South Korea has scrambled 80 military aircraft, including advanced F-35 fighter jets, after it spotted 180 North Korean warplanes flying inside North Korean territory – the latest provocative show of military might by the nuclear-armed country. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said on Friday that North Korean warplanes were spotted in various areas inland and along the country’s east and west coasts, but did not come very close to the inter-Korean border. None of the planes breached the South Korean military’s virtual “tactical action” line, which is set to be 20-50 kilometers (12-31 miles) north of the two countries’ land and sea borders. The line of action is for monitoring purposes to give the South enough time to respond to provocations or attacks. The South scrambled 80 of its warplanes, including an unspecified number of F35 fighters, but there were no immediate reports of incidents involving the two air forces. The JCS said South Korean forces “maintain a firm posture of readiness for further provocations” and are monitoring the situation in coordination with the United States. Al Jazeera’s Rob McBride, reporting from South Korea’s capital Seoul, said some of the North Korean aircraft movements were close enough to the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that separates the two Koreas to trigger the South’s overturn aircraft in response. “The South Korean military announced that during the day – from late morning local time to mid-afternoon here – they detected a flight of about 180 military aircraft of different types over North Korea – right across the width of the North Korean sector of the peninsula,” he said. The Korean People’s Army Air Force conducts a military exercise at an undisclosed location in this photo released in 2013 by North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency [File: KCNA/AFP] Months of tension between North Korea and allies South Korea and the US appear to be reaching a new level as Pyongyang moves to show its opposition to ongoing military exercises south of its border while showing off its newfound military firepower.
“Uncontrolled Phase”
North Korea had warned Seoul and Washington that their decision this week to hold the “Vigilant Storm” joint military air drills would be met with a response. When South Korea and the US announced on Thursday that they were extending the Vigilant Storm drills by a day in response to North Korea’s earlier missile launches, an official in Pyongyang warned that the situation had entered a dangerous phase. “It is a very dangerous and wrong choice,” Pak Jong-chon, secretary of the Central Committee of North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party, said of the decision to extend the drills. “The irresponsible decision of the US and South Korea pushes the current situation, caused by provocative military actions by allied forces, into an uncontrollable phase,” he said, according to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency. The Vigilant Storm exercises – which began on Monday and are now scheduled to end on Saturday – involve around 240 fighter jets and other military aircraft flying around 1,600 joint missions. The air drills came after South Korea’s military concluded the 12-day Hoguk 22 field exercises, in which an undisclosed number of US military personnel had participated. North Korea strongly opposes such training exercises, saying the military drills are in preparation for a possible attack on its soil. In a visit described as “highly choreographed” amid tensions on the Korean Peninsula, South Korean Defense Minister Lee Jong-sup toured a US air base on Thursday with US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Yonhap reported. Austin and South Korean Defense Minister Lee Yong-sup talk in front of a B-1 bomber during a visit to Andrews Air Force Base on November 3, 2022 [Mandel Ngan/Pool via AP] The defense chiefs’ tour of the US Air Force’s Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, home to nuclear-capable B-1B and B-52 bombers, was an opportunity “to highlight America’s military strength amid evolving threats from the North Korea”, Yonhap have reported. During the visit, the US defense secretary “underscored Washington’s ‘ironclad’ security commitment to the South’s defense,” Yonhap reported.
