A senior U.S. official has expressed hope that the incoming Trump administration will continue to strengthen the South Korea-U.S. alliance. 

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell made the statement Monday during a forum in Washington hosted by the Korea Foundation and the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Campbell said the U.S. has recently concluded “extraordinarily generous and gracious” host nation support arrangements with both Japan and South Korea, signaling what he called determination to keep the United States forward-engaged and forward-deployed. 

Campbell said he hopes the new administration fully appreciates the “wisdom” of those agreements. 

Last month, South Korea and the United States reached an agreement on Seoul’s share of the cost of maintaining 28-thousand-500 U.S. troops on the Korean Peninsula between 2026 and 2030.