U.S. and South Korean soldiers watch as a multiple launch rocket system fires in Gangwon Province, South Korea, Aug. 31, 2022. ()
CAMP HUMPHREYS, South Korea — U.S. and South Korean troops joined forces this week to prepare for “Hamas-style surprise” attacks, potentially out of Pyongyang.
“In case of war,” roughly 5,400 troops kicked off the three-day exercise Wednesday focused on responding to long-range artillery strikes from the air and on the ground, South Korea’s Ground Operations Command said in a news release Friday.
Around 300 artillery weapons and 1,000 vehicles were used in the exercise, along with Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt IIs and South Korean F-15K Slam Eagle fighter jets, the release added.
The training wrapped up Friday with South Korean K-9 Thunder and K-55A1 self-propelled howitzers firing live-rounds at a training site in Cheorwon county, roughly five miles from the Demilitarized Zone separating the Korean Peninsula, according to the release.
The Ground Operations Command release did not mention North Korea by name; however, the South’s military has warned that an attack from the communist regime could mimic Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7 assault on Israel.
If the North strikes the South, its troops’ “pattern of warfare would be similar to the pattern of Hamas’ invasion,” South Korean army Gen. Kim Seung-kyum, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told lawmakers in Seoul on Oct. 12.
Kim noted that North Korea’s military capabilities are a more serious threat than that of Hamas. Pyongyang possesses more than 700 long-range artillery systems, of which 300 “constitute a threat to the Seoul metropolitan area,” he said.
The allies routinely train near the border. During March’s Warrior Shield exercise, around 800 U.S. and 400 South Korean troops equipped with American Stryker vehicles and South Korean K1A2 main battle tanks carried out live-fire training in Pocheon city, roughly 16 miles from the DMZ.
North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency regularly condemns the joint drills and describes them as a rehearsal of an invasion. The communist regime has fired 21 ballistic missiles — four of them intercontinental range — in 14 days of testing so far this year.
