It will be interesting to see how long it takes South Korea to make a decision on this deployment:

South Korea has dispatched an investigation team to assess the situation in the conflict-stricken Strait of Hormuz, the defense ministry said Tuesday, amid repeated calls from Washington for Seoul to assist its war efforts against Iran.

The team departed for the United Arab Emirates (UAE) over the weekend and is expected to return as early as this week. The examination results will be reported to the National Security Council, the ministry added.

“It is aimed at assessing the state of affairs and the security situation in the strait,” a ministry official explained, stressing that the dispatch “was not decided on the premise of military deployment.”

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Here is a very interesting interaction between the Filipino Defense Minister and the Chinese delegation during the Seoul Defense Forum in regards to China’s 9-dash line claim in the South China Sea:

Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro speaks during a panel session at the Seoul Defense Dialogue at The Grand Lotte Seoul hotel in central Seoul on Sept. 8, 2026, in this image captured from the forum’s YouTube livestream.

Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro lashed out at China during a Seoul defense forum Tuesday after receiving an audience note defending Beijing’s rejection of a 2016 international tribunal ruling upholding Manila’s maritime claims in the South China Sea. (………)

The secretary read the slip line by line and offered sharp retorts to each point. When the note claimed that arbitration violated fundamental international law, he shot back, “So what you’re saying is UNCLOS violates international law? That’s what you mean.” 

Reading the part where it read the PCA award has “no binding force,” he said, “Because you don’t want to be subjected to UNCLOS,” and to that Beijing “neither accepts nor recognizes” the ruling, with Teodoro quipping, “Of course, because you lost.” 

Teodoro then held up the slip of paper to the room, denouncing the gesture as a display of China’s “desperate and ineffective” stance, accusing Beijing of a complete lack of “basic decency” and utter disrespect for international law. 

“Perhaps basic decency and behavior are what China needs,” he said, drawing applause from the audience. “This is not a gray zone anymore. This is actual coercion, bullying and aggression.” 

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but the note was mistakenly given to him by an aide working for China’s defense attaché assigned to South Korea. Teodoro even quipped that he hoped the aide who gave him the note doesn’t end up in a gulag.

Good for Teodoro for strongly standing up for the sovereignty of his country.

The world of the Terminator franchise is drawing near. What happens when these robots are equipped with AI technology as well?:

At the World Humanoid Robot Games in China last month, robots jumped, boxed and danced. Some fleet-footed bots ran faster than Usain Bolt over 100 meters. Spectators cheered the machines’ improving capabilities and their meme-worthy stumbles.

Two days after the Games ended, the People’s Liberation Army’s official newspaper drew its own conclusions from the show. The PLA Daily called for researchers to accelerate the transfer of cutting-edge technologies from laboratories to military training grounds for robotic “combatants.”

China’s defense establishment is accelerating research into humanoids’ military uses and planning ‌for their eventual wartime deployment, according to a Reuters review of more than 100 Chinese military procurement notices, academic studies, patents, official publications, government records and defense-company materials.

Military institutions are testing humanoids against battlefield requirements, seeking to acquire robots and technologies to train them, and studying how they might function ‌alongside troops, the previously unreported records show. The work gained momentum in 2025 and 2026, focusing on robot perception, manipulation, and training data.

Reuters

You can read more at the link.

Here is an opinion piece in the Korea Times on what the ROK should do with the issue of deploying troops to reopen the Strait of Hormuz:

Korea faces a dilemma over whether to deploy military assets to the Strait of Hormuz. The alliance with the United States is too important for Seoul to simply disregard Washington’s request for a military contribution. At the same time, dispatching a warship would carry serious consequences. Such a deployment could be interpreted as Korea joining U.S. military action against Iran, unnecessarily turning Tehran into an adversary.

The multinational maritime mission being developed by the United Kingdom and France deserves close attention. Early reports indicated that roughly 15 countries were involved in operational planning, while a considerably larger number later joined diplomatic consultations and expressed political support. Korea has also endorsed an international statement calling for freedom of navigation in the Strait and has discussed possible contributions with the United States, Britain and France. Seoul’s choice, therefore, need not be reduced to a simple question of accepting or rejecting a U.S. request.

The most important feature of the U.K.-France initiative is its stated effort to distinguish itself from U.S. military operations against Iran. Its purpose is not to attack or retaliate against Iran, but to ensure the safe passage of civilian vessels and remove mines and other threats to navigation. The proposed mission would focus on defensive activities such as merchant-vessel escorts, mine clearance and maritime and aerial surveillance. It is also intended to begin only after a ceasefire, consent by the relevant parties and other conditions necessary for a sufficiently permissive operational environment are in place.

That distinction is crucial for Korea. Sending a Korean warship to support U.S. operations against Iran would carry a fundamentally different political and military meaning from joining a multinational effort to restore an international sea lane. The former would expose Seoul to accusations that it had effectively become a party to America’s war. The latter could be justified as international cooperation to protect a global public good vital to the world economy.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but the waiting for a ceasefire sounds like a way to avoid doing the deployment. We already had a ceasefire and the international community had over a month to do something and instead did nothing before the Iranians decided to violate the ceasefire. There is likely going to no longer be any more ceasefires since the Iranian regime already violated one. The Trump administration now seems firmly committed to the slow economic strangulation of the regime which means no ceasefires.

If Korea wants to do something that is low risk to their troops, but still beneficial to their position in the Middle East, I propose they send anti-drone and cruise missile defense units to help defend the United Arab Emirates. The UAE has been a long-term economic and defense partners with South Korea. The Lee administration can frame the deployment as assisting the UAE and protecting ROK economic interests and not joining the US war against Iran. Additionally, this would showcase ROK military technology and provide valuable real-world experience against the same hybrid threats North Korea would use during a crisis on the peninsula.

I guess we will see if President Lee has the political courage for such a deployment, or rather, just be like the rest of the world and hide from the Thugs of Tehran.

It took a bit longer than the Kim regime expected, but their new destroyer has finally been fielded:

North Korea has commissioned its new naval destroyer Kang Kon, state media said Monday, as the country pushes to modernize its naval assets and sharpen its combat readiness at sea with nuclear-capable vessels.

Leader Kim Jong-un attended the commissioning ceremony held a day earlier at the eastern port city of Wonsan, where he called the new 5,000-ton destroyer “essentially an offensive destroyer” and part of “the state nuclear counteraction system,” according to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

“The new-generation destroyer should deal a deadly retaliatory blow at the enemies as it is a force involved in the state nuclear counteraction system,” the KCNA reported Kim as saying.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Iran is making threats to attack South Korean assets in the Middle East when they have already attacked South Korean assets in the Middle East. Let’s also not forget the hostage taking of a South Korean ship and the attack the Iranians did on UAE while former President Moon was visiting in the past as well. Let’s also not forget when the Iranians torpedoed another South Korean tanker. The Thugs of Tehran have shown over the years they are no friends to Korea and it may be time for Korea to start fighting back against these thugs:

South Korea is closely communicating with relevant countries and the international community to help ensure the free passage of all vessels through the Strait of Hormuz, the foreign ministry said Monday.

The statement came after Iranian academic Mohammad Marandi warned that Tehran could regard Seoul as an enemy and target South Korean assets in the region if Seoul joins a U.S.-led effort to secure navigation through the strait, according to the London-based Middle East news website Middle East Eye.

“We are closely communicating with the international community, including relevant countries, to help restore peace and stability in the Middle East as soon as possible and to ensure the free passage of all vessels, including those of our country, through the Strait of Hormuz,” the ministry said in a release.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.