Category: US-ROK Alliance

This is a stupid take in the Washington Post:

Rep. Song Young-gil, chairman of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), Wednesday, struck back at tweets by a Washington Post columnist saying that South Korea would be like Afghanistan if the U.S. forces leave the Korean Peninsula.

In addition, he added that Seoul needs to take advantage of the Afghanistan crisis to regain wartime operational control (OPCON) of South Korean forces from Washington.

On Monday (local time), Marc Thiessen, a former speechwriter for former U.S. President George W. Bush, tweeted, “If South Korea were under this kind of sustained assault, they would collapse just as quickly without US support. There’s virtually no American ally who could defend themselves without us.”

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but the ROK military will fight and not capitulate like the Afghan government that was corrupt and unpopular. South Korea is a developed democracy with a first world military with equipment far better than anything North Korea has. There is no way the ROK military would abandon their posts and rush to Osan Airbase to cling to fleeing C-17’s.

The waffling by the Moon administration on the upcoming CCPT military drill continues:

Calls for postponing the regular joint summertime military drills between South Korea and the United States were gaining traction inside the ruling party Thursday amid growing hope for the resumption of inter-Korean dialogue.

“The atmosphere (here) is that postponing the military exercise might be inevitable despite some potential internal resistance,” a high-profile source from the ruling party told Yonhap News Agency a day earlier. 

Talk of a possible delay or scale-down of the annual joint military exercise set to take place later this month has surfaced after the two Koreas reopened direct cross-border liaison hotlines last week.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It looks like the Moon administration is throwing out a trial balloon to see if the US is willing to cancel the upcoming joint exercise because of COVID:

President Moon Jae-in on Wednesday directed the defense minister to discuss the S. Korea-US military drills “carefully” by taking into consideration multiple factors, a hint there could be possible changes ahead for the exercises. 

According to the presidential office, Moon told Minister of National Defense Suh Wook to look at the drills with the US while “taking into account factors including the pandemic.”

Moon’s comment comes a day after the nation’s spy agency told lawmakers that North Korea could respond with military provocation, and less than a week after the North Korean leader’s sister Kim Yo-jong warned South Korea against the drills in a statement. 

Korea Herald

You can read more at the link.

No matter what the combined US-ROK exercise is called North Korea is still going to complain about it:

North Korea has resumed its belligerent rhetoric against a combined summertime military exercise between Seoul and Washington, raising questions about whether the Kim Jong-un regime will escalate the situation with a military provocation. 

Uriminzokkiri, a North Korean propaganda website, issued a warning Tuesday to South Korea and the U.S. with regard to the drill expected to be held in August, saying that “war exercises” and peace cannot exist simultaneously. 

“The current instability on the Korean Peninsula is fully attributable to the warmongers among the South Korean military colluding with an outside power, and engaging in reckless, confrontational machinations,” the website commented.

Citing previous exercises including the Combined Command Post Training in March and Seoul’s participation in the cooperative maritime exercise Pacific Vanguard, it alleged “(South Korea) showed its craze for war exercises.”

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but I guess we will see what North Korea decides to do next month.

It looks like the Korean left is not getting their way on cancelling the upcoming US-ROK exercise:

Pentagon spokesperson John Supple nixed the possibility of postponing U.S.-Korea joint military exercises scheduled in August, after dozens of ruling Democratic Party (DP) lawmakers requested a delay.  
   
“There has been no change to the schedule of our planned training events,” Supple told Radio Free Asia on Friday. “Military readiness is a top priority of the secretary of defense. Our combined military training events are a principal method of ensuring our combined alliance readiness.”   

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

I am surprised this hasn’t happened before now, but congratulations to these two officers on their marriage:

South Korean army Capt. Ha Neul laughed as she recalled meeting her husband, U.S. Army Capt. Miles Gabrielson, last year.

“We have a very different memory over that,” she said during a recent interview with the newlyweds at this base 40 miles north of Seoul. “He thought I was smiling at him.”

While relationships between Americans and Koreans are not uncommon, the couple’s Feb. 20 union became the first of its kind: a marriage between active-duty officers in the U.S. and Korean armies, according to the 2nd Infantry Division.

The bond between Ha, 31, and Gabrielson, 29, both artillery officers, formed in May 2020 after the pair was tasked with one of the most mundane duties in the military: creating a PowerPoint presentation.

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link.

It will be interesting to see if USFK gets tasked to do this or if the vaccines just get shipped to South Korea for the ROK military to do the vaccinating themselves:

The U.S. Department of Defense is working on details of how and when U.S. vaccines will be provided to South Korean troops working with U.S. Forces Korea, a Pentagon spokesman said Monday.

U.S. President Joe Biden made a surprise announcement Friday that the U.S. will help fully inoculate all 550,000 South Korean service members, who work closely with U.S. troops in South Korea on a daily basis.

“Obviously we support the president’s direction here to provide the vaccines to our ROK allies,” Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in a press briefing. ROK stands for the Republic of Korea, South Korea’s official name.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

It great to see that the Joong Ang Ilbo is sponsoring this award in honor of the late ROK General Paik Sun-yup:

Former U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis received the 8th Paik Sun-yup ROK-U.S. Alliance Award in a ceremony Tuesday in Washington for his contributions to bilateral relations and the security of the Korean Peninsula.  
   
Korean Ambassador to the United States Lee Soo-hyuk presented the award and medal to Mattis, a retired Marine Corps four-star general who served as Pentagon chief from January 2017 to January 2019, on behalf of Defense Minister Suh Wook at the U.S. Embassy in Washington.  
   
The JoongAng Ilbo is a sponsor of the award, named after the famed Korean general critical in establishing the early military ties between the allies.  
   
The Korean Defense Ministry said that Mattis was selected for the award in recognition of his stable leadership during a period of crisis on the peninsula in 2017, helping lay the foundations for the pursuit of diplomatic talks. He also helped create a blueprint for how the alliance would operate following the transition of wartime operation control (Opcon) from the United States to Korea.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

To appease China and the leftists, the Moon administration is going out of its way to state that the THAAD battery is not receiving any upgrades:

The military authorities plan to move a mobile generator replacement and construction equipment and materials Wednesday onto the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) base in the central town of Seongju, which hosts the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system. 

“The transport by land has nothing to do with the THAAD battery capabilities, and we will work as safely as possible in consideration of related circumstances,” the ministry said in a statement. 

Two electricity generators were installed in 2017 when the missile shield system was introduced. One of them will be replaced with a new one, the ministry said.

A ministry official stressed that no weapons or other items that aim at upgrading or strengthening the unit are included.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.