A National Day reception hosted by the Korean Embassy in Washington D.C. was held at the Andrew Mellon Auditorium in Washington D.C., United States. Elbridge Colby, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development at the U.S. Department of Defense, is delivering congratulatory remarks. Yonhap News

Elbridge Colby, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development at the U.S. Department of Defense, emphasized on the 8th (local time) that Asian allies must make greater efforts for their own defense to maintain stability in the Indo-Pacific region.

In a post on his X (formerly Twitter) account on the 8th, explaining the intent of the Trump administration's new National Security Strategy (NSS) released on the 5th, Colby wrote, "Crucially, securing stability in the Indo-Pacific will require our Asian allies to do more to defend themselves."

Applying this to South Korea, it is interpreted that while the U.S. will 'selectively focus' its capabilities on preparations for contingencies in Taiwan, which is given the most weight in the NSS's Asia-related sections, South Korea will need to invest more capabilities than before in building conventional deterrence against North Korea and preventing North Korean provocations.

Colby added that the NSS's Asia section states, "We will build forces capable of deterring aggression anywhere along the first island chain (from Okinawa to Taiwan to the Philippines to the Strait of Malacca). But the United States cannot, and should not, do this alone. Allies must increase their defense spending and, more importantly, do much more for collective defense."

Regarding the NSS's declaration that deterring China's invasion of Taiwan by maintaining military superiority is a U.S. priority in Asia, Colby argued that it reflects President Trump's "America First approach to the Indo-Pacific."

Colby also stated that President Trump's global defense spending benchmark "is the heart of the NSS's burden-sharing and burden-shifting discussion," and similar to how North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) members have pledged to spend 5% of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense, "other countries are already stepping up to meet this new global standard, most recently South Korea."

Previously, in his congratulatory speech at a reception for Korea's National Day and Armed Forces Day held in Washington D.C. on November 14th, Colby described South Korea's decision to increase its defense spending to 3.5% of GDP as truly being a "model ally."