Category: US-ROK Alliance

UPDATE: Make sure you check out the Marmot, Nomad, and OFK for more views on the Cheney snub.

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The Chosun is a bit upset that Vice President Dick Cheney is not visiting Korea during a February trip to Asia and Australia:

U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney will visit Japan, Australia and Guam between Feb. 20 and 27. The White House says Cheney will meet Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Australian Prime Minister John Howard to discuss security concerns in Asia and the war on terror, while delivering President George W. Bush’s message of thanks for those countries’ efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At the request of the United States, Korea dispatched 3,400 troops to Iraq. The contingent is called the Zaytun Division. Korea also sent 200 soldiers to Afghanistan and 120 to Kuwait. Korea has sent the third-largest contingent of troops those countries following the U.S. and the U.K.

If Korea did not cherish its alliance with the U.S., there would be no reason for young Koreans to go to Iraq and Afghanistan. The only reason the Korean government dispatched troops there is because of our commitment to the alliance.

If the Korean government cherished the US-ROK alliance so much then why did the Korean government unilaterally declare that the Camp Humphreys relocation is going to be delayed by 5 years from the agreed upon date and then not notify the USFK commander?  General Bell first found out about the decision by reading the newspaper.  If the Korean government cared about the US-ROK alliance why did they cut the agreed upon money for the upkeep of the US-ROK alliance only weeks after making a cost sharing agreement? 

If the Korean government cared so much about the US-ROK alliance why are they sending over a billion dollars this year to North Korea while denying USFK the agreed upon money for the upkeep of the US-ROK alliance? 

If the Korean government cared so much about the US-ROK Alliance, why did US pilots have to fly to Thailand to conduct pilot training because the Korean government closed USFK’s only bombing range in Korea due to anti-US protesters?  If the Korean government cared so much about the US-ROK alliance why did the commanding general of the US Air Force in Korea have to threaten to pull the entire US Air Force from Korea just to get co-use of a Korean Air Force bombing range?

If the Korean government cared so much about the US-ROK alliance, can someone explain to me why these leading Korean politicians made all these anti-American statements?  I think once the Korean government can explain all the questions I just posed than maybe Dick Cheney will come visit.

But wait there is more:

That’s why Cheney’s excuse — that he is bypassing Korea since he came here two years ago — is difficult to understand. Australia dispatched 1,400 soldiers and Japan brought back all of its 550 troops last year.

Some Koreans like to make a big deal about the Zaytun unit being a visible sign of Korea’s commitment to the US-ROK alliance.  I appreciate the Zaytun soldiers going to Iraq, but bottom line is that they accomplished little in Iraq.  If the Korean government allowed the ROK Army to take over the Kirkuk sector of Iraq like the Pentagon originally wanted, I have no doubt in my mind that President Bush and Cheney would be visiting Korea just as much as Japan.  However, the Korean government chose the path of being irrelevant by demanding that the Zaytun unit serve in Kurdistan where no harm would come to anyone and they could introduce the Kurds to the wonders of modern indoor plumbing. 

Heck if you believe the YTN reports from Korea, it is more dangerous for Koreans to walk the streets of Seoul than for the Zaytun soldiers to walk the streets of Irbil.  That is why I have been advocating from when they first deployed that if the soldiers were not going to be used to conduct meaningful reconstruction and security in Iraq than send them back home.  They could be used to patrol the streets of Hongdae instead. 

As far as the Chosun trying to compare the Korean contributions to Iraq compared to the Japanese and Australians I found quite humorous.  Japan a country with a pacifist constitution and 550 soldiers did just as much physically in Iraq as over 3,000 ROK Army soldiers did.  Plus politically Japan has been a huge ally of the United States.  The commander of United States Forces Japan doesn’t first find out about the breaking of transformation and funding agreements from the newspapers and no Generals have to make ultimatums to pull the Air Force from Japan to get agreements done. 

Comparing Japanese contributions to Australia is even more absurd.  Australia a country with only a population of 20 million people compared to Korea’s 50 million people sent 1,400 combat troops to Iraq who participated in the initial war and to this day continue to guard facilities in the Green Zone and provide convoy escort for VIPs and diplomats through the mean streets of Baghdad and southern Iraq, while the Zaytun unit had to be pressured to allow 40 soldiers out of over 3,200 to guard a UN building in Irbil, one of the safest cities in Iraq.  I guess they were all to busy making toilet seats. 

