South Korean Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

Jeff Head said:

So, this will now mean Seoul plans on 60 F-35As?

I wonder f the additional 20 are actually going to be F-35Bs for their Dokdo carriers?

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Korea’s ‘patriotic prostitutes’ for US soldiers get justice at last
Seoul demands repeated apologies from Tokyo for ‘comfort women,’ but has not addressed its own forced prostitution of women for American troops. Thanks to a court ruling, it – and Washington – now face some unpleasant truths
By ANOUK EIGENRAAM MARCH 3, 2018 12:08 PM (UTC+8)

The three off-duty American soldiers hesitate at the entrance to the bar they are standing in front of. They’re in their mid-20s. One of them grabs the door handle of the place and peeps in. “Let’s go in here.” The three enter the venue. Minutes later, they’re out on the street again. “It’s dead in there,” they yell at another group of GIs passing by.

“It’s been quiet for a while,” complains one of the women behind the bar. “The US Army is moving a lot of soldiers to other places in Korea. So there are less and less customers.”

Though it’s still early, it doesn’t seem to get much busier later this Friday evening. Just 40 to 50 soldiers from Camp Casey mill around these once-raucous streets.

This is the scene in Dongducheon, northeast of Seoul, home to the largest US ground combat unit in South Korea, the 2nd Infantry Division. Beyond the walls of Camp Casey, a “ville” or “camp town” of shops, restaurants and bars caters to the GIs.

But as the US prepares to shift all troops to a massive new base complex in Pyeongtaek, southwest of Seoul, and strict US military regulations against patronization of prostitutes impacts the sex trade, the “camp town,” too, appears to be winding down operations.

Camp town sleaze
Things were different in the 1950s, ’60s, ’70s and ’80s, when this camp town, and others like it, were buzzing with soldiers, prostitutes and “juicy bars” – entertainment establishments that satisfied their young male customers’ every need. A lingering legacy of the Korean War, camp towns sprang up across South Korea as US bases firmed up their presence after the fighting ended in 1953.

“Mrs Kim” – she requested to be identified only by her surname, and refused to be photographed for this article – said of those days: “There were a lot of women.” She was forced to prostitute herself to American troops from 1972, when she was only 14 years old.

She had arrived on the mainland a year earlier from the island of Jeju to live with her elder sister and her husband. One day “an uncomfortable situation” with her brother-in-law occurred. She was forced to leave the house and turn to an employment agency for work.

“The man at the employment agency asked me to stand in front of him. I had no idea why but I obeyed,” she said. “He just looked at me and sent me off.” The man indeed had a job for her: He sent her to a camp town outside the base of Camp Stanley in Uijeongbu, a gritty garrison town directly north of Seoul, as a sex worker.

“I had no idea I would end up there,” Mrs Kim said. “But I had no choice. I was already in debt because of the referral fee for my first job – cleaning and cooking in a teahouse – he had landed me.”

Mrs Kim is now 60. During her time as a sex worker, she was moved from camp town to camp town. She attempted suicide three times but was found in time, every time. “So I just lived,” she said, simply.

Now, after 46 years, she and 116 other women who shared similar fates can celebrate a judicial victory over the wrongdoings committed against them. Because it wasn’t just the employment agency that was to blame: The state was involved, too.
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State involvement in ‘patriotic prostitution’
In 2014 she and the other “camp-town women” filed a lawsuit against the South Korean state with the help of Durebang, a civic group. In a landmark decision, the Seoul High Court ruled in February that the South Korean government “operated and managed” military camp towns in order to “boost morale among foreign troops” and keep “an essential military alliance for national security” in place, “while mobilizing prostitutes” to acquire hard foreign currency.

Roughly 46,000 Korean workers in camp towns earned US$70 million in 1969 alone. The Department of Tourism and Transportation of Gyeonggi province estimated in 1970 that the yanggongju (“western princesses”) or yangsaeksi (“western brides”) – the derogatory names that officials gave the women at the time – earned $8 million annually.

