The Chinese continue to put military pressure on the ROK:

South Korea scrambled Air Force jets Wednesday to counter a Chinese military plane flying in the country’s air defense domain without notice, defense authorities in Seoul said.

It entered the Korea air defense identification zone (KADIZ) at around 7:37 a.m. and moved over southern and eastern waters for about four hours, according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).

“(We) took normal tactical measures,” such as sending a warning message and dispatching Air Force jets to track and monitor it, the JCS added.

More than 10 aircraft, including F-15K fighter jets, were mobilized, a source said later.

It marked the second flight of a Chinese aircraft, believed to be for military reconnaissance, in the KADIZ in a month.

There were similar incidents in January, February and April as well.

South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense summoned the defense attache at the Chinese Embassy in Seoul to deliver a protest message.

Choi Hyong-chan, director general of the ministry’s international affairs, emphasized that the government takes the repeated entry of Chinese warplanes into the KADIZ “very seriously,” the ministry said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but if the ROK government took the KADIZ violations seriously why don’t they respond by flying through the Chinese ADIZ?

A gold medal at the Asian Games will be extra memorable if the South Korean soccer team wins because they can avoid mandatory military service:

South Korea’s soccer team is just 90 minutes away from gold at the 2018 Asian Games and that all-important military exemption thanks to a 3-1 win over Vietnam in the semifinal Wednesday.

On Saturday, Son Heung-min and his colleagues will meet either Japan or the United Arab Emirates in the final in Cibinong, south of Jakarta. If the young Taegeuk Warriors win that then the 20-man roster will not have to perform 21 months of military service.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

I personally always thought the joint exercises would be restarted in time to execute Key Resolve 2019 because I never believed the Kim regime was were serious about real denuclearization:

The U.S. military will move ahead with all future military exercises on the Korean Peninsula, Defense Secretary James N. Mattis said Tuesday, suggesting that America’s brief suspension of the drills as a show of “good faith” toward North Korea has not paid dividends in the struggling denuclearization talks with Pyongyang.

“We have no plans at this time to suspend any more exercises,” Mr. Mattis told reporters at the Pentagon, less than three months after President Trump labeled the U.S.-South Korean drills “provocative” and ordered them temporarily halted following his unprecedented face-to-face meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.

Mr. Mattis made the announcement at a rare press conference with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Gen. Joseph F. Dunford, during which the two also weighed in on a range of other topics, including efforts to stamp out the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and the U.S. role in battling Iran-backed rebels in Yemen.  [Washington Times via a reader tip]

You can read more at the link, but supposedly the President received a hostile letter from the Butcher of the Cheonan, Kim Yong-chol that caused this announcement:

After the announcement it appears the ROK government may want to play delay games with restarting the joint exercises:

Resumption or suspension of joint military drills between South Korea and the United States is subject to discussions between the allies, an official from Seoul’s presidential office Cheong Wa Dae said Wednesday.

“As of now, the issue has not been discussed between South Korea and the United States,” Cheong Wa Dae spokesman Kim Eui-kyeom told a daily press briefing.  (……)

“It is an issue that should be discussed and decided by South Korea and the U.S. while reviewing the progress in the denuclearization of North Korea,” the Cheong Wa Dae official said.  [Yonhap]

I expect that the Moon administration will come out of his upcoming summit with Kim Jong-il offering some minor concession to entice the Trump administration to believe the Kim regime is serious about denuclearization.  Regardless I would be surprised if Key Resolve 2019 does not happen.  I guess we will see what happens.

Is anyone surprised that the Moon administration appears to have turned a blind eye to the illegal importing of North Korean coal into South Korea?:

South Korea’s spy chief told a parliamentary panel Tuesday his agency reported the import of North Korean coal to the presidential national security office last October, lawmakers said.

A monthslong probe by the customs office showed that three South Korean firms imported North Korean coal from Russia in apparent violation of U.N. sanctions resolutions. There is a controversy over whether the government turned a blind eye to the North Korean coal shipment amid a peace mood with Pyongyang.

Suh Hoon, the chief of the National Intelligence Service (NIS), told lawmakers at a closed-door meeting that the NIS reported the coal shipment to the Office of National Security under Cheong Wa Dae last October.

Suh was quoted as saying that he communicated the fact to the office though there was no direct report to President Moon Jae-in.

