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The South Korean bombshell that
wasn't
By David Isenberg
Much has been made of South Korea's recent
Defense White Paper saying the United States would
dispatch 690,000 troops and 2,000 warplanes if war
broke out on the Korean Peninsula. It also dropped
the old phrase "main enemy", meaning North Korea,
which once threatened to turn the South into a
"sea of fire" in a war. But experts say there's
really nothing alarming in the paper, which
underscores what is already known about the US
commitment to defend the South.
This comes
at a time when the North Korean nuclear crisis is
still brewing, the US is moving some forces out of
Seoul and out of South Korea, and Seoul itself
plans to downsize its military.
The South
Korean Defense Ministry's White Paper, issued last
Friday, is its first since 2000. It has not yet
been translated into English and is not yet
available online, but excerpts have been reported
by news media. According to a Captain Kim, not
further identified, at the South Korean Embassy in
Washington, an English-language translation may
not be available for a couple of months.
North Korea was predictably outraged by
the paper, saying South Korea was opposed to
reconciliation and revealed its intention to
pursue "pursue inter-Korean confrontation and
war".
South Korea currently is engaged in
a campaign to reconcile with its communist
brethren to the north and is encouraging
investment there and building an industrial park
on the border for South Korean manufacturing firms
that will use North Korean labor. Officially
dropping the phrase "main enemy" to describe the
North is considered part of Seoul's efforts to
normalize relations.
The South Korean
Defense Ministry began labeling North Korea its
"main enemy" in its White Paper of 1995, a year
after the North Korean nuclear crisis first
flared. At that time, South Koreans were angered
by threatening remarks at a border meeting by a
North Korean official who said that if a war broke
out on the peninsula, Seoul would be turned into
"a sea of fire". Until 1994, North Korea had only
been referred to as an "enemy" in earlier South
Korean Defense White Papers.
But now, in
the new paper, the preferred language is "direct
military threat". According to a British
Broadcasting Corp (BBC) report, the paper said,
"Safeguarding the nation from outside military
threats and invasion means protecting the nation
from not only direct military threats - North
Korea's conventional weapons, weapons of mass
destruction and their forward deployment of troops
- but also all outside military threats that pose
a threat to our safety."
According to Jim
Goodby, non-resident senior fellow at the
Brookings Institution in Washington, DC, "There is
not any fundamental change. It is more consistent
with Kim Dae- jung's Sunshine Policy."
Goodby told Asia Times Online that the
White Paper is, in fact, fairly unremarkable. "It
underscores US military commitment to South Korea,
and I think that's welcome. I see it as
continuity. The fundamental point is that they
have a military threat from North Korea. I don't
see anything in the White Paper to be concerned
about."
Diplomatic initiatives to improve
ties with the North can only go so far, however.
The South Korean Defense Ministry said it would
continue to call the North an "enemy" in its
internal documents.
The North Korean
government has assailed the new White Paper. A
report on Saturday by the Korean Central News
Agency in Pyongyang said, apparently contradicting
some of what has otherwise been reported about the
document, "The South Korean military authorities'
announcement of the decision to use the conception
of 'the principal enemy' in the new White Paper
for National Defense, and imbue the military with
the idea of confrontation with fellow countrymen
in the North, is little short of the revelation of
their intention to go against national
reconciliation and unity and pursue inter-Korean
confrontation and war."
The Pentagon had
no comment on the White Paper. Spokesman
Lieutenant-Commander Greg Hicks said, "We don't
comment on numbers. But any deployment to the
region would be contingent on the nature of the
crisis."
According to independent experts,
the claim that nearly 700,000 US troops would
deploy to South Korea is not news. Balbina Hwang,
policy analyst for Northeast Asia in the Asian
Studies Center of the conservative Heritage
Foundation in Washington, DC, said, "The previous
White Paper issued in 2000 states, 'US
augmentation forces, including army, navy, air
force and marines, are [composed] of approximately
690,000 troops.' So this is nothing new."
While it may not be new, a large
deployment is a complex process. According to the
website of GlobalSecurity.org in Alexandria,
Virginia:
To execute the US "win-win strategy"
and support the United Nations Command (UNC) and
ROK-US Combined Forces Command (CFC) operation
plans, the US augmentation forces deployment
plan on the Korean Peninsula is set at all
times. This plan mainly includes in-Korea
forces, pre-planned, time-phased deployment
forces, augmentation forces, and foreign support
forces. The plan centers on the forces under the
US Pacific Command, and part of the forces from
the US and other theaters are included as well.
The size of the US augmentation forces, which
include ground, naval, air and marine forces,
will amount to at least 640,000 troops, and
these forces possess fighters, support aircraft,
and aircraft-carrier battle groups and
amphibious flotillas equipped with the latest
fighters.
If a crisis does occur on the
Korean Peninsula, the US augmentation forces
units will be deployed after the approval of the
National Supreme Command and under the command
of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff. After
deployment, the augmentation forces will go
through the process of unit integration, and
then be committed to specific
operations. Hwang of the Heritage
Foundation noted, however, "In the past the
numbers have been produced jointly by the ROK
[Republic of Korea]-US Combined Forces Command in
concert with the South Korean government. I
suspect it wasn't a joint number but one put out
by the South Korean Defense Ministry."
Some see a disconnect between the large
number of US forces called for and South Korea's
attempt to downgrade the North Korean threat
publicly. Doug Bandow, a senior fellow at the
libertarian Cato Institute in Washington, noted
that South Korea is planning to cut its military
forces by about 40,000 troops. "It bothers me that
they cut their forces at the same time that they
envision a massive infusion of US troops," he
said.
Balbina Hwang said, "South Korea
doesn't want to label North Korea the primary
enemy. Yet at the same time if it isn't, why does
one need to have such a large number of troops? It
strikes me as highly inconsistent."
David Isenberg, a senior analyst
with the Washington-based British American
Security Information Council (BASIC), has a wide
background in arms control and national security
issues. The views expressed are his own.
(Copyright 2005 Asia Times Online Ltd. All
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on sales, syndication and republishing.) |
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