hankyoreh

US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel emphasized the need for South Korean missile defense before the transfer of wartime operational control (OPCON).

Hagel held a press conference aboard the plane while flying to Korea to participate in the 45th yearly US-ROK security deliberations. When asked by a reporter what capacity the South Korean military would need to make an OPCON transfer possible, Hegel said that missile defense would be “a huge part of this.”

This is the first time that a high-ranking American official has clearly stated the country’s plans to link negotiations about Korean participation in missile defense with the issue of the OPCON transfer.

In contrast, Hagel took a step back on the question of delaying the OPCON transfer, which Park’s government has been calling for. “I don’t believe we’ll be in a position to make any final decisions,” Hagel said.

In Korea, there are loud calls for delaying the OPCON handover, while public opinion in the US tends to oppose putting the transfer off yet again. It can be inferred that Hegel’s remarks are calculated to take advantage of this disagreement in a bid to achieve American strategic interests to the greatest possible extent.

It is very likely that this trend will have repercussions not only on participation in American missile defense but also on the next-generation fighter project that will have to restart from scratch and the 9th Special Measures Agreement (SMA) for sharing the cost of supporting US forces in Korea.

Indeed, some analysts suggest that that US hopes for Korea to field a stealth fighter capable of countering China and Russia played a part in the ultimate rejection of the Boeing F-15SE, the final candidate in government efforts to acquire a next-generation fighter.

If negotiations about the OPCON transfer go as the US hopes they do, they could lead to the worst possible scenario for Korean national security. In this case, Korea would provoke China and Russia without even gaining the sovereignty that OPCON would represent. This would mean that Korea would find itself on the front lines in a major power conflict pitting the US and Japan against China and Russia.

Needless to say, this would make it impossible for Park to carry out her policy goals of maintaining an alliance with the US while working with China and bringing about change in North Korea.

Despite this, the Korean government remains unconcerned and continues to blithely insist that US missile defense is different from Korean Air and Missile Defense (KAMD).

During her address on Armed Forces Day on Oct. 1, Park said, “We will make haste to acquire a kill chain and Korean-style missile defense to counter nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction through.”

Of course, anyone with the most basic understanding of missiles knows that it is impossible to develop technology that could determining which missile will strike where during the 6 to 7 minutes it takes for a North Korean missile to penetrate South Korean air space.

Now that the US has made its intentions clear, the Korean government needs to stop harping on the semantic distinction between US missile defense and Korean missile defense and state honestly whether it will take part in the US missile defense or not.

This is not a question that we can afford to ignore. Here is the answer: the government must firmly state its opposition to participating in US plans for missile defense, as these would require massive investment of funds and exacerbate the standoff between the US and China.

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]