North Korea launched about ten short-range ballistic missiles from the area around Pyongyang at about 5 p.m. Thursday, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said. Each flew roughly 300 kilometers and dropped into the water off the North’s east coast. Japan’s prime minister’s office detected the launch and said nothing further. South Korea’s presidential national security council told Pyongyang to stop.
Donald Trump had already cut that exercise in half. Thursday was day four.
He did it in a Truth Social post on Sunday, hours before Ulchi Freedom Shield, the annual joint exercise with South Korea, began. The drills cost too much, he wrote, and sent a signal that was “totally inappropriate and hostile” to North Korea. He cited his relationship with Kim Jong Un and Seoul’s refusal to back him over the war in Iran. On Wednesday the two militaries confirmed the cut: eleven days became five, ending Friday, with field training canceled or moved into simulators.
Nobody asked him for it.