The customs office’s recent announcement has spurred controversy over whether South Korea is fully implementing U.N. sanctions on North Korea.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

This is horrible news out of Okcheon:

A man, 42, has been arrested for allegedly killing his wife and three young daughters in Okcheon, North Chungcheong, police said Monday.

The bodies were found on Saturday. The man had tried, but failed, to kill himself, police said.

The wife’s sister found the bodies when she came to visit. She told police she had heard her sister and brother-in-law complain about their dire financial situation.

The daughters were aged 7, 9 and 10. Police said sleeping pills were scattered around the bodies.

The man’s kendo or Japanese sword-practicing center had been in financial difficulty recently after he reportedly borrowed 250 million won ($224,000) from private lenders.

He allegedly borrowed some of the money under the name of a student and had clashed with the student’s parents.  [Korea Times]

Moon admin is dismantling anti-tank barriers. Says it's for people's convenience & safety. What about national security? With no barriers, could allow #NorthKorea to invade #Seoul within hours. pic.twitter.com/WguZbEEVTh

— Tara O (@DrTaraO) August 26, 2018

North Korean members of the unified Korean canoeing team celebrate after the team grabbed its first-ever gold in women’s 500-meter dragon boat racing at the 18th Jakarta-Palembang Asian Games on Aug. 26, 2018. (Yonhap)

Apparently some people are upset at KBS for highlighting the looks of the biracial child of Korean soccer player Park Joo-ho:

KBS2’s reality show “The Return of Superman” has sparked a controversy for promoting “lookism” to market a four-year-old biracial girl on Aug. 19.

National football star Park Joo-ho appeared with his biracial daughter, Park Na-eun.

Park married Swiss woman Anna when Park was a player of FC Basel from 2011-13. Anna gave birth to their first daughter Na-eun in 2015.

Na-eun was an instant hit. But the show put excessive emphasis on her appearance, describing her as “pretty even when eating.”

Then it compared and contrasted her to Suri Cruise, daughter of Hollywood heavyweight Tom Cruise. The narrator said, “Na-eun looks better than Suri in my eyes.”

The aim of the program was to show how fathers care for their children without help from mothers, but it has long deviated, showing cute children in order to gain higher ratings.

“Looks are not everything,” commented a viewer. Another wrote: “Lookism is so deeply rooted in some people ― they do not even know what the problem is.”  [Korea Times]

It was only a matter of time before some lawyers would round up BMW owners in Korea and start launching lawsuits.  What is interesting is that they are calling on President Trump to do the investigating for them since he is supposedly hostile to German auto manufacturers:

BMW drivers in Korea sent letters to German Chancellor Angela Merkel and U.S. President Donald Trump to urge the German and U.S. authorities to investigate the cause of engine fires in BMW vehicles, an attorney for the drivers said Monday.

The so-called “BMW fire victims group” consisting of 1,000 BMW car owners in Korea also said they are considering filing lawsuits against government officials at the transport and environment ministries for their alleged dereliction of duty.

“We decided to send letters to Merkel via German Ambassador to Korea Stephan Auer to ask the German government and prosecutors to investigate BMW headquarters for its alleged concealment of the defect,” Ha Jong-sun of Barun Law told reporters at the law firm’s office in Seoul.

The lawyer added the victims would send letters to Trump to call on him to issue an executive order to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board to initiate its own investigation into potential defects in exhaust-gas recirculation (EGR) valves and coolers in BMW’s SUVs.

“Accordingly there is an immediate need to check the safety of EGR valves and coolers in X3, X5 and X6 diesel SUVs sold in the U.S. to prevent fatal car fires and save innocent lives on U.S. highways and roads,” Lee Gwang-deok said in the letter.

The victims plan to ship a burnt BMW vehicle to the U.S., as the cause of its fire has not been discovered in Korea.

They expect the U.S. president to take an appropriate measure, considering he has been hostile toward German carmakers.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

The message President Moon should bring with him is very simple, get rid of the nukes if you want sanctions dropped:

South Korean President Moon Jae-in will likely seek to mediate a breakthrough in talks between the United States and North Korea when he visits Pyongyang for a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, a Seoul official said Sunday.

The presidential aide highlighted the importance of Moon’s role in advancing apparently stalled talks on the North’s denuclearization following the cancellation of U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s visit to the North scheduled for this week.

“I believe President Moon’s role has only become greater,” the official from the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae said when asked about any possible change to Moon’s scheduled trip after U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday abruptly called off Pompeo’s visit.

Trump cited a lack of “sufficient progress with respect to the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.