US sends F-22s to join for South Korean air drills

Six of the U.S. Air Force’s advanced stealth fighter jets reportedly arrived in South Korea on Saturday for joint air drills and war rehearsals scheduled next week in a show of force against North Korea.

The Defense Department sent the F-22 Raptors for the air drills alongside the South Korean Air Force only days after North Korea launched an intercontinental ballistic missile that military officials have said flew higher than any to date. 

The South Korean Air Force will send several models of its own fighter jets and support aircraft to take part in the drills, where the allies will conduct strikes on mock North Korean missile and nuclear sites, as well as missile transporters, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency reports. 

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The drills will mark the first time that six of the stealth fighters fly over South Korea at once, according to the report.

The U.S. is also expected to send F-35A and F-35B stealth jets, F-16C fighters and B-1B bombers to join the demonstrations, according to the report.

North Korean state media declared that the missile launched earlier this week marks a major development of its “state nuclear force” and that the missile was a “super-large heavy warhead, which is capable of striking the whole mainland of the U.S.”

U.S. officials have assessed that North Korea is capable of creating nuclear weapons and that the latest missile had the capability of reaching the east coast of the U.S. It remains undetermined whether the new missile can deliver a heavy nuclear warhead.