Tag: USFK

The Korean government better be ready to pay more for USFK cost sharing because this is something that I suspect President Trump will not waver on:

The Korean Ministry of National Defense said on Monday it is working toward a “reasonable” solution to the issue of maintaining U.S. troops here, following U.S. President Donald Trump’s claim that Korea should pay a larger portion of the cost.

Moon Sang-gyun, the Korean Defense Ministry spokesman, said in a briefing Monday, “The U.S. Forces Korea’s contributions to defense on the Korean Peninsula, our financial capability, the security situation on the Korean Peninsula, and also enabling conditions for stability in the stationing of USFK will all be comprehensively taken into consideration to enable negotiations to set burden-sharing at a reasonable standard.”

Trump said during the joint press briefing with President Moon Jae-in Friday in Washington after their summit, “We are working together to ensure fair burden-sharing in support of the U.S. military presence in South Korea.” He upped pressure on Seoul ahead of negotiations later this year to decide a defense cost-sharing plan.

“Burden-sharing is a very important factor,” Trump also said at the joint conference, which is “becoming more and more prevalent, certainly in this administration.”

This marks the first time Trump has publicly raised the issue of Korea paying more for the stationing of U.S. troops since he took office in January, amid concern in Seoul over upcoming cost-sharing negotiations.

During his presidential campaign, Trump took an “America First” stance and has urged for U.S. allies to pay their fair share of the cost in defense.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.

It seems like an inevitability that the ROK will end up paying more for the upkeep of the US-ROK alliance since it is an issue that President Trump continues to highlight:

President Moon Jae-in faced a demand on Friday by U.S. President Donald Trump to resolve trade imbalance between the two countries and pay more of the cost for the presence of U.S. troops in Korea, while winning assurances for stronger defense measures to deter North Korea’s rapidly advancing threats.

In the joint press conference that followed the Oval Office summit, Trump said the era of strategic patience with the North Korean regime has failed. “And frankly, that patience is over,” he added. After calling upon regional powers and all responsible nations to implement sanctions and pressure North Korea to end its nuclear and missile programs, Trump said now the goal is “peace, stability and prosperity for the region.”

The United States will defend itself and its allies, Trump said, and as part of that commitment, he said he wants to ensure that the cost of U.S. military presence in South Korea is equitably shared. “Burden sharing is a very important factor,” he said. “A factor that is becoming more and more prevalent, certainly in this administration.”

Trump also spoke of a “fair and reciprocal economic relationship” with South Korea, while complaining that the Korea-U.S. free trade agreement has increased the U.S. trade deficit with South Korea by more than $11 billion.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.

Even if it is cheaper to permanently station a brigade in South Korea, the reason USFK has been citing for using a rotational brigade is increased readiness of the unit since it trains together, deploys together, and returns to its home station together:

The downsizing of the Army overseas has cost more money than expected because of a reliance on expensive rotational forces when forward-based units can perform the same roles more cheaply, according to a new U.S. Army War College report.

An examination of the costs of troop rotations during the past several years in Europe and South Korea undermines a decade-old Defense Department argument that shuttling units back and forth from the United States is a more efficient way of doing business than basing them overseas, said report author John R. Deni, a War College professor.

There also is evidence that the long rotations are taking a toll on troop morale, with units deployed to Europe and South Korea showing lower re-enlistment rates than their counterparts, the report found.

Deni, whose findings were the subject of a panel discussion Wednesday at the Atlantic Council in Washington, said the Army should base one additional armored brigade in Europe and one in South Korea along with aviation assets and enablers.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link, but one of the other positives of the rotational brigade is that if the Pentagon wants to reduce troop numbers on the peninsula it is much easier to do so with a rotational unit that is not sent instead of trying to pull a permanently stationed brigade off of the peninsula.

It looks like the US Air Force has added a new tool to their toolbox of weapons to deal with any North Korean contingency:

The U.S. military has deployed to South Korea state-of-the-art missiles equipped with precision strike capability for a possible North Korea contingency.

Multiple diplomatic sources said on Monday that to their knowledge, U.S. Forces Korea(USFK) recently put in place around ten Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles(JASSM) at its air base in Gunsan, North Jeolla Province.

It is also known that the missiles can be mounted on F-16 fighter jets deployed to South Korea on a regular and rotational basis.

The missiles are assessed to have precision strike ability to hit key facilities in Pyongyang when launched from south of the military demarcation line(MDL).  [KBS Global]

Here is the latest armored brigade to rotate into South Korea:

A new combat brigade took point on the heavily militarized Korean Peninsula on Wednesday.

The 2nd Armored Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division replaced the 1st ABCT, 1 ID as the only U.S. combat brigade in South Korea during a transfer-of-authority ceremony at Camp Humphreys. It also marked the first day of the new brigade’s nine-month rotational deployment.

“I’m very proud to have the Black Jack brigade rejoin the rolls of the 2nd Infantry Division,” Maj. Gen. Ted Martin, the division’s commander, said during the ceremony.  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link.