Keep in mind as well that Australia only has a standing Army of 25,000 soldiers and along with their Iraq operations, they have seen heavy combat in Afghanistan, while continuing to spearhead peacekeeping operations in the Solomon Islands and East Timor along with participating in UN observer missions in places such as the Egyptian Sinai and Lebanon.  The ROK Army with over 600,000 soldiers cannot match the world wide relevancy of the Australian Defence Force.  This is not a question of capability because the ROK Army is highly capable, it is a matter of governmental policies of irrelevancy. 

So basically my message for anyone who feels Korea is being snubbed by the US government is this, when you implement policies that make you irrelevant, than don’t be surprised when people treat you as being irrelevant.

Here is another sign that USFK Commander General Bell has been doing his job exceedingly well, he has officially pissed off the Korean Foreign Ministry:

South Korea expressed concern over "undiplomatic" remarks made by the top U.S. military officer here regarding possible delays in the relocation of U.S. military bases, a Foreign Ministry official said yesterday.

Earlier this month, Gen. Burwell Bell, commander of U.S. Forces Korea, said he would "fight" any further delay of the planned base movement.

"The comment (made by Gen. Bell) could produce unnecessary misunderstandings, so we delivered an indirect message asking him to be cautious about making comments," the ministry official said on condition of anonymity.

The ministry expressed its concern regarding the matter to U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kathleen Stephens while she was visiting Seoul last weekend, the official said. But it was not an official warning per se, he added.

You can read General Bell’s prior comments here. 

Why do I say General Bell is doing his job well you may ask?  It is because he is pissing off the Korean government which is a sure sign that he is not about maintaining the status quo, business as usual USFK relationship in Korea and the Foreign Ministry knows it.  Remember the Korean government is all about maintaining the status quo for reasons I have listed before here.  Apparently the Foreign Ministry doesn’t have the courage to tell General Bell what they think about him themselves, so in order to under cut him, the ministry has decided to complain to the State Department representative visiting Seoul about him.  I hope the State Department won’t entertain this crap from the Korean Foreign Ministry, but the State Department has a track record for entertaining characters that they shouldn’t.  Need I bring up Madeline Albright toasting Kim Jong-il for one obvious example?

If the Foreign Ministry wants to talk about being "undiplomatic" let’s discuss it.  First of all, isn’t unilaterally declaring that the Camp Humphreys relocation is going to be delayed by 5 years from the agreed upon date between the US and Korean governments and then the USFK commander first finding out about this by reading the newspaper just a bit undiplomatic?  Isn’t unilaterally cutting agreed upon money for the upkeep of the US-ROK alliance only weeks after making the agreement undiplomatic?  Isn’t giving over a billion dollars this year to North Korea while denying USFK the agreed upon money for the upkeep of the US-ROK alliance, which is no where near as much money as the Korean government is sending to North Korea, undiplomatic?  Isn’t the fact that US pilots had to fly to Thailand to conduct pilot training because the Korean government closed USFK’s only bombing range in Korea due to anti-US protesters and then denied the US Air Force co-use of a Korean Air Force bombing range undiplomatic?  Isn’t the fact that the commanding general of the US Air Force in Korea had to threaten to pull the Air Force from Korea just to get co-use of a Korean Air Force bombing range that the Korean government continued to deny him undiplomatic? 

You want more undiplomatic?  How about this classic post from One Free Korea listing the undiplomatic comments that leading figures in the Korean government have made towards the US:

*  Kim Won Ung, the unmedicated nutcase who holds a senior foreign policy post in the National Assembly, and who threatened to throw our Ambassador out of Korea, railed at Bell for suggesting that North Korean missiles could be viewed as a threat to the South, and even asserted territorial claims on Manchuria;

*  Kim Dae Jung, who blamed America for North Korean nuke tests and urged other poliiticians to adopt the same fraudulent spin; 

*  Current Foreign Minister Song Min Soon:  ”[The United States] has fought more wars than any other nation in the history of its establishment and survival ….”;

*  “Comrade” Chung Dong-Young, who as UnFiction Minister, published this rambling, illogical, error-riddled screed accusing the U.S. of responsibility for Japan’s occupation of Korea, over a peace treaty it helped broker in 1904, and which won Teddy Roosevelt one of the first Nobel Peace Prizes;

