The Indo-Pacific region is entering a period of sustained contestation across the security, economic, and technological domains. Great-power competition, evolving trade and industrial policy, rapid advances in AI and defense technology, and a changing U.S. political environment are testing alliances built for an earlier era. The U.S.-South Korea partnership sits at the center of these pressures, and how it adapts offers a case study in whether alliances can hold their shape under simultaneous and often countervailing strains.

This public session will bring together leading voices to examine the forces reshaping allied strategic environments and what they mean for the alliance and for U.S. interests in the region. This discussion examines how defense industrial cooperation depends on trade and investment policy, how technology competition shapes threat perceptions, how domestic politics on both sides of the Pacific conditions the whole, and other issues affecting the U.S.-South Korea alliance.