The United States, the Republic of Korea and Japan will conduct a two-day, trilateral naval exercise June 21 - 22 in the waters south of the Korean peninsula.
The exercise will focus on improving interoperability and communications with the ROK Navy and the Japan Maritime Self Defense Force, which can facilitate cooperative disaster relief and maritime security activities in the future. The three navies will conduct this exercise beyond the territorial waters of any coastal nation.
The United States will then conduct a routine carrier operation with the ROK Navy in the Yellow Sea immediately after the trilateral exercise June 23 - 25.
The routine carrier operations will be by the George Washington Carrier Strike Group.
The Chinese may not (yet) have declared the Yellow Sea a core interest of China that they claim as their territorial waters the way they are making a play for the South China Sea, but they really don't like it when our carriers sail around close to them. We define where we will sail as beyond the territorial waters of any coastal nation. But I'm not sure where China draws the line in the Yellow Sea.
I may have deep doubts about the survivability of carriers in high intensity naval combat against other capable navies and air forces, but for expeditionary warfare against minor states or diplomatic signaling, 90,000 tons of
UPDATE: Our commander of the Pacific Command notes:
I think it helps people in the region understand that those three strategic partners are working together in a way that's not aggressive but certainly that's demonstrating freedom of access throughout that particular region.
Freedom of access in seas that China would like to restrict freedom, that is.