*  Chang Yong-Dal, the Uri representative and standing committee member who praised the 9/11/05 thugs who tried to tear down a statue of General MacArthur for their “deep ethnic purity” (the lead thug is now under arrest as a North Korean agent);

*  Jung Chung-Rae, the pervy Uri rep who compared the USFK to unclean sperm;

*  Presidential Candidate and Uri Leader Kim Geun Tae, who dances for the amusement of the North Koreans the week after they test a nuke; but declares an insult to national pride when the U.S. declares that it will actually implement UN Security Council Resolution 1718;

*  Ex-Unification Minister Lee Jong-Seok: “The Bush administration of the U.S. is fundamentalist in nature, and it has been raising questions about drugs and human rights abuses since it took office.”

Read the rest of OFK’s post for more great commentary about the demagoguery by the South Korean government towards the US government.

If anything the only one being diplomatic in Korea is General Bell. 

The drive by diplomats from the US State Department don’t have to put up with the daily demagoguery and anti-US maneuvering by the Korean government that General Bell has had to deal with.  General Bell was able to create momentum for the USFK transformation in the past because he had strong backing from former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in Washington.  Once Rumsfeld was replaced last December the Korean government immediately took this as an opportunity to back out of all USFK transformation and alliance cost sharing agreements. 

So far the only one speaking out on the South Korean governmental betrayal of the US troops sent to Korea to help protect  the country is General Bell.  The Pentagon is so blinded by Iraq that it appears they don’t want to even be bothered with USFK related issues.  The drive by diplomats from the State Department have been of even less help.  American politicians have been just as worthless.  Once Congressman Henry Hyde retired from office, the lone voice in Congress that understood what was going in Korea was gone.  Why isn’t Hillary, Pelosi, Murtha, and the rest of the crew not visiting the 30,000 soldiers helping keep the peace in Korea?  Could it be because they care more about being seen by the media in the Green Zone then having any real concern about the welfare of US soldiers, especially ones being betrayed by the US’s so called blood allies?  The media is no where to be seen in Korea unless Kim Jong-il is launching a missile or testing a nuclear bomb.  The inattention to the plight of the USFK commander by the US military brass, political leaders, and media is disgraceful.  It appears General Bell truly is a lone voice and the Korean government knows it. 

You can read more of course at the Marmot’s Hole.

USFK has come out now and put it quite clearly that once operational control is handed over USFK will not be responsible for maintaining the armistice agreement:

The U.S. Forces Korea on Tuesday said the UN forces commander here €œcannot be responsible for maintenance of the Armistice Agreement and potential crisis escalation once he has no further control of South Korean forces after their full operational control has been handed over to Seoul. USFK Commander Gen. Burwell Bells statement came in a press release aimed at clarifying reports on Bells recent remarks about the changing role of UN Command.

It was Bells first official statement of his position that the largely nominal UN forces, which are headed by the USFK chief, will no longer be responsible for maintaining the armistice treaty once Combined Forces Command is dismantled. The remarks as good as say the UNC’s duty of maintaining the armistice and dealing with violations will be left to South Korea.

General Bell felt the need to respond to media reports that falsely claimed that the General was trying to keep command of South Korean forces after the operational control hand over with his UN title.  The CFC will no longer exist which has been discussed at length before.  This is just nothing more than people in South Korean government doing everything possible to delay the inevitable.

In the Stars and Stripes they have an interesting article up about the neutral nations committee from the UN that investigates and reports violations of the cease fire agreement on both sides of the DMZ:

Maj. Gen. Sture Theolin of Sweden and Maj. Gen. Gerhad Bruegger, Switzerland, meet weekly. Polish delegate Brig. Gen. Anatol Czaban joins the meetings a few times each year. The commission reports to the senior member of the Military Armistice Commission.

The NNSCs mission is to “supervise, observe, inspect and investigate military activities outside the Demilitarized Zone and to ensure that neither side violates the armistice by introducing or reinforcing military personnel and materiel for resumed fighting, Theolin said during a news conference prior to the meeting late Tuesday afternoon.

Since the commission hasnt been allowed for decades to inspect ports for any military build-up, officials admitted their presence is largely symbolic.

But they represent the value of the international community, Bruegger said.

