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South Korea, alarmed at what appears to be the North Korean use of a Yu-3 type torpedo to sink one of their warships, has undertaken to reform their armed forces to better deal with tactics like this. North Korea officially denies having anything to do with the loss of the 1200 ton corvette Cheonan, but most North Koreans accept the fact that North Korea did the deed, and northerners are proud of that. Examination of the salvaged wreckage made it clear that it was an external explosion, using military grade explosives, that sank the ship and killed 46 sailors on...

Korea and the United States are in sync over ways to deal with the sinking of a South Korean warship, which left 46 sailors dead on the sea border with North Korea in March, a senior South Korean official said Friday. Lee Yong-joon, deputy foreign minister, did not elaborate, just saying, "Details will be released after the outcome of the probe (of the sinking) is announced." North Korea is suspected to be behind the sinking of the 1,200-ton Cheonan, although an international team of South Korean, U.S. and Australian specialists has not yet determined the cause. The investigation is being...

North Korea has deployed about 50,000 commandos along the inter-Korean border in an apparent show of force with the threat of rapid infiltration "suicide missions" against South Korea, a military source in Seoul said. The North "has completed the frontline deployment of seven light infantry divisions over the past two or three years," the source said, citing a joint study by South Korean and U.S. militaries. Each division consists of about 7,000 troops. A South Korean soldier keeps watch northwards on the south side of the truce village of Panmunjom in the demilitarised zone separating the two Koreas, north of...

China's decision to roll out a glitzy welcome mat for the North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has stunned and shocked South Korea's leaders, ignoring South Korea's anger over the sinking, undoubtedly by the north, of a South Korean navy patrol ship on March 26 with the loss of 46 lives. South Korean President Lee Myung-bak was not given any hint from his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao at a Shanghai summit meeting, hardly a week ago on May 1, that Kim was on his way to Beijing. It was on May 2 that the 68-year-old North Korean leader's clandestine visit initially...

Japan and the United States reaffirmed Thursday that, together with South Korea, they will respond in a united manner to North Korea based on the findings of the probe being conducted into the unexplained sinking of a South Korean warship, Japanese officials said. The decision was made in a meeting between Akitaka Saiki, director general of the Foreign Ministry's Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, and U.S. special envoy to North Korea Stephen Bosworth. They met at a time when suspicion is growing that the March 26 sinking in the Yellow Sea, which killed 46 crew members, might have been the...

South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak has ordered the military to become stronger to counter North Korea, saying the sinking of the South's warship was likely caused by its "belligerent" communist neighbor. In a show of his determination to overhaul the country's "loosened" defense posture, Lee convened a meeting of top military commanders on May 4. It was the first time in the nation's history that a president had done so. At the meeting, Lee vowed to take "definite, stern" action against those responsible for the sinking. The 1,200-ton Cheonan, a Navy corvette, exploded and sunk on March 26 during a...

Charles Reeder remembers the backlash after the ‘Highway 56 Incident’ in 2002, when a couple of US soldiers driving an armoured vehicle accidentally crushed two South Korean schoolgirls, yet were found not-guilty of negligent homicide by a US military court. ‘It rocked the whole USFK,’ says Reeder, 42, a recent retiree from the United States Forces Korea, who was stationed in downtown Seoul at the time. ‘It was painful…We were out there on the gates, and it was like a siege mentality.’ South Korean activists broke into a US facility in the northern part of the capital, he recalls, and...

More than half a century since the end of the Korean War and the beginning of a long period of relative military isolation, South Korea is gradually, and quietly, playing a larger role in world security. Despite strong US support, South Korea’s rise as a military power is complicated by domestic politics, and by a belligerent North Korea. To avoid provoking foreign and domestic opposition, Seoul has cleverly disguised its newest overseas military operation as a strictly peaceful affair. Despite a technologically advanced military and a gross domestic product just shy of $1 trillion, making it the world’s 15th wealthiest...

South Korea on Saturday raised the front half of a warship that exploded and sank a month ago near a contested sea border with North Korea, finding clues that support growing suspicions Pyongyang attacked the vessel. The 1,200-tonne corvette Cheonan sank in what military officials said was a torpedo attack. Forty-six South Korean sailors were killed in what could be one of the deadliest strikes by Pyongyang on its rival since the end of the Korean War. The North denies involvement. South Korea's president on Friday gave the clearest signal yet Seoul had no plan to launch a revenge attack,...

Military officials and experts believe that if a North Korean torpedo was involved in the sinking of the South Korean Navy corvette Cheonan, it was probably launched from a 325-ton Shark-class submarine. The sub ranks between a full-blown submarine and a mini-sub in terms of size. South Korean military intelligence are reportedly focusing on the fact that one or two Shark-class submarines from a submarine base in Cape Bipagot, South Hwanghae Province are unaccounted for during the time of the Cheonan's sinking. The Bipagot submarine base is around 80 km from Baeknyeong Island. Shark-class submarines can travel at speeds of...

