The United Arab Emirates has sent a fleet of military transport aircraft to South Korea on a tight, near-daily schedule, as Abu Dhabi moves to secure additional batteries of the Korean-made Cheongung interceptor missile system months ahead of their original delivery date.
Flight-tracking data shows the operation began on Jun. 9, when a UAE Air Force C-17 transited Subang Airport in Malaysia in the early morning hours en route to South Korea. Since then, the pattern has repeated daily: an inbound C-17 from the UAE passes through Subang around sunrise, while another aircraft returning from Daegu, South Korea, lands at the same airport around sunset.
According to military and defense industry sources cited by Yonhap News Agency, the aircraft are picking up the third Cheongung-II battery along with dozens of interceptor missiles from an air base in Daegu, about 240 kilometers southeast of Seoul. The shipment is arriving roughly a month earlier than scheduled, and the UAE plans to use a total of eight C-17s to complete the transfer in successive trips.
It is the second time the UAE has carried out this kind of airlift. In March, shortly after the outbreak of the U.S.-Iran war, UAE transport aircraft made a similar trip to Daegu to pick up Cheongung interceptors.
The urgency behind this latest shipment appears tied to how the system performed in combat. According to a report from JoongAng Ilbo, the two Cheongung-II batteries already in UAE service saw their first real-world use during the Iran war, firing more than 60 interceptor missiles with a reported success rate of around 96 percent.
Cheongung-II, sometimes described as South Korea’s answer to the U.S. Patriot system, is a mid-range, mid-to-high altitude air defense system designed to intercept missiles and aircraft. Each battery includes four mobile launcher vehicles carrying eight missiles apiece, along with a multifunction radar and an engagement control system.
The current shipment is part of a larger $3.5 billion contract the UAE signed in 2022 with South Korean defense firms LIG Nex1, Hanwha Systems, and Hanwha Aerospace for a total of 10 Cheongung-II batteries. With two batteries already active and a third now in transit, the UAE has seven more batteries still to receive under the agreement
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