mo4ch:>South Korea needles Tokyo with military drills around Japanese-claimed islets | Mo4ch News

Days after Seoul scrapped intelligence-sharing with Japan, all branches of its military descended on a handful of disputed islets for two-day drills, raising ire in Tokyo and fueling a brewing trade conflict between the neighbors.The wargames will see members of the South Korean Navy, Air Force, Army and Marines hone their combat skills around the Dokdo islets that lie halfway between South Korea and Japan, according to Yonhap news agency. The drills take place each year in June and December, but they were re-scheduled this time to show “determination to defend the country’s territories,” an unnamed navy official told the agency.Seoul has doubled the number of troops and the amount of hardware involved in previous exercises, deploying the country’s first Aegis-capable destroyer ‘Sejong the Great,’ and nine other warships, along with 10 jets, including the F-15K fighter. The South Korean Navy is one of the few non-US operators of Aegis, an advanced command and control system that uses …