A mural inside a camp town bar makes clear the kind of entertainment on offer. Photo: Anouk Eigenraam/Asia Times A mural inside a camp town bar makes clear the kind of entertainment on offer. Photo: Anouk Eigenraam/Asia Times
Local governments, police and officials from the Ministry of Health all cooperated, Mrs Kim remembers. During the trial, she testified anonymously, wearing a veil. “The city registered me and gave me a false ID, even though I was clearly a minor,” she said. “There were lots of girls working in the bars that were underage.”

Sometimes, police would raid the bars and arrest girls infected with sexually transmitted diseases.

“Soldiers would point the girls out they got an STD from,” another plaintiff, “Mrs Lee” (not her real name), recalled. “Then they locked us up in medical detention centers where we underwent involuntary treatment with penicillin injections, which was excruciatingly painful. It gave all kind of side effects, but they didn’t care if we got sick. Preventing us from spreading STDs was their only concern.”

These “Base Community Clean-Up Committees,” known in Korean as “Purification Movements,” were established on the order of then-president Park Chung-hee in 1971. Women were also required to take classes in the medical facilities on “etiquette and good conduct.” The yanggalbo (“western prostitutes”) were praised as “patriotic” even though prostitution was officially illegal.

Mrs Lee, 17 when she started, remembers living with six girls and the brothel owner in one house. Working hours were from 6pm until 5am. Running away was useless. “They constantly kept eyes on you,” she said. “If you attempted to escape, they beat you up. They lifted you into the air and threw you on the street. A lot of abuse happened – violence and even occasional murders.”

“Lucky” women were sometimes sold for longer periods of more than a year to live with one soldier. It was a temporary reprieve from the brothel, Mrs Lee says. Occasionally a soldier liked a girl so much that he paid off her debt to her pimp and married her when his deployment finished. Other than that, escaping the trade was almost impossible.

Seoul and Washington in the firing line
In an earlier ruling last year, a lower court had called the government practices “a serious violation of human rights” and awarded reparations to 57 of the plaintiffs. The High Court extended that to all the plaintiffs: Each victim was awarded between 3 million and 7 million won (US$2,730-$6,370). In its ruling, the High Court also noted that the promotion of prostitution and related human-rights violations is “not solely the responsibility of the South Korean government but the responsibility of the US government as well … the US must answer for these crimes.”

A US Embassy official declined to comment on the court’s judgment, saying that it is an “ongoing case.” It is: The state or the women could file an appeal to the Supreme Court. But considering the rulings, it seems unlikely that the state will appeal. Nor do the women want to drag the case out any further. It has been enough, they say.

Mrs Kim is elated with the ruling of the High Court. “It is beyond my imagination. When we started this lawsuit we couldn’t even imagine that the court would acknowledge state involvement,” she said.

Home-grown ‘comfort women’?
Yet the court decision has gone largely underreported. The ruling came just after President Moon Jae-in decided not to renegotiate a 2015 agreement with Japan on the World War II “comfort women” issue, a key national agenda item that frequently dominates local front pages. Under that 2015 agreement, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe “expressed anew his most sincere apologies and remorse to all the women who underwent immeasurable and painful experiences and suffered incurable physical and psychological wounds as comfort women.” Japan subsequently paid $8.8 million in compensation.

The issue of the comfort women – sex workers for Japanese troops during World War II, many of whom were coerced, tricked or even forced into service – has been a strain on diplomatic relations for decades. On Thursday, Moon once again demanded a “sincere apology” from Abe over the issue.

Given the insistent demands for compensation and apologies from Japan, South Korea must be held accountable for its own involvement in forced prostitution, in Mrs Kim’s opinion. “I think the government should apologize first to us before they should ask an apology from Japan,” she said.

But Mrs Lee, who is equally happy with the decision of the court, doesn’t entirely agree. “Historically, our country had no rights when Japan took over,” she said. “So in my opinion, the comfort women suffered a great deal more and were in a far more difficult situation.”