The military will draw up a new operational plan for the Yellow Sea after its existing one was leaked in the wake of the sinking of a naval vessel late last month. A military official said yesterday that the Navy cannot conduct missions with the existing plan because it and other military secrets have been leaked to North Korea since the sinking. “We have re-designated the operational zone of naval patrol ships to cope with the North’s coastal artillery since last year’s (inter-Korean) naval clash,” the official said. “In particular, we find it inevitable to review the operation of monitoring...

Top U.S. military commanders said Friday that they are ready to transfer the wartime command control of South Korean troops to Seoul as scheduled in 2012, but left open the possibility of a delay if governments agree. "To the extent that the government would question that, I think then it becomes a government to government decision between the United States and the Republic of Korea," Adm. Robert Willard, commander of the U.S. Pacific Command, told a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. "This is a government of Korea decision, or certainly OPCON transition will be considered by the government of Korea...

North Korea has about 1,000 short- and medium-range missiles that are capable of hitting U.S. military facilities in Japan and Guam as well as South Korea, Defense Minister Kim Tae-young said Wednesday. Kim told a forum in Seoul that the North is also believed to have 30 to 40 kilograms of highly enriched uranium. Kim's remarks indicated an increase in Pyongyang's missile stockpile given South Korean military authorities had made an assessment in 2008 that the communist state would have about 800 short, medium and intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs). Kim said North Korea is struggling to maintain the regime amid...

US experts in weapons of mass destruction are taking part in a military exercise simulating an attack by North Korea on South Korea, the US commander in the South said Thursday. The communist North has bitterly denounced the US-South Korean exercise as a preparation for a nuclear attack, and vowed to respond to any aggression with its atomic weapons. The visiting experts are from a team called Task Force Elimination, of the Maryland-based 20th Support Command. US commander General Walter Sharp said they brought unique WMD expertise to the Key Resolve/Foal Eagle drill, in which 18,000 American troops and 20,000...

American and South Korean military members kicked off Exercise Key Resolve/FOAL Eagle 10 March 8 and will train for 10 days here. The annual joint/combined command post and field training exercise is defense-oriented and designed to ensure the South Korean and U.S. alliance is prepared to defend against outside aggression. "Key Resolve is our combined Joint Chief of Staff exercise where we train and prepare for conflict," said Col. Danny Wolf, the 7th AF director of operations and plans. "It's a command and control exercise where we have Combined Forces Command working in concert with the ROK, JCS and all...

A leading U.S. defense official yesterday said Washington will invest in establishing a “regional missile defense” against North Korean nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles. Deputy Assistant Defense Secretary Michael Schiffer made the statement in his op-ed piece “Quadrennial Defense Report and the Korean Peninsula” sent to The Dong-A Ilbo. He said the threat of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles aimed at South Korea and the U.S. exists and is growing. Schiffer is seen indirectly inviting Seoul, which has declined to join the U.S. missile defense system, to participate in a new “regional” system. On the regional missile system, he said...

The United States and South Korea began their annual joint military exercise on Monday, dismissing a verbal warning by North Korea, which views the drill as a preparation for war. The Key Resolve and Foal Eagle exercise is to continue across South Korea through March 18, drawing about 18,000 U.S. troops from bases here and abroad and mobilizing more than 20,000 South Korean troops. The U.S. says the drill is a routine exercise to improve its ability to defend South Korea, but North Korea insists it is a precursor to invasion. On Sunday, North Korea said in a statement it...

The South Korean military is developing into a smaller, stronger version of itself to meet the war environment of the 21st century. Established in 1948 with only 50,000 troops in the Army and Navy, following the nation's liberation from Japan's colonial rule (1910-45), the Korean military was a rudimentary force largely dependent on U.S. and other foreign forces for national security. The Air Force and Marine Corps were created a year later. Major weapons systems at the time consisted of Type 99 rifles, 105mm field guns and other aging weapons. The 1950-53 Korean War damaged the undeveloped Asian armed forces...

The United States and South Korea will go ahead next month with a major annual military exercise set to anger North Korea but fewer US troops than last year will take part, officials said Thursday. North Korea denounces the exercise and other annual military drills in the South as a rehearsal for invasion, a claim denied by Seoul and Washington. The Key Resolve and Foal Eagle exercise, slated for March 8-18, will draw 18,000 US troops including 10,000 stationed in South Korea and 8,000 from abroad, said Combined Forces Command spokesman Kim Yong-Kyu. Some 26,000 US troops took part in...

Korea and the United States plan to conclude bilateral talks this year on the method and procedures for possible overseas redeployment of American troops stationed here, sources in Korea said yesterday. An informed source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the sides were seeking to conclude negotiations before the annual defense ministerial talks, known as the Security Consultative Meeting, slated for October. “Talks are being held between the two sides to conclude the details and procedures of strategic flexibility of the U.S. Forces Korea,” the source said. Seoul had opposed the flexibility of U.S. troops as it earlier believed the...