, as long as Donald J. Trump has been President, has been unthreatening and respectful,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Trump went on to raise his request for South Korea to help with the US war against Iran.

“While somewhat unrelated (?), I recently asked the President of South Korea if they would like to join us in the Denuclearization of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and they said, ‘No thanks!’” Trump wrote.

The US president has frequently lashed out at allies that have not aided in the war.

Trump has had a warm relationship with Kim despite North Korea being a longtime adversary of the United States. Earlier this weekend, Trump posted a picture of him and Kim, with the caption: “Despite the unfriendly look on this particular picture, there are many where we’re smiling, Kim Jong Un and I get along GREAT!”

The joint exercises with South Korea, called Ulchi Freedom Shield military drills, were set to begin Monday and go for 10 days.

North Korea has long criticized such exercises, with its Central Military Commission calling trilateral exercises last year with Japan and South Korea “the most comprehensive and offensive war drill for aggression in terms of scale, content and nature” that has been conducted on the southern Korean Peninsula.

During Trump’s first term, the United States and South Korea also scaled back joint operations as part of an effort to ease tensions with North Korea.

The president said in 2018 that it was “inappropriate to have war games” on the Korean Peninsula as the US was engaging in nuclear negotiations with North Korea.

In March 2019 — after a Trump-Kim summit in Hanoi that failed to reach an agreement — the United States and South Korea announced that annual large-scale exercises, which had been a common feature of the defense relationship between the two militaries, would be reconfigured into smaller exercises.

As he did on Sunday, Trump in 2019 also cited the cost to the United States. “The reason I do not want military drills with South Korea is to save hundreds of millions of dollars for the U.S. for which we are not reimbursed,” he posted at the time.

South Korea has been a close American ally for over 70 years and frequently drills with the US military. The country hosts the largest US military installation overseas, Camp Humphreys, which is home to thousands of American service members, their families and Korean nationals.

After meeting Kim several times during his first term, Trump has referenced their “good relationship” since returning to office. On his home way from China in May, for example, the president said he had been in communication with the North Korean leader but wouldn’t say how many talks they’d had.

Kim has said the United States’ war with Iran proves his country made the right decision to keep its nuclear weapons. In a speech to North Korea’s Supreme People’s Assembly published in March, Kim accused Washington of “acts of state sponsored terrorism and aggression,” but did not mention Iran by name.

This story has been updated with additional information.

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CNN’s Brad Lendon, Will Ripley and Alejandra Jaramillo contributed to this report.