South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha is aboard an Apache helicopter during a visit to the U.S. Forces Korea’s Camp Red Cloud in Uijeongbu, north of Seoul, on June 25, 2017, the 67th anniversary of the Korean War. (Yonhap)

With the leftists emboldened every GI crime incident now has the potential to be blown up in the media.  So far this one has been kept pretty low key considering it happened back on April 1st and we are hearing about it now:

An American soldier faces a charge for sexual assault, the Gangnam Police Station said Monday. The soldier, part of the United States Forces Korea stationed at Osan Air Base in Gyeonggi Province, allegedly raped a woman after taking her to a hotel at 7:30 a.m. near a club where they met in Gangnam, April 1.

According to police, the woman had been intoxicated when she was taken to the hotel and then raped. She reported the incident to the police the same day, claiming she believed she was raped.

After about a month-long police investigation, in which the police analyzed video footage from the club and hotel, the police identified the soldier as the culprit. The police summoned the suspect for questioning June 17 and indicted him June 20, following the protocol of the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), a mutual defense treaty between Korea and the U.S.  [Korea Times]

Just like with all the other criminal cases involving US GI’s this soldier will be prosecuted through the Korean court system and if found guilty will be put in Korean prison.  It will be interesting to see in the coming months if the currently emboldened anti-US groups in Korea will try to revive the narrative that GIs are committing all these crimes and then flying home with no punishment.

I have been to Camp Stanley so many times and I never realized this training tunnel was located there:

Boxes have been packed and nails stick out from walls where pictures and maps used to hang.

U.S. soldiers are getting ready for a historic move from the front lines to new quarters south of Seoul, South Korea, as part of a relocation plan that has been in the works for more than a decade.

But there’s one important feature they can’t take with them — a half-mile tunnel carved into a mountain that rises above Camp Stanley, which has been home to 2nd Infantry Division units since shortly after the 1950-53 Korean War.  (…..)

Training for the possible need to search and clear such facilities is high on the agenda for U.S. and South Korean forces. But it’s about to become more challenging for the 23rd Chemical Battalion, which is preparing to move to Camp Humphreys, about 55 miles south of Seoul, this month. It will retain access to the tunnel, although it’s unclear how that will work without a regular presence on the base.  [Stars and Stripes]

You can read more at the link.

It looks like some of the silent majority in South Korea have decided to stand up to the currently empowered leftists trying to create a wedge in the US-ROK alliance:

Dozens of South Koreans waved American flags and signs with slogans like “Deploy THAAD immediately” and “Strong ROK-US alliance” during a rally Monday to support the 2nd Infantry Division after several musicians boycotted a recent concert celebrating its centennial.

The municipal government in Uijeongbu organized the June 10 concert at a sports complex in the city, which has long been home to 2ID headquarters at Camp Red Cloud. But several South Korean K-pop bands and other musicians who had been expected to perform either did not show up or declined to play their songs.

The group organizing Monday’s rally, which was held on the sidewalk in front of the U.S. Army garrison, produced a letter addressed to the division’s commander, Maj. Gen. Theodore Martin.

“We, Patriotic Koreans want to deliver our deepest apology about the disruption of the Centennial concert,” the letter read. “We also want to express our sincere appreciation for you and your soldiers’ dedication for the security of the Republic of Korea.”  [Stars & Stripes]

You can read more at the link, but the boycott had to be highly embarrassing to the Uijongbu mayor Ahn Byung-yong who was sitting next to USFK Commander General Vincent Brooks when the cancellations happened.  According to the article the mayor is blaming pro-North Korean leftists and media for causing the cancellation.

I think the President of the KATUSA Veterans Association makes a good point that South Korea is lucky that the abrupt cancellation of a concert recognizing 2nd Infantry Division troops has not received media attention in the US:

The recently disrupted concert meant to celebrate a key U.S. military unit’s centennial could trigger a bout of anti-Korean sentiment in the United States, a keen observer told The Korea Times Wednesday.

“We should put ourselves in their shoes,” Kim Jong-wook, president of the KATUSA Veterans Association, said. “Naturally, they would feel unappreciated for their service. After all, they are here, being a half world away from home, to defend Korea.”

On Saturday, Uijeongbu, the city north of Seoul, which is home to the U.S. Army 2nd Infantry Division, hosted a farewell concert for its members ahead of its centennial in October. Most of the Korean performers canceled their participation after receiving a flood of protests triggered by NGOs.

The civic groups demanded the singers stay away, arguing that the concert was preempted by the 15th anniversary of two Korean girls who were crushed to death by a U.S. armored vehicle in 2002.

“If the American public find out about what happened, I would have little doubt that they would want their children home,” Kim said.  [Korea Times]

You can read the rest at the link, but I don’t see this story getting any traction either in the US because all the American media cares about now is anything with the word Russia and Trump in it.