The other question that needs to be asked is if the Moon Jae-in administration wants to restart major bilateral exercises:

The United States will consider resuming military exercises with South Korea that have been suspended depending on North Korea’s next move, the Pentagon chief has said.

U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper made the comment in an interview with MSNBC Thursday after North Korean leader Kim Jong-un threatened in a New Year’s message to soon showcase a “new strategic weapon.”

Experts have said the strategic weapon could be an intercontinental ballistic missile intended to pressure the U.S. to make concessions in the two countries’ stalled denuclearization talks.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

Here is the latest on the election meddling investigation in Ulsan that has been linked back to the Blue House:

Prosecutors raided the Ulsan government office on Saturday amid rising allegations that the city’s vice mayor colluded with the presidential office to help the president’s close friend in the 2018 mayoral election.

The raid of Ulsan Metropolitan City Hall, some 400 kilometers southeast of the capital city, came amid suspicions that Song Byung-gi, Ulsan’s vice mayor for economic affairs, conspired with several presidential aides to influence the city’s mayoral poll last year.

Prosecutors also suspect that the presidential office and the ruling Democratic Party intervened in establishing campaign pledges for the incumbent mayor.

The vice mayor is suspected of tipping off the presidential office to bribery allegations involving ex-Ulsan Mayor Kim Gi-hyeon’s confidants, which led to investigations ahead of the 2018 election.

Kim, who was seeking reelection as mayor in June 2018 as a candidate of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party, lost the race to current mayor Song Cheol-ho of the ruling Democratic Party, a longtime friend of President Moon Jae-in.

Kim claimed publicly that the Ulsan Metropolitan Police Agency deliberately raided his office a few months ahead of the election, with Cheong Wa Dae behind the move.

Yonhap

With the Blue House installing their new Justice Minister I guess we will see how long this investigation in Ulsan is allowed to continue.

Nick Eberstadt's #NewYearGift“ [C]omplete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” is "code language for an end to Seoul’s defense treaty with Washington and the withdrawal of American troops…for achieving the unconditional unification [by] the North" https://t.co/ZxotT7bisu

— Sung-Yoon Lee (@SungYoonLee1) January 1, 2020

That is what the Korea Times is recommending:

How young is too young to be prosecuted? In Korea, that legal threshold is 14 years old. But after a series of horrendous crimes committed by minors in recent years, there have been growing calls for change.

The latest controversy erupted last week when a fifth grader was found to have stabbed a peer to death at her grandparents’ home in revenge for “badmouthing” her and her family.

The attacker, who “was removing blood stains” at the crime scene when police arrived, later confessed to the killing and trying to cover it up.

Because she is under 14, she will not face trial. Instead, she was sent to a juvenile review center, where she will stay for about a month for medical observation.

Shocked by the news, hundreds of people have signed online petitions urging authorities to toughen laws against minors’ crimes.

Data from the National Police Agency show that 7,364 people under 14 were sent to juvenile institutions last year, up 12.4 percent from 2015. Four crimes ― murder, robbery, assault and larceny ― accounted for 77 percent of offenses. Sexual crimes numbered 410, up 32 percent during the period.

Under juvenile laws, perpetrators under 14 cannot be sent to prison and those under 19 are exempt from the death penalty or imprisonment longer than 20 years. 

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

How to respond to Kim Jong Un’s threatening New Year’s remarks? The U.S. should fully resume all canceled or down-sized military exercises in South Korea. Hold Congressional hearings on whether US troops are truly ready to “fight tonight.”

— John Bolton (@AmbJohnBolton) January 1, 2020

This is typical behavior from the usually mentally handicapped or drug addicted homeless people in Seattle:

A Seattle man was charged Monday with a hate crime after police say he attacked two Korean tourists on Christmas because of their race, nationality and ancestry.

According to court documents, 30-year-old Aaron Charles Rowe followed a group of Korean men visiting Seattle and attacked two of them near the AMC movie theatre at Pacific Place.

The group told police they hid inside the theater until it closed, but were followed by Rowe when they walked out.

The Korean tourists told police Rowe punched one of them in the back and hit another one in the face. In court documents, they say he yelled, “I hate Chinese,” and “F***ing Chinese” and “Coward” at the group.

The four men were visiting Seattle from California, Missouri and Korea.

Rowe was arrested later that night after stealing two umbrellas from the valet station at the Hyatt Regency and trying to smash a hotel window.