The UN is willing to sends millions upon millions of unaccounted for dollars to North Korea while they can’t even inspect a port in accordance with the armistice agreement in return?  If this isn’t a perfect example of the irrelevance of the UN I don’t know what is.  The “value of the international community”?  What the heck is that?  Does he mean kind of like the value of the international community in Lebanon?  That has worked out great.

Wait there is more:

Most likely, the year of 2006 will not be remembered as a good year for reconciliation and cooperation on the peninsula, Theolin told a gathering of journalists. The Norths missile tests in July and the nuclear event in October cast shadows into an uncertain future.

You don’t say?

And decisions made in ongoing discussions on the future role of the U.N. Command will inevitably affect also the NNSC, Theolin said.

He declined to speculate what changes could be in store for the commission.Theolin added that the armistice is of fundamental relevance, that has allowed for a blossoming South Korean democracy and regional security and stability.

“It is important to recognize that although (North Korea) tries to undermine the NNSC and other institutions of the armistice, claiming that they no longer exist, North Korea continues to respect the cease-fire itself, he said.

Respect the cease-fire?  The UN most be using the Palestinian definition of a cease fire where one side stops firing while the other one continues to take pot shots.  How can the UN claim North Korea respects the cease fire when North Korea murdered 6 six South Korean sailors and wounded 18 others in a planned ambush to draw attention away from South Korea’s amazing 2002 World Cup run?  Or how about the 1996 spy submarine incident that claimed the lives 13 ROK Army soldiers and 4 civilians?  There has been numerous clashes in recent years in the West Sea and the DMZ due to North Korean violations of the Military Demarcation Line.  I can keep playing this game, but I think everyone has got the point, North Korea isn’t abiding by the cease fire resolution and the UN is making excuses for another dictator; not that it isn’t anything new.

UPDATE: OFK and the Marmot’s Hole has more on the billion dollar tribute to North
Korea.

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US and Korea conclude USFK cost sharing agreement:

South Korea and the United States on Wednesday struck a deal to increase Seoul’s share of the cost of maintaining American soldiers here in 2007 and 2008 by 6.6 percent, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said.

Korea will contribute a total of 725.5 billion won ($780 million) next year, up 45.1 billion won from its share this year, and its share in 2008 will be 725.5 billion won plus the rate of inflation in 2007, ministry officials said.

“We could conclude the agreement with the U.S. side on the phone,’’ a ministry official said. “Both sides are not totally content with the result of the negotiations, but I think it is the most reasonable result based on the spirit of the Seoul-Washington alliance.’’

The deal was struck after six rounds of negotiations between Seoul and Washington.

South Korea is going to contribute $780 million dollars to USFK next year which is still less than half the overall USFK costs. Prior to this agreement South Korea payed roughly 40% of USFK’s costs; this new agreement means they are paying roughly 46% of costs.

Let’s compare the $780 million dollar cost sharing agreement to the amount of money Seoul sends to North Korea. While North Korea was busy creating international instability with their ballistic missile and nuclear bomb tests, the South Korean government was busy sending them a record amount of humanitarian aid. The South Korean government sent $227 million dollars worth of humanitarian aid while private donors in South Korea sent $70 million dollars worth of humanitarian aid for a grand total of roughly $300 million dollars in humanitarian aid to North Korea.

On top of the humanitarian aid, the Korean government this year sent 650 billion won or about $690 million dollars in inter-Korean economic aid to North Korea to finance joint Korean ventures such as the Kaesong Industrial Project the and Kumgang Tour operations.

So if you add up the humanitarian aid and economic aid sent to North Korea by South Korea this year, it comes up to nearly $1 billion dollars in aid while the South Korean government payed only 40% of the cost sharing for the US-ROK alliance for a total $735 million dollars. In effect the South Korean government is willing to pay the North Koreans more money than they are willing to pay for cost sharing of the US-ROK alliance that has been responsible for ensuring the economic, political, and national security of the nation for over 50 years.

Then to make matters worse the US negotiators had to then haggle for months to get the South Korean government to raise their cost sharing contributions by a only 6.6% to $780 million dollars this year while planning on continuing to give North Korea a billion dollars in aid next year despite their provacative ballistic missile and nuclear tests.

