The following is a joint statement announced at a weekly rally held by the PDP and anti-imperialist organizations in the ‘ROK’ on September 19.
Public opposition to the Hormuz deployment is intensifying. On September 17, even lawmakers from the ruling coalition publicly urged against the deployment during a meeting of the National Assembly Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee, and the NSC Standing Committee meeting, which was expected to address the Hormuz deployment issue, was postponed. On the 17th, Foreign Minister Cho Hyun, while saying that “no position has been decided,” revealed his true intentions by stating that the ‘ROK’ “is in a position to participate in international cooperation.” President Lee Jae-myung said on the 18th that there would be “no troop deployment,” but premised this on “getting involved in or intervening in the war.” The previous day, JTBC revealed, citing the French Foreign Ministry, that the ‘ROK’ was holding concrete discussions on participating in a multinational force led by France and other countries. Earlier, Lee Jae-myung, who mentioned a “substantial contribution” in April, expressed political support in May for a joint statement on a “Multinational Military Mission for the Strait of Hormuz” led by the UK and France. “International cooperation” that serves the US imperialist war of aggression is nothing more than another name for troop deployment.
The pressure from US imperialism is becoming increasingly overt. On the 14th, US President Donald Trump pressured other countries over the war with Iran, saying to the effect that “countries that did not help him must pay reparations after the war.” Yonhap News Agency reported on the 16th that a mood had formed within the government that “it is inevitable to submit a troop deployment consent bill to the National Assembly,” and that opinions were emerging that it would be difficult to continue delaying the matter due to behind-the-scenes pressure from the USA. The Iranian government sternly warned that it could regard the deployment of the ‘ROK’s military assets as direct participation in the war. Yielding to pressure from US imperialism and pushing ahead with the deployment of ‘ROK’ troops to the Strait of Hormuz is a self-destructive act that drives the lives and safety of the people into an extreme crisis. This is why all sectors of society are strongly rejecting the deployment of troops to the Strait of Hormuz with one voice.
Wars are expanding, and battlefields are converging into one. The war in Eastern Europe is heading toward an imminent crisis. Around 200 K2 tanks produced in the ‘ROK’ have been fully deployed as the spearhead of NATO’s eastern front in Poland, while Russian forces have carried out airstrikes just 2 km from the Polish border. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has stated that support for Ukraine will be expanded. In West Asia, at the Strait of Hormuz, the international energy distribution network has been brought to a complete standstill as the number of vessels passing through the strait has plummeted from around 120 a day to just 3–4 due to US imperialist airstrikes, the blockade of the strait, mine-laying, and drone attacks. The Bab el-Mandeb Strait in the Red Sea has also been blockaded by Yemen’s Ansar Allah forces. US imperialism is pressuring the ‘ROK’ to participate in the war, demanding that it provide weapons in Eastern Europe and enter the war at the Strait of Hormuz.
The war crisis in East Asia is serious. On the 15th, former Director of the National Security Office Kim Sung-han is openly advocating the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in the waters surrounding the Korean Peninsula. As can be seen from the experience of the war in Ukraine, the US imperialist aggressors’ plan for the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in the ‘ROK’ and Japan could become a trigger for an East Asian war. What will happen if the scheme to dispatch troops to the Strait of Hormuz, which would drive our people into the jaws of death in order to collaborate in the imperialists’ war of aggression, is added to this precarious situation? Although the Lee Jae-myung administration says that there will be no troop deployment, there is no one who will believe it as it stands. The approval rating in the 30-percent range in the early days of its administration plainly shows how angry the public sentiment is. The Lee Jae-myung administration must not commit the fatal mistake of following in the footsteps of the previous administrations that served US imperialism as their master and ended up collaborating in its wars of aggression. If things continue like this, the Lee Jae-myung administration, too, will not escape the historical judgment of the people’s uprising spreading like wildfire.
September 19, 2026
In front of the US Embassy in Gwanghwamun, Seoul
Anti-US Struggle Headquarters · 21st Century Che Guevara · People’s Democracy Party
