KBS Global has a good write up about the Ulchi Freedom Guardian exercise that recently ended this past week:

The South Korea-U.S. joint military exercise, Ulchi Freedom Guardian, began Tuesday and will continue nationwide through this coming Friday August 26th. This year, the computer-aided exercise will mobilize some 56,000 South Korean troops from the leadership ranks and about 30-thousand U.S. soldiers, including some 3,000 joining from overseas.

Ulchi Freedom Guardian is an annual Command Post Exercise organized by the Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command. It is held to maintain a joint defense posture and guarantee the security of the Korean Peninsula. A command post exercise is involves the commander, staff, and communications within and between headquarters. It does not involve actual training for combat but it is to practice for command response and deployment of operations in various scenarios using computer simulations.

It was formerly called the Ulchi Focus Lens but the name changed to Ulchi Focus Guardian in 2007, ahead of the U.S. transfer of wartime operational command back to South Korea scheduled in 2015. The difference between UFL and UFG is that now Korean troops are in charge of the exercise while the U.S. plays a supporting role. Actual troops are at times deployed in Korea and abroad during this period. Also forces in the U.S. mainland take part in the exercise via the computer system.

The exercise typically proceeds in the order of reporting a contingency situation, conducting drills on risk management, drills on simulated support and finally, an assessment of the exercise. Also timed with the UFG, some 4000 central and provincial government agencies in Korea hold their respective crisis management drills called the Ulchi Exercise.  [KBS Global]

You can read more at the link.