One Free Korea has a great analysis of this Chosun article that discusses OPLAN: 5029 which as far as the ROK government is concerned is treated as if it is a dirty word:

The South Korean and U.S. defense chiefs in October gave the green light to strategic guidelines known as Concept of Operations Plan 5029, which include outlines for a joint response to sudden changes in North Korea. This will allow the two armies to cooperate in giving concrete shape to the plan, devised during the Kim Dae-jung administration in 1999, and ensure they are ready to deal with North Korea’s weapons of mass destruction.

A government source on Thursday said then-defense minister Yoon Kwang-ung and U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld signed off on the strategic guidelines in October. “Under the strategy, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command will complete CONPLAN 5029 by the end of next year,” the source added. The plan has been controversial between the two nations. North Korea, Seoul fears, will be particularly sensitive about the plan, which prepares for contingencies such as a sudden crisis in North Korea as the Stalinist country suffers tighter international sanctions over its nuclear test. Details of the guidelines have not been released, but they reportedly include ways of handling a seizure of North Korean WMD by hypothetical rebel insurgents and their attempt to take them out of the country, and a mass exodus of North Korean refugees.

The South Korean reluctance to plan for the internal collapse of North Korea, something that is just as likely to happen as second Korean War, should be looked at as ideology compromising the national security of the nation. A collapse of North Korea with no contingency plan between South Korea and the US would make the incompentent occupation planning before the Second Gulf War look like the second coming of the Marshall Plan.
The Roh administration’s incompentence to plan is clearly evident now that North Korea misbehaved any way by testing their ballistic missiles in July and their recent nuclear test.

Read OFK for a whole lot more analysis on OPLAN: 5029 controversy.

It looks like the operational control issue isn’t the only thing maybe needing a ultimatum to get completed:

South Korea and the United States on Wednesday resumed talks on how to share expenses for maintaining American soldiers here, with Seoul hoping to conclude the negotiations this time.

“We hope to strike a deal this time, given that we don’t have much time left to get the National Assembly’s approval on the result this year,” Cho Tae-yong, director-general of the North American affairs bureau at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, recently told reporters.

The two-day session in Seoul, aimed at renewing the Special Measures Agreement (SMA), is the sixth of its kind this year.

Technically, it is necessary for the ministry to get the lawmakers’ approval before the agreement goes into effect next year. But there was an exemption of the rule in 2005 when the cost-sharing talks ended four months after the deadline.

The US negotiators have been trying to get South Korea to pay more for the maintenance of USFK because South Korea only pays approximately 40% of the costs of maintaining the alliance while next door neighbor Japan pays approximately 70% of the costs of maintaining the USFJ forces in Japan. The US would be happy to get South Korea just to pay 50% of the upkeep but it appears the negotiators probably won’t even get that:

After several months of discussion with Washington, Seoul agreed in April 2005 to allocate 680.4 billion won ($710 million) per year in 2005 and 2006 to pay for the presence of U.S. Forces Korea (USFK).

That was a decrease of 8.9 percent from the 2004 expenditure.

During the five rounds of talks in the past, Seoul wanted to reduce its burden further, as Washington is determined to cut U.S. troop numbers.

But Washington called for an “equitable” sharing of the expenses, saying it made an exception when it agreed to reduce South Korea’s burden for 2005 and 2006 because Seoul was under financial pressure because of its dispatch of non-combat troops to Iraq.

If the US is only going to get a one digit increase from the South Koreans that means that Korea will not even pay 50% of the USFK costs. It appears that the US negotiators are now paying for the mistake of giving the South Koreans incentive to dispatch troops to Iraq by temporarily cutting costs for the past two years due to the troop dispatch to Iraq. Plus what did the US get out of the troop dispatch? Improved plumbing?

What annoys me most about this is that the South Koreans are willing to give hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to the North Koreans, the ones who threaten the very existence of the country, while playing penny pinchers with USFK which is dedicated to preserving the existence of the nation.

Another thing that annoys me is that I often hear from average South Koreans that the Korean government gives special pay to the USFK soldiers. This is absolutely untrue but it seems to persist within Korean society. Feel free to add your thoughts if anyone disagrees.

Some of you garrison guys out there can correct me if I’m wrong, but most the money from the Korean government goes to renovating or making new buildings, which with the reduction of USFK camps from 41 to 10 means the Korean government is getting many of the buildings back. It also goes to paying the salaries of Korean employees that work for USFK. Additionally South Korea gets a discount in their cost sharing by providing USFK with civilian vehicles. The civilian vehicles are bought at discounted rates but when considered in the cost sharing their are totalled up at their full retail sale price.

