South Korea and the United States reaffirmed their commitment to providing extended deterrence, including U.S. nuclear capabilities, on the Korean Peninsula through a Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG) meeting. However, the statement did not include previous language targeting North Korea. Notably, this marks the first time a statement explicitly stated that South Korea will take a leading role in conventional defense on the Korean Peninsula.
According to South Korea's Ministry of National Defense on Thursday, the two allies reached the agreement at the fifth NCG meeting held in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday. This was the first meeting since the inauguration of the Lee Jae-myung administration in South Korea and the second Trump administration in the United States.
The South Korean delegation was led by Kim Hong-chul, Director General for Defense Policy at the Ministry of National Defense, while the U.S. delegation was headed by Robert Soofer, Acting Senior Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear Deterrence and CWMD Policy and Programs. The NCG delegations included senior defense and diplomatic officials as well as military and intelligence authorities.
In a joint press statement released immediately after the meeting, Director General Kim emphasized that South Korea will take a leading role in conventional defense on the Korean Peninsula. Acting Senior Deputy Assistant Secretary Soofer reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to provide extended deterrence to South Korea using the full range of U.S. military capabilities, including nuclear.
The statement effectively reflects both President Trump's goal of "alliance modernization" and President Lee's objective of "wartime operational control transfer within his term."
The representatives reviewed progress on NCG tasks and agreed that the NCG is an "enduring bilateral consultative body" for strengthening the Korea-U.S. alliance and extended deterrence. Concerns had been raised about whether the U.S. was reconsidering the NCG after no meetings were held for approximately 11 months since January, but both sides dispelled such concerns by reaffirming the NCG as an "enduring bilateral consultative body."
Meanwhile, references to North Korea were absent. The previous fourth NCG statement had included the phrase "any nuclear attack by North Korea is unacceptable." This appears to reflect President Trump's goal of holding a U.S.-North Korea summit and the South Korean government's stance of restoring inter-Korean dialogue.
The two sides also discussed various efforts to maintain and strengthen nuclear deterrence policy and posture through in-depth dialogue across all areas of extended deterrence, including information sharing, consultation and communication procedures, conventional-nuclear integration (CNI), and combined exercises, simulations, and training.
Both sides assessed that NCG activities—such as enhanced nuclear deterrence education, NCG TTS, and CNI TTX—strengthen allied collaborative decision-making in potential nuclear contingencies on the Korean Peninsula. They also approved the NCG mission plan and key activities for the first half of 2026, including the sixth NCG plenary meeting.
The NCG is a bilateral consultative body through which South Korea can provide input on U.S. nuclear operations to strengthen extended deterrence against North Korea's nuclear threats. It was officially launched following the "Washington Declaration" by the leaders of South Korea and the United States in April 2023.
