North Korea criticized the first-ever Freedom Edge exercise conducted by the U.S., South Korea, and Japan, which aimed to demonstrate the Multi-Domain Operations (MDO) concept. North Korea described the exercise as a display of ambition for supremacy, accusing the participating countries of seeking to expand their combat operations into areas designated for humanitarian and peace development.
Rodong Sinmun warned in a registered article titled “The Extremely Reckless Stage of Military Hegemonic Ambition” that the U.S. is frenziedly implementing its new war concept of Multi-Domain Operations. It further criticized that the hegemonic ambitions of the U.S. and its dependent countries are reaching an extremely reckless and dangerous stage, infringing upon the space for the peaceful development of humanity without any hesitation or discrimination.
The Multi-Domain Operations concept, introduced during the Freedom Edge joint exercise conducted from the 27th to the 29th of last month in the international waters surrounding the Korean Peninsula, extends the traditional battlefield from land, sea, and air to space, cyber, and electromagnetic domains.
The exercise includes tri-nation naval missile defense, anti-submarine warfare, air defense, aerial search and rescue, maritime blockade, and cyber defense training.
The newspaper mentioned that other exercises simulated MDO, such as the Ulchi Freedom Shield last August and the large-scale live-fire exercise Exercise Valiant Shield in June, and further addressed in the following August Ulchi Freedom Shield MDO is planned even including nuclear attack drills.
“These war exercises suggest a very dangerous trend that the U.S.’s war concept of Multi-Domain Operations is being practically applied to realize military hegemony in the Asia-Pacific region and will be progressively expanded and reinforced in the future,” the newspaper pointed out.
The concept of Multi-Domain Operations originated from the Multi-Domain Battle concept created by the U.S. Army in 2017 as an operational concept to respond to new forms of conflict threatening U.S. interests.
Since then, it has evolved into an allied operational concept to expand tactical achievements to operational and strategic levels. It was settled under its current name in 2018.
The newspaper described the concept of Multi-Domain Operations as “a roughly bundled up new concept for the U.S.’s attempt to maintain its hegemony in an environment where their decline is becoming more apparent by enhancing or focusing on the main contents of the previous air and sea wars or the third offset strategy.”
It summarized the concept as the U.S.’s attempt to compete by diversifying and modernizing the U.S. Army’s war execution capabilities, which have been relatively neglected, while focusing on areas where the U.S. is dominant, such as space warfare, cyber warfare, and electronic warfare.
The newspaper reported that in 2017, the U.S. established the Multi-Domain Task Force (MDTF) to enhance its comprehensive operational capabilities, including space, cyber, and electronic warfare, as well as its existing combat power. The U.S. has already deployed three MDTF units within the United States and Germany and plans to deploy additional units in Japan and Australia within the next few years.
After establishing the Space Force as a new military branch in 2019, the U.S. conducted a large-scale live-fire exercise in June 2022 in the waters of the Western Pacific to enhance the capabilities of integrated multi-domain operations, mobilizing the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and Space Force.
The newspaper criticized, “The U.S. is frenziedly training its allied and follower countries in their new war methods to create a collective war front and supplement their declining power.”
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