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After North Korea conducted its fourth nuclear test in April 2016

At the request of the South Korean government, which is concerned about rising tensions on the Korean Peninsula ahead of the North Korea-US summit, a joint South Korea-US military exercise called Blue Lightning that was supposed to involve American B-52 strategic bombers was canceled, the Wall Street Journal reported on May 18.

The newspaper quoted an anonymous American official as saying that the South Korean government had wanted to pull out of Blue Lightning because of the inclusion of B-52 bombers and that the US government had accepted the South Korean government’s request because of the importance of maintaining cooperative relations with South Korea at a sensitive diplomatic time.

According to the newspaper, the canceled exercise was separate from Max Thunder, a joint air exercise between South Korea and the US that began on May 11 and will end on May 25, though the two were supposed to take place on a similar timeframe.

The original plan was for a joint exercise between South Korea, the US and Japan that would involve 2 American B-52s deployed to Guam, as well as the Republic of Korea Air Force and the Japan Air Self-Defense Force. But because of continuing tension between South Korea and Japan, the plan was altered so that the B-52s would engage in separate exercises with the two air forces, and even the South Korea-US exercise was supposed to be minimized to avoid provoking North Korea.

But after North Korea condemned Max Thunder, South Korean Defense Minister Song Young-moo and Gen. Vincent Brooks, commander of ROK-US Combined Forces Command, met on May 16 and adjusted the plans so that the B-52 bombers would only fly through Japanese air space and not enter South Korea’s air defense identification zone. A senior official from the Defense Ministry declined to comment further on these developments.

By Yi Yong-in, Washington correspondent, and Park Byong-su, senior staff writer

Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]