 |
|
Government employees take part in the Ulchi Exercise on Aug. 23, 2017. (Kang Chang-gwang, staff photographer)
|
Next year’s South Korea-US joint military exercises replaced by South Korean Ulchi Taeguk drill
The South Korean government has decided not to proceed this year with the Ulchi Exercise, a drill to prepare for a war or other states of national emergency. For next year, the government made plans for South Korea to hold the “Ulchi Taeguk” exercise on its own rather than joint exercises with the US as a gesture of consideration for inter-Korean relations. “We have made the decision to provisionally defer the Ulchi Exercise government drill planned for this year,” the Ministry of the Interior and Safety (MOIS) and Ministry of National Defense (MND) announced in a joint briefing at Seoul Central Government Complex on the morning of July 10. The decision was “based on the security situation that has recently taken shape and the deferment of South Korea-US joint exercises,” they explained. On June 19, the South Korean and US militaries made the decision to defer their Freedom Guardian joint exercise, which had originally been scheduled for August. In place of the joint Ulchi-Freedom Guardian joint exercise held in the past with the US, the Ulchi Taeguk exercise is to be staged by South Korea on its own as of next year, the government announced. “The Ulchi Taeguk exercise taken place as of next year is to be developed into a joint civilian/government/military training model through application of a comprehensive security concept encompassing armed attacks from outside, terrorism, large-scale disasters, and the like,” explained Minister of the Interior and Safety Kim Boo-kyum. The MND also postponed the date of Taeguk, a Joint Chiefs of Staff headquarters command post exercise conducted independently by the South Korean military. “Since the South Korea-US joint Freedom Guardian exercise has been deferred, we have decided to hold the Taeguk exercise originally planned for June of next year during the second half of the year,” said Minister of National Defense Song Young-moo. “This year’s Taeguk exercise is to be held in conjunction with the Hoguk field maneuvers planned for late October,” he explained. If the Ulchi exercise is carried out, individual government ministries are to examine emergency preparation plans and go through the procedures of wartime execution of duties. First held after a 1968 attack on the Blue House by armed North Korean agents, the drills were named the “Ulchi Exercise” the following year and have been staged on an annual basis since then. By Kim Mi-hyang, staff reporter Please direct comments or questions to [english@hani.co.kr]
