Why U.S.-South Korea F-35 sales are exacerbating the threat from Pyongyang | NK News
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September 26, 2026Sep 26, 2026

Weapon Directory

Opinion

Why U.S.-South Korea F-35 sales are exacerbating the threat from Pyongyang

Breaking the impasse will require more than just talk — dropping provocative arms deals is a good place to start

Views expressed in Opinion articles are exclusively the authors’ own and do not represent those of NK News. 

The collapse of the latest U.S.-North Korea talks in Sweden earlier in the month should come as no surprise following the spectacle at South Korea’s Armed Forces Day days before.

President Moon Jae-in’s decision at the ceremony to showcase the country’s new F-35 fighters was ostensibly intended to bolster confidence in U.S.-ROK defenses.

Yet it produced only the opposite effect, underscoring how divorced the logic of U.S.-ROK arms sales are from the realities of the North Korean threat while providing the North