South Korea sends patrol planes and bomb squad to Hormuz, but no troops

South Korea's defence ministry said Thursday it will push its Cheonghae anti-piracy naval unit beyond its usual beat, extending operations from the Gulf of Aden off Somalia to waters near the Strait of Hormuz. The force protecting commercial shipping will be beefed up with a destroyer, a P-8 maritime patrol aircraft, an explosive ordnance disposal team and a fleet of unmanned surface and underwater vehicles, according to Yonhap News Agency.

Seoul is walking a careful line. A defence ministry official, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity, said the reinforcement is purely non-combat and that the unit will not operate alongside allied forces. Operations stay confined to open waters south of Oman, and the patrol aircraft are barred from targeting or surveilling Iranian territory, Iranian territorial waters or the interior of the strait itself.

"The enhancement of the Cheonghae unit's mission is to protect our citizens and safeguard our economic interests," the official said. The stated goal is keeping a chokepoint open that normally carries about a fifth of the world's oil — traffic that has been disrupted since the US-Iran war began on February 28.

The timing is delicate. Tehran has warned Seoul off any such deployment after South Korea said it was weighing a contribution to the waterway's security. President Lee Jae Myung doubled down in September, saying Seoul has held to "the principle of non-involvement and non-intervention in the war" and will keep holding to it — meaning no troops that could drag the country into the fighting.

There's a procedural hurdle too. The Cheonghae unit's current mandate runs only to the end of this year, so extending its deployment area will need parliamentary approval, per Yonhap. Until lawmakers sign off, the plan remains a proposal on paper — with a warship, a patrol plane and a bomb squad waiting in the wings.