The cancellation follows President Donald Trump’s surprise order last week to scale back another annual joint military exercise.
Published August 24, 2026
South Korea announced that the United States had canceled a large-scale joint amphibious landing exercise scheduled for next month, citing restrictions on the supply of troops due to the US-Israel war against Iran.
“In June, the U.S. Marine Corps formally notified the U.S. military that its deployment of troops for this year’s SsangYong exercise would be restricted due to the situation in the Middle East,” Han Seung-jeong, a spokesperson for the South Korean Marine Corps, said at a press conference on Monday.
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The biennial SsangYong exercise involves South Korean and U.S. Marines and is intended to enhance combined operations, which typically involve warships, aircraft and ground forces training for amphibious landings.
South Korea and the United States are continuing talks toward resuming amphibious exercises, the spokesperson said, without elaborating.
There was no immediate comment from the Department of Defense.
The announcement follows U.S. President Donald Trump’s sudden order last week to scale back another annual joint military exercise that ended last Friday, citing cost and South Korea’s refusal to join the war against Iran.
The annual Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise has been shortened from 11 days to 5 days.
President Trump is also seeking to revive the relationship he forged with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during his first term.
He wrote on his Truth social platform last week that the Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise sent “a completely inappropriate and hostile signal to a country that has been treated with respect without intimidation for as long as Donald J. Trump has been president.”
Despite the curtailment of the exercises, North Korea launched 10 short-range ballistic missiles last week and issued a statement condemning the exercises.
North Korea has long denounced such joint exercises as rehearsals for invasion.
The US president said last week that it was important to “get along” with Kim, adding that North Korea now has 57 “very powerful” nuclear weapons. The South Korean government estimates that North Korea has 80 to 120 such weapons.
President Trump met with Kim three times during his first term, but North Korea accelerated its nuclear program after a second summit in Hanoi in 2019 collapsed without an agreement on North Korea’s denuclearization.