Researchers Na-Young Lee and Jae Kyung Lee from Seoul’s Chung-An University and Ehwa Womans University point out in a research paper that the history of camp-town prostitutes has been “forced out of Korean people’s consciousness and left behind official national history for a long time.” A symbol of national tragedy and insecurity, it is hardly an issue that Koreans are proud of. The women themselves are subject to prejudice. “People look down upon us as ‘fallen women’ and shameful creatures,” Mrs Kim said

“The comfort women didn’t become an issue until 40 years after the war, when Korea became a democracy,” said Michael Breen, author of The New Koreans. “As bad as it was, it was something that happened in wartime, when Korea was part of Japan and extremely poor.”

This may explain the time lag in the camp-town women taking so long to get recognition and justice. “I can imagine the same applies to the camp-town women,” Breen added. “Sure, there is a lot of irony, but if you would have said in the 1950s, ‘We should make an issue out of this,’ I am sure Koreans would have laughed at you.”

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Jura said:

I now watched the vid

I'm guessing it's supposed to show 'surgical strike capability':

(the missile is right up the crosshair)

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South Korea’s arms procurement agency recently

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to purchase 90 more Taurus long-range, air-launched, bunker-busting missiles, according to defense officials.
The contract for the missile system, made by German company Taurus Systems GmbH, was signed late February, said Kang Hwan-seok, spokesman for the DAPA.

The latest contract for the Taurus missile is the second of its kind since 2013, when the DAPA ordered 170 Taurus missiles to arm the fleet of F-15K fighter aircraft. Each missile costs about $1.8 million.

The Defence Acquisition Program Administration, or DAPA, however, had not issued a news release on the contract, an apparent move not to harm the warming atmosphere for dialogue with the nuclear-armed North.

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in the wake of meetings between North Korea and South Korea, as well as ongoing

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between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

The missile is a core asset of South Korea’s “Kill Chain” pre-emptive strike systems against North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs upon imminent threat.

The precision-guided missile has a range of 500 kilometers and is said to be able to destroy North Korea’s

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, including Kim’s hideouts, with pinpoint accuracy.

Last September, the South Korean Air Force staged a live-fire drill of the Taurus for the first time following North Korea’s sixth nuclear test Sept 3. During the drill, the air-to-surface cruise missile fired from a F-15K flew some 400 kilometers before hitting a designated target in the coastal waters off Gunsan, 200 kilometers southwest of Seoul.

The South Korean Air Force is considering equipping its indigenous FA-50 light-attack aircraft with the Taurus 350K-2 missile, a shorter version of the Taurus 350K, as part of the FA-50 modernization efforts. The service operates 60 FA-50 jets.

The 350K-2 is known to weigh 300 kilograms less than the original version and have a hitting range of 300 kilometers.

In December, the service commissioned the six-month feasibility study of the FA-50 modernization plan to a Seoul-based defense institute. The modernization plan includes armament upgrades, air-refueling capability and engine improvements, according to Air Force officials.

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South Korea may buy more Apache helicopters to lead the fight across DMZ
By:

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  4 hours ago

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, according to defense officials.

Ordered by Defense Minister Song Young-moo, the Joint Chiefs of Staff is expected to issue requirements for the

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next week, an official at the Ministry of National Defense said.

It’s unknown exactly how many more Apaches the government wants, but informed sources tell Defense News the number could reach as much as 40.

“The South Korean military has been shifting the concept of its

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to an offensive one,” an official said. “To that end, the military leadership decided to put a priority more on helicopter assets than tanks.”



Because of that shift, the military may cancel plans to acquire some 300

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, according to the official.

The South Korean military has long established a counteroffensive strategy in which South Korean armed forces conduct a full-scale counterattack only after U.S. augmentation troops arrive on the peninsula.

