The Korean War ended over 50 years ago but tensions between North and South Korea continue. Amid growing international concern, the two nations continue to move closer toward a military conclusion. Tensions along the Northern Limit Line are numerous with clashes occurring frequently. In addition, with North Korea’s struggling economy, stifled by sanctions from the United Nations and the United States, South Korea’s yearly scheduled military exercise simply fans a flame of discontent already engulfing the country.
Without strong demands from China or poor weather conditions, the exercise will take place. Although North Korea is poised to react by using strong military force to answer South Korea’s live-fire artillery drills set to take place on the island of Yeonpyeong, closed door negotiations press on.
Since the signing of the armistice, Yeonpyeong Island has been a point of contention. Bloomberg says, “The North says it won’t recognize a sea boundary drawn up by U.S. officials commanding UN troops at the end of the Korean War in 1953. It says the sea around the islands belongs to the North, and has vowed massive retaliation if the South again fires into the sea around the islands. The U.S. has about 28,500 troops in South Korea.”
