Bucket-wheel excavators mine rare earth materials on Ukrainian soil on February 25, 2025, in the Zhytomyr region of Ukraine. (Kostiantyn Liberov via Getty Images)
The guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald fires the first Naval Strike Missile from a US destroyer on July 18, 2024, in the Pacific Ocean. (US Navy photo)
Fast-attack submarine USS North Carolina (SSN 777) enters Dry Dock 1 at Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility, Hawaii, on September 4, 2024. (US Navy photo by Justice Vannatta)
A South Korean Army K1E1 tank crosses a pontoon bridge on the Imjin River during a joint river- crossing exercise as part of the Freedom Shield military drills with US and ROK forces in the border town of Yeoncheon, South Korea, on March 20, 2025. (Getty Images)
Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III and Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, meet with Republic of Korea’s Minister of Defense Suh Wook for the 53rd US-Republic of Korea Security Consultative Meeting in Seoul, South Korea, on December 2, 2021. (DOD Photo by Navy Chief Petty Officer Carlos M. Vazquez II)
Ships from the US, Japan, and Republic of Korea conduct a trilateral ballistic missile defense exercise in the Sea of Japan, on October 6, 2022. (US Navy Photo by Gray Gibson)
A woman walks past a television screen showing a news broadcast with file footage of a North Korean missile test in Seoul, South Korea, on November 3, 2022. (Jung Yeon-je/AFP via Getty Images)
Xi Jinping votes at the closing ceremony of the Twentieth Party Congress at the Great Hall of the People on October 22, 2022, in Beijing, China. (Lintao Zhang/Getty Images)
The Republic of Korea and United States conduct combined attack squadron flight and precision bombing drills on October 4, 2022, in South Korea, following North Korea’s ballistic missile launch. (ROK Joint Chiefs of Staff).
The guided missile destroyer USS Barry conducts routine underway operations in the South China Sea on November 21, 2022. (US Navy photo by Mass Communications Specialist Molly Crawford)