However, military leadership under the Moon Jae-in administration are seeking to shift operational focus to enable South Korean forces to more rapidly advance into North Korea should conflict arise.

Under the envisaged plan, the South Korean military aims to occupy North Korea’s capital Pyongyang two to three weeks after the outbreak of war.

“One of the Army’s key operational focuses is the improvement of an air assault capability,” according to Kim Dae-young, a research fellow at Korea Research Institute for National Strategy, a Seoul-based think tank. “Toward that end, the South Korean Army now seeks to model after the U.S. 101st Airborne Division consist of helicopters and infantry forces.”

The South Korean Army recently ran simulations of how fast and effective its airborne capability can advance into the North in case of war, according to sources.

“The simulations are known to have showed that the fleet of Apache helicopter is more effective than main battle tanks in penetrating the North’s air defense network and making breach for our forces,” Kim noted.

Based on the results, the Army is said to have reported the needs of procuring more Apache attack helicopters to the Ministry of National Defense.

Seoul bought 36 Boeing-built AH-64E Apache Guardian attack helicopters in 2013 under a Foreign Military Sales contract valued $1.6 billion.

The South Korean Army now operates two Apache battalions. In November, the battalions carried out an Apache Hellfire air-to-surface missile exercise on top of rocket and machine gun live-fire drills as part of final operational tests before full-scale field deployment. A Stinger missile exercise was subsequently held in December.

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U.S.

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leaders mapped out a rough plan to lawmakers Thursday describing how the service has spent the past 18 months preparing for war with North Korea.

Members of the House Appropriations Committee's defense subcommittee expressed a keen interest in possible contingency plans should the

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between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un fail to result in an agreement over that country's nuclear weapons program.

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Army Chief of Staff Mark Milley said the Army has conducted "a significant amount of training for contingency operations ... both on the peninsula itself with units that are stationed there but also with the units" in the U.S. Pacific Command area of operations.

"We've got, roughly speaking, 70,000 Army soldiers in the PaCom AOR and another 30,000 depending on exercise schedules," he said.

"And then in the continental United States, I guess it was a year or 18 months ago, we gave out guidance to our units that we would designate selected units to increase their readiness training specifically oriented toward high-end combined-arms warfare -- not specific necessarily to Korea but although it would be applicable to Korea.

"And we have been running those units pretty hard, getting them to a much higher level of readiness," Milley added.

Rep. Harold Rogers, R-Kentucky, wanted to know if the Army has done anything to prepare for a short-notice operation on the peninsula.

"In view of the unusual activities in the last few months, i.e., North Korea, what changes have you made, if any, in preparation for what may come?" he asked.

Recently sworn-in Secretary of the Army Mark Esper told lawmakers the Army will "hope for the best but prepare for the worst."

Esper recently visited American soldiers and leaders stationed in South Korea to observe the readiness posture firsthand.

"I can tell you everyone is working hard to ensure we are ready, that we are doing what is necessary to strengthen the hands of our State Department, our diplomats if you will, and to make sure we have all options available for our decision makers," he said.

Milley told Rogers that he could not get into specifics about North Korea.

"Congressman, I don't want to do a cop-out, but I would like to actually come by and brief you in a classified session on the details of what we are doing," he said.

Aside from training, the Army has taken steps to ensure that "all of the prepositioned stocks are full up" and increased the "personnel fill for the units that are both there and the units that are expected to first to respond," he said.

The Army has worked closely with PaCom leaders as well as commanders on the ground in South Korea to ensure units are ready a number of possible missions, Milley said.

"We have done a tremendous amount over the last 12 to 18 months or so in preparation for any possible contingency, so that the president has the widest latitude of options if needed," he said.

Defense subcommittee chairwoman Kay Granger, R-Texas, said she plans to set a date for a classified briefing on North Korea, adding that "everyone on the subcommittee will be invited because I know we all have questions."

Rogers also asked why the Army is "requesting a huge increase in 155mm artillery shells" in the proposed fiscal 2019 budget.

