The U.S. and South Korea are in private negotiations to jointly build nuclear-powered submarines for both navies, a potential major shift in their alliance that would go beyond the announcement made by the countries’ presidents two weeks ago, people familiar with the matter say.
President Donald Trump and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung met in South Korea in late October and announced a pact to enable South Korea to build its own nuclear-powered submarines, with Trump saying they’d be built in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Since then, behind the scenes, a more sprawling vision has taken shape, the people said.
A joint fact sheet on their overall trade, tariff and defense agreement published Thursday evening in Washington, and Friday morning in Seoul, touched on the building of nuclear submarines but gave no further details, an indication that many points remain unresolved.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.