Ties With US to Get Stronger
By Jung Sung-ki
Staff Reporter
The inauguration of the Lee Myung-bak government will usher in a new era of a stronger South Korea-U.S. military alliance, past the relationship that some critics described as a ``twilight divorce,'' military experts here and abroad say.
Lee, a conservative former mayor of Seoul, has pledged efforts to build stronger, independent defense posture against North Korea, on the basis of close cooperation with the United States, unlike the Roh Moo-hyun government that persistently sought ways to emerge from the decades-long US security umbrella.
The President-elect, a former star CEO of Hyundai Engineering and Construction, will take office Feb. 25.
``The Korea-U.S. alliance is expected to evolve into a more dynamic and robust one beyond the military and political perspectives under the Lee administration, pursuing a pragmatic approach to relations with Washington,'' a researcher of the state-funded Korea Institute for Defense Analyses said, asking to remain anonymous.
``Defense ties between the two nations, in particular, are likely to receive a great boost, as the President-elect puts more emphasis on the alliance with the United States than on relations with North Korea,'' he said, referring to Lee's visit to the Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command (CFC) Jan. 15.
Lee also visited the Ministry of National Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff earlier this month for the first time as a President-elect before inauguration, in an apparent move to highlight his policy priority on national defense.
Will Seoul Join US Missile Shield?
Attention is high on South Korea's potential joining the U.S.-led ballistic missile defense (BMD) network worldwide.
Seoul has not participated in the missile shield (in which Japan is actively participating) against possible attacks from North Korea, due to financial constraints and anti-U.S. sentiments under the liberal governments for the past 10 years.
South Korea was also worried that the participation in the U.S.-led global BMD would provoke North Korea and other neighboring countries such as China and Russia.
But the atmosphere has drastically changed.
A senior military source told The Korea Times that the military is preparing to cooperate on the U.S. missile defense plan to enhance its capability to intercept incoming missiles from the North.
``We expect the U.S. government to ask us to join their missile defense system as it has for the past decade, or our government may offer to participate in the system first to upgrade the country's missile intercepting capability,'' said the source. ``We're reviewing various ways to cooperate on the U.S. missile shield.''
Measures to cooperate on the U.S. BMD network include providing missile launch sites to the U.S. military, participating in the missile shield system, mandating ballistic missile defense to the U.S. military and declaring public support for the U.S. scheme, he said.
The source added that upgrading South Korea's low-tire missile shield program with the purchase of high-tech U.S. missile defense systems, including the hit-to-kill Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) system, was also under review.
``The bottom line is that we are going in the direction of building an extended missile defense shield, either by joining the U.S. ballistic shield or acquiring more advanced weapons systems to thwart North Korea's missiles,'' he said.
South Korea aims to establish a low-altitude missile shield, dubbed the Korea air and missile defense (KAMD) network system, which will be fully operational by 2012.
The KAMD will involve used PAC-2 interceptors from Germany, ship-based air defense systems based on KDX-III Aegis-equipped destroyers armed with SM-II ship-to-air missiles, and a ballistic missile early warning radar to be built by the state-run Agency for Defense Development with technological support from foreign countries.
The terminal-phase defense is designed to intercept targets about 40 kilometers north of Seoul.
The system mainly aims to take down low-flying, short- and medium-range missiles from North Korea, including more than 600 short-range Scud missiles with a range of 320 to 500 kilometers and 200 medium-range Rodong missiles with a range of 1,300 kilometers, capable of hitting Japan, which are believed to have been deployed near the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas.
Last year, Pyongyang test-fired a series of missiles off the eastern coast toward Japan, including the Taepodong-2 ballistic missile with a range of 6,700 kilometers, believed to be capable of reaching parts of the United States with a light payload.
The Defense Acquisition Program Administration approved the $1 billion SAM-X project last September to purchase 48 second-hand PAC-2 launch modules, radars and missiles, including the Patriot Anti-Tactical Missile and Guidance Enhanced Missile Plus (GEM+) from Germany beginning this year.
The agency plans to buy Raytheon's ground-control equipment to support two Patriot system battalions.
The Navy recently unveiled a plan to buy the up-to-date SM-6 extended range active missile being developed by Raytheon and the U.S. Navy to equip its 7,600-ton KDX-III Aegis destroyers
The first of the planned three Aegis-equipped destroyers ― the Sejong the Great ― was launched last year. Two more ships will be commissioned by 2012.
The SM-6, or Standard Missile-6, with a range of 320 to 400 kilometers is expected to help intercept the North's incoming ballistic missiles at an earlier stage, defense experts say.
Previously, the Navy wanted to buy more than 200 ship-to-air SM-2 Block IIIA/B missiles with a range of 170 kilometers to equip its advanced KDX series of destroyers.
Wartime Operational Control
The agreed transfer of wartime operational control (OPCON) of South Korean troops from the U.S. military to Korean commanders is expected to be a major litmus test of the alliance under the Lee government.
The Roh administration pushed for taking over OPCON with the aim of achieving self-reliant defense capabilities, emerging from the decades-long U.S. security umbrella.
Under a deal struck early this year, South Korea is to exercise independent OPCON of its troops during wartime beginning April 17, 2012. The U.S. military will shift to a naval- and air-centric supporting role.
The two sides also agreed on a package of command rearrangement plans, including operation of separate military commands after disbanding the CFC.
The President-elect pledged earlier that he would consider renegotiating the timeline for OPCON transition unless North Korea's nuclear threat is diminished substantially.
South Korean and U.S. conservatives are also echoing the need for rescheduling the timetable. They have expressed concern that the smaller role of the U.S. military amid lingering threats posed by North Korea's nuclear and missile programs could tip the military balance on the Korean Peninsula.
``The timing for OPCON transfer should be decided after evaluating the security condition and North Korean nuclear threats in a careful and measured way,'' said Rep. Hwang Jin-ha of the Grand National Party (GNP). ``The problem was the Roh government dealt with the issue from a political and nationalistic point of view.''
Bruce Klingner, a senior research fellow for Northeast Asia in the Asian Studies Center at the Heritage Foundation, a U.S. conservative think tank, said in an article on the outcome of South Korea's election ``The U.S. could announce that the planned 2012 transfer date is contingent on both a sufficient reduction in the North Korean threat and satisfactory progress in improving South Korean military capabilities. The feasibility of the transfer by the currently agreed upon date is open to discussion.''
The U.S. government officially downplayed the possibility of rescheduling the timeline for the command transfer, but the two governments share the need for a flexible approach toward their combined defense readiness against North Korea's military threat.
``Talking about renegotiating the OPCON transfer timing now is meaningless and not a good idea,'' a senior official of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said. ``The transition plan should be implemented as agreed. But it's obvious that the two militaries will map out new strategies in accordance with the changing security environment.''
South Korea voluntarily handed over both peacetime and wartime operational controls to the U.S.-led United Nations Command (UNC) at the outbreak of the 1950-53 Korean War. The command authority was later transferred to the CFC. Seoul took over peacetime control in 1994.
Currently, the four-star U.S. commander of the CFC has the authority to command both South Korean and American troops in case of an emergency.
The commander concurrently serves as chief of the UNC and U.S. Forces Korea of some 27,000 troops.