Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mullen meeting with Japanese Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa in Tokyo on December 9, 2010
At the beginning of this month the Japanese foreign minister affirmed his nation's commitment to forming the first military links between Japan and South Korea, stating: "We hope to conclude an alliance with South Korea to ensure security." [5]
At the same time an official at the South Korean Defense Ministry confirmed Maehara's assertion in revealing that Seoul and Tokyo intend to sign a defense agreement. "The pact, if signed, will open a new chapter in the development of military relations between South Korea and Japan," he stated.
The South Korean news source from which the above is extracted added that "the U.S. has been urging the two neighbors to build a stronger military relationship." [6]
On January 10 the defense ministers of Japan and South Korea, Toshimi Kitazawa and Kim Kwan-jin, met in the South Korean capital to plan "future-oriented" joint military relations and to "start discussing two pacts designed to facilitate their ties." [7]
The defense chiefs signed a General Security of Military Information Agreement and an Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement, the first providing for the pooling of intelligence and the second for exchanging military supplies for so-called peacekeeping missions -" which is how Japanese and South Korean troop deployments to Iraq after 2003 and military assistance for the war in Afghanistan (troops from South Korea and ships from Japan) have been characterized -" and military exercises.
The efforts of Admiral Mullen, Secretary of State Clinton and Secretary of Defense Gates have borne fruit.
The U.S. has led almost monthly naval war games in East Asia since late last July, when Mullen, Clinton and Gates visited South Korea for the sixtieth anniversary of the beginning of the Korean War, with the last two traveling to the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas.
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