The United States, South Korea and Japan kicked off their first joint multi-domain “Freedom Edge” exercises since the latest leadership changes in Washington and Seoul, prompting sharp warnings from Pyongyang. The five-day training in international waters near Jeju is aimed at tightening interoperability against North Korea’s advancing nuclear and missile programs, even as Kim Jong Un’s regime threatens “counteraction” if the allies’ “muscle-flexing” continues.

Five-Day Multi-Domain Drill off Jeju

Seoul’s Joint Chiefs said the training runs Monday through Friday and integrates maritime, air and cyber assets with ballistic-missile defense, air-defense, medical evacuation and maritime interdiction components to improve trilateral responses. The exercise follows combined air drills in June and large-scale US-ROK training in August, underscoring a push to institutionalize three-way coordination amid regional uncertainty.

North Korea’s Warnings and Regional Context

North Korea said it would respond “with counteraction in a very clear and intensified way” and Kim Yo Jong called the drills a “reckless show of strength” that will bring “bad results” for the allies, repeating Pyongyang’s view that the exercises are a war rehearsal. The rhetoric lands as North Korea claims its nuclear-armed status is “irreversible,” and as Kim supervises development of longer-range solid-fuel engines that target the US mainland.

A Sharper Great-Power Backdrop

The timing also follows a rare show of unity among China, Russia and North Korea: earlier this month, Xi Jinping hosted Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un at a Beijing military parade—an event widely read as a signal against the US-led order. That tableau, coupled with the new Freedom Edge iteration, highlights competing security blocs hardening across Northeast Asia.