US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he was “greatly encouraged” by Seoul’s plan after security talks in Seoul on Tuesday, praising the alliance as resilient amid what he described as a dangerous security environment. The discussions touched on alliance modernisation, conventional deterrence and practical cooperation on ship maintenance, while officials also addressed North Korean firing near the inter-Korean border and long-running debate over nuclear integration frameworks.
Washington has been pressing South Korea to bolster its conventional defence capabilities as part of broader alliance modernisation efforts, while President Lee Jae-myung has voiced support for transferring wartime operational control to a binational command. Those differing emphases framed the talks in Seoul, where Hegseth met with South Korean counterparts to explore ways to update the U.S.-South Korea security relationship for current threats.
Speaking after the meetings, Hegseth said he was “greatly encouraged” by Seoul’s plan and noted the alliance’s strength. He and Ahn Gyu-back agreed to a practical demonstration of work to maintain U.S. warships in South Korea, aiming to harness South Korea’s shipbuilding capabilities as a tangible example of deeper operational cooperation. The planned demonstration was presented by officials as a way to translate high-level modernisation goals into shared, on-the-ground capacity.
The talks took place against the backdrop of heightened tensions on the peninsula. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff reported detecting about 10 artillery rounds fired by North Korea on Monday, an incident that occurred shortly before Hegseth arrived at an inter-Korean border village. The meeting in Seoul did not produce a joint statement, leaving certain policy alignments and next steps unspecified publicly.
Discussions in recent years among officials have included the idea of integrating U.S. nuclear weapons with South Korean conventional forces under a combined nuclear integration, or CNI, framework. That concept has stirred debate over its implications for deterrence and non-proliferation. Addressing related speculation, Ahn Gyu-back denied that Seoul seeks its own nuclear weapons and affirmed South Korea’s commitment to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
Hegseth’s characterization of the security environment as dangerous underscores the strategic context for both the push to strengthen conventional forces and the examination of deeper operational ties, including ship maintenance cooperation and possible CNI arrangements. The agreement to demonstrate maintenance work on U.S. warships in South Korea was presented as an immediate outcome of the talks, while broader issues such as wartime command arrangements and the contours of nuclear-conventional integration remain subjects of ongoing negotiation and public scrutiny.
Officials did not issue a joint communique following the meetings, and it was not announced when the maintenance demonstration would take place. The discussions in Seoul signal continued efforts by Washington and Seoul to reconcile calls for stronger conventional capabilities with political preferences in Seoul regarding wartime command and alliance posture, even as incidents on the peninsula continue to test those ties.