The Army requested funding to buy 148,000 155mm artillery shells, compared to fiscal 2018's request to buy 16,500, he said.

"I'm an old 155mm artillery guy in the Kentucky Guard, so I have got an affinity for 155mm shells. What's going on here?" Rogers asked.

Milley said he wants to make sure the service has sufficient ammunition stocks of 155mm “because the United States Army has been and still is a fires-based Army in order to create opportunities for maneuver and movement, so artillery is fundamental to our ability to do that."

"And in the event of a contingency, artillery and munition consumption rates would be really high, so I want to make sure that the ammunition stockpiles are significant enough to withstand any contingency," he said.

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The South Korean Army plans to deploy surface-to-surface missiles in a newly created counter-artillery brigade by October, with the aim of destroying North Korea’s

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near

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, should conflict erupt on the Korean Peninsula.
The missile, dubbed “artillery killer,” has a range of more than 120 kilometers and can hit targets with a 2-meter accuracy, according to ADD and Hanwha officials.

Four missiles can be launched almost simultaneously from a fixed launch pad. The missiles can penetrate bunkers and hardened, dug-in targets several meters underground.

The plan is part of South Korea‘s defense reform for developing an offensive operations scheme, a defense source said. The tactical missiles are developed locally.

“The Ministry of National Defense has approved a plan to create an artillery brigade under a ground forces operations command to be inaugurated in October. The plan is to be reported to President Moon Jae-in next month as part of the ‘Defense Reform 2.0’ policy,” the source said. “The brigade’s mission is fairly focused on destroying North Korea’s long-range guns more rapidly and effectively, should conflict arise”

The three-year development of the GPS-guided Korea Tactical Surface-to-Surface Missile was completed last year. Hanwha Corporation, a precision-guided missile maker, led the development in partnership with the state-funded Agency for Defense Development, or ADD.

“North Korea’s long-range artillery systems deployed along the border pose significant threats to the security of the capital area of South Korea,” said retired Lt. Gen. Shin Won-sik, a former operational director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “The counter-artillery brigade is expected to play a key role in neutralizing the North’s long-range artillery fire power, as the new surface-to-surface missile is capable of destroy the hideout of artillery forces.”

The artillery brigade is also to operate the Chunmoo Multiple Launch Rocket System, which can fire three types of ammunition: 130mm nonguided rockets; 227mm nonguided rockets; and 239mm guided rockets. The hitting range of the rockets are 36 kilometers, 80 kilometers and 160 kilometers, respectively.

According to the 2016 Defense White Paper, North Korea has some 8,600 towed and self-propelled artillery, as well as 5,500 multiple-launch rockets. Seventy percent of them were deployed near the border.

North Korea has forward-deployed 340 long-range guns that can fire 15,000 rounds per hour at Seoul and the surrounding metropolitan area.

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The first F-35 destined to the ROKAF (Republic Of Korea Air Force) has successfully completed its first flight.
On Mar. 19, 2018, the first F-35A destined to the ROKAF performed its maiden flight at Lockheed Martin Ft. Worth facility, Texas. Piloted by LM F-35 Chief Test Pilot and Test Flight Director Alan Norman, the aircraft flew as “Lightning 41”, taking off at 14.48LT and landing at 16.40LT. The photo in this post was taken by

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during South Korea’s F-35’s first sortie (designated C01).

Known as AW-1, the aircraft is the first South Korean 5th generation combat aircraft out of 40 F-35A Conventional Take Off and Landing (CTOL) variant jets that the ROKAF with all aircraft slated for delivery by 2021.

The Republic of Korea concluded its F-X III fighter acquisition program with the signing of a Letter of Offer and Acceptance (LOA) between the U.S. and Korean governments on Sept. 30, 2014. In December 2017, South Korea’s Defence Acquisition Program Administration established a process for procuring the 20 additional aircraft, the

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, citing multiple government sources.

