President Roh Speaks Out On War Time Control
It is becoming more and more clear that the US military seems to care more about the security of Korea than Korea’s own president:
President Roh Moo-hyun on Wednesday said Korea is capable of exercising sole wartime operational control of its troops ¿even if we get it back now.¿ In an interview with the Yonhap news agency, the president said, ¿The South Korean military’s capability is sufficient and it can get U.S. military support.” The remarks pour oil on the flames of controversy by suggesting that what Seoul calls the ¿withdrawal¿ of operational control will be possible to achieve even before the 2012 timeframe the government has set. Scores of foreign and security affairs experts including 13 former defense ministers say even 2012 is unfeasible.
What I find interesting is that President Roh who is not a military man, yet he thinks he is a better security expert for the country than all the military and former defense ministers who say Korea will not even be ready for sole operational war time control by 2012. Basically what President Roh is doing is playing again to his domestic political base by saying Korea could take back control now, but he is also like the Chosun article said, trying to hedge his bet by maintaining that Korea should stick to the 2012 timeline. For reasons I have discussed before, President Roh wants to keep that 2012 timeline for his own political reasons.
President Roh is right about one thing, the ROK Army does have sufficient capability to defeat a North Korean attack now. What President Roh fails to look at is if war broke out what additional cost would the country absorb with no immediate US support? How many more lives in South Korea would be lost during a North Korean attack than they would with an immediate US counterattack? President Roh is playing around with the potential lives of many Koreans because he hopes the North Koreans will not strike South Korea if the US does redeploy it’s forces from Korea. Someone in the military does not plan around hope, military people plan around reality.
The US operational control turn over and camp consolidation plan were all closely planned in conjunction with the ROK military’s transformation in order to ensure that the national security of the country was not compromised due to these changes on both sides of the alliance. However, a good plan the military officials on each side came up with is being compromised by those with their own axe to grind and political ambitions. Than again it is easy for a Korean politician to plan around hope when they know when the kimchi hit’s the fan, the Yankee cavalry will save your ass anyway.