Like I said before this is all penny pinching stuff that Koreans are notorious for unless of course it Kim Jong-il demanding aid, then it seems that everyone in the Korean government is stumbling over each other to provide him whatever he wants.

Maybe the Korean government was hoping the command transfer issue would be forgotten with the ouster of former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld? They thought wrong:

The four-star army general stressed the need for a firm date for the transfer of operational control. He said that without a fixed date, the two militaries would not be able to draw up new joint war plans or secure military funding and equipment that would correspond to the changing military structure.

“It’s like rolling out new products. In about six months, that (fixed date) will give everybody a lot of confidence with regard to the ability of the alliance between the two countries,’’ said Bell, who concurrently serves as chief of Combined Forces Command (CFC) and United Nations Command (UNC).

He reaffirmed that the U.S. military would provide intelligence “bridging capabilities’’ centered on surveillance and reconnaissance assets to the South Korean military if needed even after Seoul exercises independent wartime control of its armed forces.

This is really reaching a point of absurdity that the Korean government has yet to agree on a date for the hand over considering President Roh said the ROK Army could take operational control now if needed. As I have speculated before, President Roh is trying to drag out the handover to where it is implemented well after he has left office and any economic and political reprecussions he will have successfully avoided.

Maybe it is time for the USFK commander to issue an ultimatum like General Garry “Give Me My Damn Bombing Range” Trexler did in order to get a command handover date. It is sad when threats and ultimatums appear to be the only way to get major issues settled between USFK and the Korean government.

It looks like General Trexler’s ultimatum worked. From Yonhap:

South Korea has finally approved the construction of an electronic weapons scoring system on an island southwest of the mainland, a move expected to kickstart firing exercises by United States pilots stationed there soon, a government official said Sunday.

The approval came after nearly a year of postponement amid protests from residents at the designated island site on Jikdo, some 70 kilometers off the port city of Gunsan.

Like many issues in Korea, it is all about the Benjamins:

The altitude of the bombers will increase to 4-5 km, from the current 600 m, to minimize noise, while the controlled sea area where fishing boats are banned is to be reduced from a radius of 18 to 9 to provide more fishing area. Gunsan city will be given W300 billion (US$1=W947) and other incentives by the government.

The next step by the anti-US groups will be to claim noise pollution and environmental damage on Jikdo once the Air Force begins training there. Eventually I wouldn’t be surprised if the groups try to take a boat to Jikdo to protest and delay training exercises there to increase tensions between USFK and the Korean authorities. Jikdo is just a short term solution to what will continue to be a long term problem for USFK.

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.

I wrote in a posting a year ago that the Korean government at least owes the United States military an honorable face saving redeployment of forces from the peninsula. My argument centers around that if the Korean government wanted USFK to reduce or redeploy forces from the peninsula it should be done in a face saving way in which it doesn’t appear that the US is retreating from South Korea due to rabid anti-Americanism running out of control in the country. The US should be able to redeploy forces off the peninsula with honor; however the ruling South Korean government thinks otherwise:

Seoul also insists on the loaded term ¿withdrawal¿ as the official designation for the project. “Since the issue first came up, the U.S. has asked Korea not use the word ‘withdrawal’,” the government official said. “But Cheong Wa Dae at the urging of the National Security Council has insisted.¿

The above comment was made in reference to the negotiations currently going on between the US and Korean governments over the handover of war time operational control of the ROK military and the US force reductions on the peninsula. The current Korean government is openly anti-American and seems determined to make the reduction of USFK an embarrassing “withdrawal” for the United States with public comments from the government and the Korean President Roh Moo-hyun about the US using failed policy with North Korea, encouragement of anti-Americanism in Korea, delay of the Camp Humphreys camp consolidation plan with violent anti-US protests, giving government subsidies to these violent anti-US groups, the fraudulent environmental issue, distribution of pro-North Korea propaganda in Seoul, and the denying of a bombing range for the US Air Force for a few quick recent examples off the top of my head.