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South Korea’s Navy is reviewing a plan to build a 5,000-ton nuclear-powered submarine in an effort to boost its

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’s sub-based nuclear attack capability.

Last October, the service commissioned from the Korea Defense Network five months worth of research on the feasibility of developing an indigenous nuclear-powered attack submarine. The Seoul-based think tank recently reported the results to the Navy, suggesting the service build a nuclear attack submarine modeled after the French 5,300-ton Barracuda-class sub, multiple Navy sources told Defense News.

“We’re reviewing the KDN report on indigenous submarine building in a careful manner,” a Navy spokesman said. “After thorough review, we’ll report it to the defense minister and the presidential office subsequently for final decision.”

The nuclear submarine project is, however, not to be discussed openly, the spokesman noted, in an apparent move not to harm the mood of inter-Korean dialogue.

“The nuclear-powered submarine-building plan is highly sensitive for itself and especially at a time when the discussions of inter-Korean summit and U.S.-North Korea summit talks are being taken place,” he said. He declined to comment on whether the submarine program could be halted or delayed due to the mood of the dialogue.

According to another informed Navy source, the KDN report referred to the Barracuda-class submarine as a model because the French sub, designed by DCNS, is powered by low-enriched uranium. “The use of uranium with over 20 percent enrichment for a nuclear-powered submarine could breach a nuclear agreement with the U.S.,” the source said.

“In that regard, the French submarine model is realistic and safe to secure nuclear fuel,” the source added.

Under a revised U.S.-South Korean nuclear deal signed in 2015, Seoul is not allowed to enrich uranium and reprocess spent fuel for military purposes. The deal allows enriching uranium for civil nuclear energy and low-enriched uranium.

South Korea launched a clandestine nuclear sub-building project in 2003. The project, code-named “362 initiative,” was canceled a year later when the plan became public and was brought to the attention of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

“During the 2003 project, we finished works of basic design for indigenous nuclear-powered submarine, as well as of a miniaturized nuclear reactor,” said Moo Keun-sik, a retired Navy captain who had led the “326 initiative.” “South Korea has enough ability to design and develop its own nuclear submarine.”

Moon said the South Korean effort would need foreign technical assistance on weapons integration. “Designing and building a nuclear-powered submarine is no problem for South Korean premier shipbuilders, but for integration of weapons and other equipment into the submarine platform, we may need some help from France or others,” he said.

Some experts are skeptical about the costs and development timeline of a locally built submarine.

“There are consensus that indigenous nuclear submarine building is to take 10 years or more, as longer as 17 years,” said Kim Dae-young, a research fellow with Korea Research Institute for National Strategy. “Per-unit cost is also expected to overrun the government’s estimated cost of some $1.1 billion.”

Kim added that if the country wants a capability sooner rather than later, it should consider buying nuclear attack submarines or produce them under a foreign license.

South Korea has built nine 1,200-ton KSS-I diesel-electric submarines and nine 1,800-ton KSS-II subs, both with technical assistance from German shipbuilding company Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft. The Asian nation is on track to build its own 3,000-ton attack submarine known as KSS-III.

“Underwater operations with the fleet of diesel-electric submarines are restricted to detecting and countering the North’s [submarine-launched ballistic missile] threat,” Moon said. “On the other hand, nuclear-powered submarines will help conduct patrols for much longer periods to thwart North Korean SLBM attacks.”

North Korea’s submarine force is burgeoning, as it has developed new conventionally powered subs capable of firing ballistic missiles, according to experts.

The North is entering the final stage of development for a 3,000-ton submarine that could carry three SLBMs. The SLBM, called Pukkuksong-1, was reportedly successfully test-fired Aug. 26, 2016, and flew about 500 kilometers.

In August 2017, the communist state’s news agency released the Pukkuksong-3 SLBM, which appeared to be the latest in its series.

According to Seoul’s 2016 Defense White Paper, North Korea operates a fleet of some 70 submarines, including six Sinpo-class attack submarines.

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