By Jung Sung-ki
Staff Reporter
The U.S. and South Korean militaries are discussing ways of countering any Iraq-style insurgency tactics by North Korea in the event of war on the Korean Peninsula, the top U.S. military commander here said Saturday.
In an interview with Stars and Stripes newspaper, Gen. Walter L. Sharp, commander of the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) expressed particular concern regarding makeshift bomb attacks, which have resulted in devastating U.S. casualties in Iraq and Afghanistan.
``I do believe that North Korea is taking lessons out of Iraq, and they will change and adapt tactics," Sharp was quoted by the military newspaper as saying. Sharp is also in charge of the Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command and the United Nations Command. ``I greatly worry about IEDs showing up in this theater.''
IED refers to an improvised explosive device, a bomb constructed and deployed in unconventional ways. IEDs are often used in terrorist strikes or in unconventional warfare by guerrillas or commando forces.
In Iraq, IEDs have been used by Iraqi insurgents extensively against the U.S. and its coalition forces, and by the end of 2007 were responsible for approximately 40 percent of coalition deaths in Iraq, according to reports.
IED attacks are currently on the rise outside Iraq and Afghanistan, prompting concerns by military experts that the device is becoming the ``weapon of choice" by terror groups worldwide.
Sharp said that as North Korea may adopt new tactics and methods, he wants to ensure that U.S. forces on the peninsula build on key counterinsurgency lessons learnt from the war in Iraq.
To that end, staff officers from the Center for Army Lessons Learned at Fort Leavenworth, Kan., will come to South Korea later this year and assess what new training or other measures may be appropriate.
Sharp said he has raised the counterinsurgency issue with South Korean military officials.
``They agree that we have to learn some lessons," on applying counterinsurgency doctrine to plans for defending South Korea, said the four-star Army general, who took command of 27,000 U.S. troops here earlier this year.
Sharp also said North Korea's massive special operations forces have long been identified as a potential wartime threat, and that South Korean and American troops have geared themselves to counter this threat.