All of this is maybe reaching a point where the US government may have had enough:

The U.S. is playing tit-for-tat by offering to hand over wartime operational control of troops to Korea at what experts say is the unfeasibly early date of 2009-2010, a high-ranking official speculated Monday. Seoul aims at the ¿withdrawal¿ of wartime control of Korean troops, as it is officially termed, in six years¿ time. “Perhaps this is a counterattack motivated by anger because [U.S. authorities] feel Korea is seeking the 2012 withdrawal for political reasons,” the official said.

A Korean source quoted a U.S. official as saying in recent bilateral discussions that Korea will not realistically be ready to exercise independent control of its forces even by 2012, but since that deadline appeared to be politically motivated, there was no reason for Washington to cling to military logic either.

The above statement comes on the heels of the uni-lateral handover of vacated USFK camps plus an announcement today of further USFK troop reductions below the 25,000 number agreed upon with the South Korean government:

The United States will lower troop levels in South Korea beyond a previously agreed reduction to 25,000, but the cut will not be “substantial,” a senior defense official said on Monday. “As the adjustments (in capabilities) take place, there will be a reduction in the number of U.S. forces located in the Republic of Korea beyond the level of 25,000 that we’ve currently agreed to,” the official said.

What the current South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun is trying to do is score domestic points with his political base in South Korea for standing up to the US on what are basically hypocritical and demagogued issues, while at the same time avoiding the fall out of a USFK pull out during his presidency. The Korean president is limited to one 5 year term and next year President Roh’s term ends and with approval ratings in the 20 percentile he will probably leave office as the greatest lame duck president in Korean history. His unpopularity will probably open the door for a South Korean conservative to regain the presidency.

However, if President Roh can keep the operational control handover date at 2012, that would mean the possible conservative president in power at the time will be blamed for when the country’s economy bottoms out from the USFK pull out. A pull out does not happen over night. It will probably be a 2 year process which if the operational control happens in 2012 that means 2010 the first US forces will start to leave the country, right in the middle of the presidency of the next Korean president. This would open the door for another Korean liberal to take power in the 2012 election if that president is held responsible for the country’s economic woes. However, if the hand over happens in 2009 that means the first forces will start pulling out next year, during President Roh’s term in office. Any bottoming out of the Korean economy will fall squarely on his shoulders and will forever be his legacy as he leaves office.

The old guard of Korea’s security understands very well the game that President Roh is playing and have now begun mobilizing to stop the hand over of operational control from the US to Korea:

A group of senior military experts including 13 former defense ministers have urged Defense Minister Yoon Kwang-ung to stop seeking the return of wartime operational control from the U.S. The meeting came at Yoon’s invitation on Wednesday.

It is rare for the contents of such a meeting to be made public, especially when it focuses on a call to end a core government project.

The group included Lee Sang-hoon and other former defense ministers as well as retired Gen. Paik Sun-yup and former vice defense minister Lee Jung-rin. They said now is not the time to reclaim wartime operational control of troops but rather the moment to strengthen the Korea-U.S. alliance.

These old defense ministers fought and lived through the Korean War plus helped build the country into the economic miracle that is today, knowing full well it would not have been possible without the assistance of the United States. So now they see one Korean presidency undoing the 50 years of work they have done to keep the US-Korea alliance strong and beneficial to the economy and most importantly the security of South Korea. In fact this is the advice that these ministers have given to USFK officials:

¿I¿ve sought a meeting with Gen. [Bell], the commander of the U.S. Forces Korea. If I meet him, I¿ll suggest that he ignores what the South Korean government says.¿

These statements have even led some to speculate that South Korea may be headed for a military coup if the current Roh policies remain in effect. Military coups have happened before in South Korea so it wouldn’t be stretch to say it couldn’t happen again. For the sake of South Korean democracy let’s hope this doesn’t occur and that these issues can be worked out before something drastic such as a military coup happens.

Obviously it is interesting times in South Korea and the coming months are really going to shape the future of Korea for decades to come. The South Korean media has now circled the wagons and have become extremely critical of the Korean president with articles such this, this, this, and this. All these competing dynamics in South Korea means that for USFK, leaving the country with honor is easier said than done.

However, shouldn’t liberation from the Japanese after World War II, 36,000 lives lost during the Korean War, and over 50 years of stability and economic development on the Korean peninsula provided by the United States be at least worth an honorable redeployment of US forces from the Korean peninsula? Is that asking too much?