North Korea launched ballistic missiles toward the sea on Saturday (September 12, 2026), its neighbours said, a day after the U.S., South Korea and Japan ended their trilateral military drill that North Korea views as a security threat.

South Korea’s military said it detected the launches of several missiles from North Korea’s eastern coastal Wonsan area. It said South Korea has boosted its surveillance posture and was closely exchanging information on the launches with the U.S. and Japan.

The U.S. Pacific Command said the North’s launch event does not pose an immediate threat to U.S. territory or to its allies. It said the U.S. remains committed to the defence of the U.S. homeland and allies in the region.

South Korea’s military said the five-day Freedom Edge exercise is defensive in nature and meant to enhance a joint response capability against North Korean nuclear threats.

Hours after the drill began on Monday (September 7, 2026), North Korea’s Defence Minister, Kim Song Gi, criticised the exercise and warned North Korea was capable of taking “strong and reflective countermeasures from the standpoint of power.”

The South Korean and U.S. militaries have agreed to shorten their drills at the U.S.’s request, South Korean officials said on Wednesday (August 19), days after U.S. President Donald Trump ordered cuts to the exercises.

The allies’ summertime Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises began on Monday (August 17) morning for an 11-day run, just after Mr. Trump ordered his Pentagon chief to “substantially reduce” them. Mr. Trump cited what he said was a good relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and South Korea’s refusal to join the U.S. war against Iran.

South Korea’s military said in a statement the ongoing drills with the U.S. would end on Friday, not August 27 as initially planned. It said the allies also agreed to downsize some joint field training exercises.

Many experts say Mr. Trump’s move threatens to hurt combined U.S.-South Korean readiness and eventually weaken their decades-long alliance.

Ulchi Freedom Shield is largely a computer-simulated command post exercise meant to hone the allies’ ability to deal with potential regional security threats like North Korean aggression. The two countries usually hold field training exercises during the command post exercise period.

The drills and a similar springtime exercise are a central pillar of the U.S. -South Korea alliance, which dates to the 1950-53 Korean War. But it’s also a long-running source of tensions with North Korea, which has denounced the exercises as a rehearsal for war and responded with provocative missile tests.

North Korea hasn’t responded to Mr. Trump’s overture. But earlier Wednesday (August 19), its state news agency, KCNA, published commentary slamming the U.S.-South Korean military drills as “frantic” and “extremely dangerous” and vowing to completely frustrate its rivals’ hostilities.

Experts said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, now emboldened by his advancing nuclear program and expanding military cooperation, won’t likely embrace Mr. Trump’s overture anytime soon unless he’s promised bigger concessions. In response to Mr. Trump’s previous outreach, Mr. Kim suggested last year that he can return to talks only after the U.S. drops its demand of a North Korean denuclearization as a precondition for diplomacy.

Mr. Trump and Mr. Kim met three times from 2018-2019 but their high-stakes diplomacy eventually fell apart over wrangling over a North Korean demand for extensive sanctions relief in return for limited denuclearization steps.