For old 2ID personnel like myself, it still seems weird to hear about an elementary school on Camp Casey.  After only six years of operation the school is closing this summer:

Camp Casey’s elementary school and child development center will close this summer as U.S. forces on the Korean Peninsula relocate to Camp Humphreys.

An Installation Management Command memo, dated Jan. 28 and addressed to the parents of children stationed at U.S. facilities north of Seoul, says Camp Casey Elementary School will close in June and Child and Youth Services will end at the base July 1.

“In accordance with the 2002 Land Partnership Plan (amended in 2004), Area I is reducing in U.S. population and bases,” Col. Jack Haefner, U.S. Army Garrison Camp Red Cloud and Area I commander, said in the memo.

Camp Casey’s Department of Defense Education Activity school opened in 2010 with an enrollment of about 250 as part of U.S. Forces Korea’s plan to increase the number of command-sponsored slots on the peninsula. A new wing opened in 2011, nearly doubling the K-8 school’s capacity. However, enrollment has declined over the past year. [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link.

https://twitter.com/thejointstaff/status/708706701583601665

Fashion designer Victoria Beckham (C), better known as a former Spice Girls member and wife of retired footballer David Beckham, unveils a new clothing line exclusively designed for Asian customers during a press conference at a Seoul hotel on March 21, 2016, in this photo released by the Munich-based mytheresa.com online shop. (Yonhap)

Considering how authorities have been scouring Brussels for terror suspects ever since the Paris terror attacks you would think it would be hard for these guys to execute such attack.  Fortunately this US military family was not killed by this latest terror attack in Europe.  I hope they have a speedy recovery from their injuries:

A U.S. airman and his family were among the scores wounded in a series of bombings in Brussels Tuesday claimed by the Islamic State group that killed more than 30 people, prompting a temporary travel restriction to the country for all American forces, U.S. military officials said.

The airman, assigned to Joint Force Command Brunssum, Netherlands, was injured at Brussels’ international airport, the Air Force said in a statement. The Airman, who the Associated Press reported was a lieutenant colonel, “sustained various injuries,” the statement said.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read the rest at the link.

Here is the latest North Korean provocation in response to the ongoing US-ROK military exercises being executed this week:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has inspected the military’s test-fire of a new large-caliber multiple rocket launcher, the North’s state media said Tuesday, amid heightened tension on the divided peninsula.

The North’s leader has expressed his satisfaction over the “perfect accuracy” of the launch system, praising officials and technicians in the field of defense science, according to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

The leader said that its rocket launchers would help increase “the capability of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) to mount a precision attack on the enemies’ targets in the operational theater in the southern part of Korea,” the KCNA said.  [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link, but the way I look at it is that these types of provocations are better than them torpedoing ships or blowing the legs off of ROK soldiers.

More bad news for US Forces Japan.  The strangest thing to me about this story is how do you assault someone for 90 minutes on airplane?:

 A Navy lieutenant was arrested Friday following allegations that he groped and punched a female passenger aboard a Japan-bound flight, police and Navy officials said.

The lieutenant, 33, assigned to Naval Air Facility Atsugi, is suspected of touching the 19-year-old college student’s clothed thigh, then punching her in the head several times during a flight from San Diego to Narita International Airport, an airport police spokesman said.

Police allege the officer assaulted the woman for about 90 minutes aboard the Japan Airlines flight, beginning around 11 a.m. Thursday, according to police and media reports.

The woman changed seats after another passenger reported the incident to a flight attendant, police said.

The officer had been drinking on the flight, though how much he had consumed is unclear, the police spokesman said.

Police arrested the lieutenant and took him into custody shortly after midnight, following an investigation that began after the plane arrived Thursday afternoon.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read the rest of this crazy story at the link.

In other (good) news: Unemployment amongst North Korean defectors continues to decline. pic.twitter.com/Dm2z32aLvZ

— Sokeel Park 박석길 (@Sokeel) March 18, 2016

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un inspects a set of military landing drills, the state-run Rodong Sinmun reported on March 20, 2016. Kim ordered his forces to bury any enemies attacking the country at sea. (Photos posted in Rodong Sinmun)

According to civilian satellite imagery it appears that the Kim regime is preparing the Pungye Nuclear Test Site for future nuclear tests:

North Korea’s Punggye-ri site in Kilju County, North Hamgyong Province, is active and could be ready for new nuclear tests, according to 38 North, as Pyongyang continues to ignore United Nations resolutions and threaten further nuclear and ballistic missile tests.

The website 38 North, which specializes in North Korean affairs and is run by the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), said Friday that satellite imagery from March 6 and March 14 show active maintenance at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site.

The activity “does not appear directed at further tunnel excavation,” it said, but rather to maintain existing tunnels as well as to clean up after the nuclear test in January.

“It is highly likely that site is capable of supporting additional tests at any time,” the website continued.   [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read the rest at the link, but just because they are cleaning up the test site I would think does not necessarily mean there will be a test in the near term.  However, I do have to wonder who in North Korea cleans up these test sites?  Do they send some of their political prisoners into the tunnels to do the work?

The man behind the “Pacific Pathways” program which has seen the US Army expand operations throughout the Pacific region has been selected to be the next USFK commander:

Carter also has named Army Gen. Vincent K. Brooks, if confirmed by the Senate, to be commander of U.S. Forces Korea. Brooks now is commanding general of U.S. Army Pacific, Pacom’s Army component.

The command has administrative control over all U.S. Army forces in the Pacom area of responsibility and provides forces and performs theater security programs with 36 countries from the Asia-Pacific regions of Alaska, Japan and Korea.

Carter said U.S. Forces Korea “is part of U.S. Pacific Command, but is a major political military command, a place where we need our very best, and Vince is that, and also an officer with tremendous operational and managerial experience.”  [Defense.gov]

You can read the rest at the link.