Author: GIKorea

Here was a good move by Ambassador Harris to score some easy points with the Korean public at the expense of the Chinese:

U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Harry Harris learned how to make kimchi from a renowned chef Tuesday, calling the fermented cabbage dish “uniquely Korean, world-renowned food.”

The kimchi-making event at the Habib House, the ambassador’s official residence in Seoul, came amid Chinese media’s claim that Beijing led the development of a global standard for the staple Korean dish.

“There’re some pretenders out there, but I think there’s nothing more Korean than kimchi,” Harris said during the 25-minute event streamed live on Facebook by the Asia Society Korea Center. 

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but great job who ever came up with the idea for this event.

This looks like an attempt to show the public “we are doing something”:

More than 300 Special Warfare officers were dispatched to public health centers Monday to help with the government’s handling of the new coronavirus, the Army said. 

A total of 379 officers from the Army’s Special Warfare Command were sent to 78 public health centers in Seoul and the surrounding areas to conduct diverse supporting roles, such as contact tracing, data management and transferring samples for virus tests for two months, according to the Army. 

The move came as the metropolitan area has reported large numbers of COVID-19 cases in recent weeks. On Sunday, the country’s number of daily infections hit a record high of 1,030, and nearly 80 percent of them were from Seoul, the western city of Incheon and Gyeonggi Province.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link, but this appears to be nothing more than a PR move because you don’t need special forces soldiers to do contact tracing or data management.

Here is the future of warfare:

A drone has been converted into a flying flamethrower in central China in a fiery campaign to eradicate more than 100 wasp nests.

Blue Sky Rescue, a volunteer group that conducts search and rescue and other emergency work, have teamed up with villagers in Zhong county near the city of Chongqing.

They raised 80,000 yuan ($12,200) to buy a drone and equip it with a gasoline tank and an arm-length nozzle.

Videos released by Blue Sky show a recent mission by the six-arm drone. It hovers above a hive as large as a suitcase before swooping down. The drone operator flips the ignition switch, and the drone spits bursts of fire onto the hive.

Associated Press

You can read more at the link, but image in a swarm of drones equipped with flamethrowers coming at dismounted U.S. troops.

USFK continues to slowly but surely give back more its land to South Korea. It will be interesting if any of the left wing groups will use this as an opportunity to protest environmental issues like they have done for past hand overs:

Parts of Yongsan Garrison and the former headquarters of Stars and Stripes in Seoul are among a dozen U.S. military sites that will be returned to South Korea by U.S. forces, according U.S. and South Korean officials.

The decision, which did not include timelines for the handovers, was made during a virtual Status of Forces Agreement Joint Committee meeting involving both nations Friday, according to a statement that day.

“The parties agree that further delays aggravate the economic and social challenges of the local communities surrounding the camps and that the returns process should be expedited,” the statement said.

Included in a list of facilities is the Far East Engineer District Compound in Seoul’s Dongdaemun neighborhood that was home to Stars and Stripes’ South Korean headquarters before it relocated to Camp Humphreys, south of Seoul, in September 2018.

Also on the list are parts of Pilsung Air Range, Taebaek; parts of Camp Walker, Daegu; Commander Naval Forces Korea Detachment, Pohang; parts of Camp Mobile, Dongducheon; Camp Jackson, Uijeongbu; Sungnam Golf Course, Hanam; Seobinggo Compound, Seoul; Niblo Barracks, Seoul; 8th Army (Religious) Retreat Center, Seoul; Camp Kim, Seoul; and parts of Yongsan Garrison, Seoul.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

The community spread of the coronavirus continues to worsen in South Korea like much of the rest of the northern hemisphere that is entering winter:

South Korea’s single-day coronavirus cases broke the 1,000-mark for the first time on Sunday, prompting President Moon Jae-in to warn that the country will have to consider enforcing the toughest level of social distancing unless the current spread is curbed.

The country added 1,030 more COVID-19 cases, including 1,002 local infections, raising the total caseload to 42,766, according to the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA).

Sunday’s daily caseload jumped from the previous day’s record high of 950, marking the highest since the country reported its first COVID-19 case in January.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It appears the autopilot in a Tesla vehicle may have contributed to this crash:

Police are investigating the fatal conflagration of a Tesla Model X that killed its owner and injured two others in an underground parking garage in Seoul.  
   
The Model X crashed into the wall of the parking garage of an apartment complex in Yongsan District, central Seoul, then caught fire, on Wednesday. This led to the burning death of the car’s owner, who was in the passenger seat.  
   
The driver, who escaped with injuries, claimed “the car suddenly got out of control,” raising the possibility of a sudden unintended acceleration as the cause of the accident, according to police.  
   
It is unusual for a car slowly winding its way through a parking garage to suddenly smash into a wall and result in the death of a passenger. The police will ask the National Forensic Service to try to determine the cause of the accident.    
   
Some experts asked about the case suggested that the Tesla’s autopilot function could have played a role.  
   
“It is more likely that the car’s autopilot feature malfunctioned or the driver’s misunderstanding of the system caused the accident, instead of a sudden unintended acceleration,” said Kim Pil-soo, a professor at Daelim University College department of automotive engineering, who observed the accident site. “If the car was powered by an internal combustion engine, the fire could have been more easily extinguished. But since it was an electric car, it was harder to stop the fire.” 

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but using the autopilot in a parking garage seems to be a very bad idea.