By Jung Sung-ki
Staff Reporter
South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) has ordered its naval unit operating in Somali littoral waters not to conduct close-range helicopter operations against pirates' boats until missile countermeasure devices are attached to the unit's Lynx helicopter, JCS officials said Sunday.
The move comes as procedures to arm the helicopter with anti-aircraft missile protection equipment and sensors have been delayed, they said.
``New operational guidelines for the Cheonghae unit have been drawn up and have been distributed,'' a JCS official said, asking not to be named.
Concerns have grown over the unit's operational safety since The Korea Times reported last month that the Combined Forces Command in Seoul had notified South Korea's Ministry of National Defense and JCS of intelligence that Somali pirates were presumed to have obtained U.S.-made Stinger surface-to-air missile systems from al-Qaida.
The Stinger is a personal portable infrared homing missile that entered into service in 1981. The shoulder-launched weapon has to date been responsible for downing 270 aircraft. The missile can hit targets flying as high as 4.8 kilometers above ground and travels at a speed of around Mach 2.
The unit's only Lynx helicopter, however, is vulnerable to any anti-aircraft guided missile attacks because it has no missile protection systems, such as flare dispensers and radar warning receivers.
Almost all other coalition forces, patrol helicopters operating off Somalia's coast are known to be equipped with anti-aircraft missile countermeasure devices.
Withdrawing its previous lukewarm attitude toward the intelligence after the report, the JCS belatedly announced it would come up with proper countermeasures, including equipment procurement.
As part of short-term measures, the JCS has already sent 25-kilomter-range marine glasses to the unit's helicopter pilots.
It also pledged that it would set aside a budget to fit anti-aircraft missile systems to the Lynx helicopter of Choenghae's second contingent to be deployed by September.
The unit was deployed in March, the first overseas combat deployment of the South Korean Navy. Since then, the destroyer-based Korean unit has given one of the most outstanding anti-piracy performances among coalition forces operating off the troubled waters.
The unit's anti-submarine Lynx ― carrying sharpshooters ― has rescued several foreign vessels, including a North Korean cargo ship, from the heavily armed pirates.
The Somali pirates reportedly run sophisticated operations using high-tech equipment such as satellite phones, rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) launchers and GPS receivers. They are also known to have acquired Soviet-era anti-aircraft missiles such as the SA-7 and SA-18.
Located along the route of a crude-oil pipeline connecting the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean and racked by civil war, Somalia's coastline has become infamous for piracy.
Each year, about 20,000 ships, including some 460 South Korean vessels, sail throughout the Gulf of Aden headed for the Suez Canal, an important shipping route for international trade that links Europe to the Middle East and Asia.
The International Maritime Organization counted 111 attacks in 2008 in the Arabian Sea near Somalia, the most notorious location for such activity.