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The ROK-US Combed Forces Command building at the Yongsan Garrison. (by Kim Kyu-won

A plan is being deliberated that would relocate the ROK-US Combined Forces Command from its current location in the middle of the Yongsan Garrison in Seoul to the building of the ROK Joint Chiefs of Staff, next to the Ministry of National Defense. If this plan is implemented, Combined Forces Command would be based outside the park that will be built after the US military relinquishes control of the Yongsan base. The current site of the Combined Forces Command (240,000㎡) takes up 10% of the total area (2.43 million ㎡) of the planned park (called the Yongsan National Park), and its location bisects the northern and southern halves of the park.

“South Korea and the US had tentatively agreed to keep the Combined Forces Command headquarters inside the Yongsan base until the OPCON handover, but a plan is currently being discussed to transfer the headquarters to an available facility outside the Yongsan base as soon as possible. This is viewed as a way to support the project of building the Yongsan National Park and to prepare for the transition to the future of the Combined Forces Command following the OPCON handover,” explained an official with the Defense Ministry on Nov. 28. (OPCON refers to the wartime operational control of the South Korean military, which currently resides with the USFK commander.)

If the Combined Forces Command remains in its current location to the east of the War Memorial, the Yongsan Park will be split into northern and southern halves, which has fueled continuing criticism that it would be “half a park.”

“Considering that the Joint Chiefs of Staff building has extra space designed for the OPCON handover, a plan to move Combined Forces Command there is being discussed with USKF, and they are responding positively,” said another official from the Defense Ministry. Since the relocation of American military units from the Yongsan Garrison to Pyeongtaek is currently underway and is supposed to be wrapped up by next year, the relocation of Combined Forces Command to the Joint Chiefs building is expected to take place by next year, too.

Moving Combined Forces Command into the Joint Chiefs building is expected to go a long way to resolve the north-south division of the Yongsan Park that will be occupying the site of the US military base. The northern and southern halves of the Yongsan base are currently split by a road that runs between Noksapyeong Station and Samgakji Station, both on Line Six of the Seoul subway system. But since a large number of military facilities remain on and around the future site of the Yongsan Park – including the Defense Ministry, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Dragon Hill Lodge and a helicopter pad – some have argued that all these facilities must be moved for the park to come into its own.

After regaining control of the site of the Yongsan base, the South Korean government was planning to turn the area into one of the country’s finest parks. Toward this end, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport created a master plan for Yongsan Park in 2011. But after the administration of South Korean President Park Geun-hye decided to leave Combined Forces Command on the Yongsan base in 2014, this master plan underwent a major revision, and the schedule was disrupted as well. The push to relocate Combined Forces Command is thought to be the first step toward restoring the original plan for the Yongsan Park.

If Combined Forces Command moves to the Joint Chiefs building, the entire northern half of the Yongsan base (currently known as the Main Post) will become a public park except for 79,000㎡ reserved for the construction of the new US embassy. The War Memorial (116,000㎡) would remain on the west side, but that can be integrated into Yongsan Park. And incorporating the site of Combined Forces Command into the park would make it very easy to move from the park’s southern half (currently known as the South Post) to its northern half. That would open up the entire eastern section of the northern half of the park, which is currently blocked by Combined Forces Command.

Even so, the southern half of the park is still in serious trouble. The Defense Ministry and the Joint Chiefs of Staff (280,000㎡) remain near Samgakji Station, on the west side of Yongsan Park, and next to them are the Dragon Hill Lodge (84,000㎡) and defensive and entrance facilities (74,000㎡) managed by USFK. There is also a helicopter pad (56,000㎡) to the south of the Defense Ministry, and the accommodations of the US embassy (174,000㎡) will remain to the east of the Yongsan Family Park until 2025. Altogether, that amounts to 668,000㎡. As a consequence, it appears that the only parts of the southern half of the Yongsan Park that will actually be used as a park are the area south of the Defense Ministry and the Dragon Hill Lodge and the area north of the National Museum of Korea.

Combined Forces Command ended up remaining on the Yongsan base through an unfortunate series of events. Originally, Combined Forces Command was supposed to be dismantled at the time of the OPCON handover in 2012, according to a plan developed by the Roh Moo-hyun administration. But problems occurred in 2010 when the Lee Myung-bak administration pushed back the OPCON handover until 2015 and then again in Oct. 2014 when the Park Geun-hye administration delayed the handover indefinitely. The fact that the US military still held OPCON made Combined Forces Command necessary. Because of this, the two countries decided during their Security Consultative Meeting in 2014 to leave the current Combined Forces Command at the Yongsan base.

Under the Moon Jae-in administration, the situation has changed. The Moon administration has decided to once again push for the OPCON transfer and has also instructed the Defense Ministry to move Combined Forces Command, which was getting in the way of building the Yongsan Park.

“Just clearing the site of Combined Forces Command would be very significant. In the medium-to-long term, however, the only way to make the Yongsan Park whole is to move the Defense Ministry and the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the Gyeryongdae military complex in South Chungcheong Province, where the army, navy and air force have their headquarters,” said Cho Myung-rae, director of the Korea Environment Institute and former head of an advisory committee for the Yongsan Park.

“The Defense Ministry doesn’t want to leave Yongsan, and the Culture Ministry and others are trying to get into Yongsan Park. We must not allow any new buildings to go up in Yongsan Park. The entire Yongsan base should be emptied and turned into a public park,” said Hwang Pyeong-woo, director of the Korea Cultural Heritage Policy Research Institute.

By Kim Kyu-won, staff reporter and Park Byong-su, senior staff writer

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