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U.S. Forces Korea commander Javier Brunson sharply criticized the speed at which the South Korean government is pushing to transfer wartime operational control (OPCON), saying, Political convenience must not outpace the conditions. He reiterated that military capability and security conditions must be fully in place before any firm date is set.<\/p>\n
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On the 21st (local time), Brunson told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the OPCON transfer must be strictly conditions-based and that concentrating on those conditions is the only way both the U.S. and South Korea will be safer. With the Lee Jae-myung administration pressing to complete the transfer within its term, U.S. officials appear to be warning against a hasty, politically driven handover ahead of the 58th Security Consultative Meeting (SCM) in Washington, D.C., this October.<\/p>\n
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Brunson also made clear he intends to prioritize capability over sheer troop numbers when shaping U.S. force posture on the peninsula.<\/p>\n
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He said the Korean Peninsula is a critical strategic hub for defending the U.S. homeland and advancing regional U.S. interests, and added, We are modernizing U.S. Forces Korea to respond to rapidly shifting strategic challenges. To grasp the shift from size to capability, he said, you must focus on the specific military capabilities that will be deployed on the peninsula. Observers see this as a push to strengthen strategic flexibility\u2014adjusting troop levels as conditions change and expanding U.S. Forces Korea’s role beyond deterrence against North Korea to broader operations across the Indo-Pacific.<\/p>\n
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He pointed to U.S. Forces Korea units taking part in Indo\u2011Pacific Command exercises, saying those activities demonstrate the potential to project capabilities from Korea to support deterrence across the region.<\/p>\n
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Brunson also warned about North Korea’s military. Politically, Kim Jong Un remains firmly in power, he said. Militarily, we are seeing a more experienced force. He noted that North Korean units that deployed to the war in Ukraine returned home and have since trained other units, applying lessons learned from that conflict to their drills.<\/p>\n
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At the hearing, Senate Armed Services Committee Chair Roger Wicker took aim at President Donald Trump, who has been sharply critical of U.S. allies, saying, It does not help for U.S. leaders to mock our allies, and he stressed the value of alliances in confronting authoritarian states.<\/p>\n
U.S. Forces Korea Commander emphasized that conditions must be met before transferring wartime operational control, highlighting military readiness.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_thumbnail_url":"https:\/\/cdn-union.tenbizt.com\/contents\/crawler-dev\/thumbnail\/2026\/04\/CP-2023-0235\/thumb-10df2683-f569-4a75-9dbc-4d1f6a677290.jpg","footnotes":""},"categories":[278104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-261973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-military"],"yoast_head":"\n