According to the Prosecutor’s Office, this was Rowe’s third booking into the King County Jail this month.

“Visitors to Seattle deserve to feel safe in the heart of our city,” said a spokesperson for the Downtown Seattle Association. “With a string of recent arrests, it’s clear this individual isn’t getting the help he needs. We need to fix a system that is failing both the community and the repeat offender.”

Rowe has had 16 warrants for his arrest since 2016. He was convicted of felony assault in 2004 and 2016. He has nine gross misdemeanor convictions.

When arrested, Rowe told police his address was at a nearby homeless shelter.

KOMO News

Anyone want to make any bets that this guy will be back out on the streets again?

I do not support aggression against South Korea’s riot police, especially since many of them are mandatory service conscripts. With that said the protests against the Moon administration are nothing like the violent protests we have seen Korean leftists commit in the past with little to no consequences:

State prosecutors on Friday sought a court warrant to arrest a conservative pastor for his alleged role in a violent anti-government protest.

Rev. Jun Kwang-hoon, chief of the Christian Council of Korea, led a mass rally in central Seoul on Oct. 3 calling for the resignations of a scandal-ridden justice minister and President Moon Jae-in.

Police have investigated the pastor, also chief of a coalition of conservative groups which organized the rally, on suspicions that he instigated protesters to use violence against police when they marched toward the adjacent presidential office.

Prosecutors requested a Seoul court issue arrest warrants for Jun and two other protest leaders on charges including obstruction of justice and breaching assembly and demonstration laws, according to legal sources with knowledge of the matter.

Hundreds of thousands participated in the rally in Gwanghwamun, central Seoul. Speakers on stage shouted radical phrases such as “Seize the Blue House” and “Arrest the president.”

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link, but when the Korean government did arrest a violent left wing KCTU protester last year they ended up letting him go. It will be interesting to see if the Korean courts do the same thing with this pastor.

In recent months I made my way up to Uijeongbu to visit friends and we ate dinner at a budaechigae restaurant near where the old USFK military bases Camp Kyle and Camp Sears were located. For people that have never seen Camp Kyle before, here is what it looked like before it closed in 2005:

From the restaurant I could look right into where Camp Kyle was once located. Currently there are no buildings standings and essentially the land is slowly being reclaimed by nature:

Long time ROK Heads may remember that Camp Kyle was at the center of environmental pollution claims made by the anti-US groups and the ROK media at the time. For example the ROK media was claiming that Camp Kyle was so polluted that people had to walk around in “anti-contamination suits” to protect themselves. I knew this was bogus and did something no one in the Korea media decided to do and actually visited Camp Kyle. Of course I saw no one wearing anti-contamination suits.

Regardless Camp Kyle remained one of the frontlines in the USFK pollution debate with the ROK government demanding that U.S. pay to decontaminate the soil at the camp. ROK Heads may remember that the pollution clean up costs have come up during the ongoing US-ROK alliance cost sharing negotiations this month.

After eating dinner we then took a walk around the Geumo-dong neighborhood towards where Camp Sears used to be located.

For those that have never been to Camp Sears here is how it looked back in 2005:

This is what Camp Sears looks like today:

Besides the typical commercial buildings that have gone up around the old camp, a couple of major government buildings have been constructed right on where Camp Sears was once located. The first is a Uijeongbu government service building:

The other is the Northern Gyeongi-do Provisional Police headquarters:

Around these buildings a number of parks have been constructed on the old Camp Sears property, however they are not being maintained:

You would think that with all the money spent on these new government buildings there would be enough money left over to pay a gardener:

Around the government buildings there is now a road that has been constructed, Cheongbo-ro which is named after the mountain behind the old camp, Cheonbosan:

A walk completely around the old camp and could find no sign of the existence of the former camp anywhere. Adjacent to Camp Sears there used to be an area that housed ROK Army fuel storage tanks. This property now has a major construction project underway on it:

After walking around Camp Sears we then walked over to the major Geumo-dong shopping district that has not changed much since 2005 when Camp Kyle and Sears closed.

The Home Plus remains the major shopping attraction in the Geumo-dong neighborhood:

It may be hard to believe, but prior to 2000 this shopping area was actually home to various farms. The closing of Camp Kyle and Camp Sears is just a continuation of South Korea’s incredible development. The camp’s are mostly a long forgotten memory for people that live there, just like the farms the shopping district now sits on top of.