hankyoreh

staff reporter)

The South Korean government’s announcement that the process of transferring control of the US military garrison in Yongsan, Seoul, will begin within the year is likely to accelerate the timetable for relocating the ROK-US Combined Forces Command (CFC) to Camp Humphreys, in Pyeongtaek. At the moment, facilities providing services to US service members are rapidly closing at the Yongsan Garrison; by the year’s end, the only ones remaining will be CFC and the Dragon Hill Lodge, a hotel for US troops. US Forces Korea (USFK) Command moved to Pyeongtaek in June 2018, and the US 8th Army Command transferred there nearly a year earlier, in July 2017.

The CFC relocation is widely thought to be linked to the transfer of wartime operational control, or OPCON, of South Korean military forces, which is likely to take place during the presidency of Moon Jae-in.

“Once the OPCON transfer takes place, CFC will switch to a new leadership structure under which a South Korean four-star general would take charge in the event of a war on the Korean Peninsula. Before that happens, CFC and USFK need to bolster their operational efficiency,” a source in the South Korean military said on Sept. 1.

South Korea and the US assessed the initial operational capability (IOC) of the South Korean military in recent joint command post exercises; full operational capability (FOC) will reportedly be assessed in 2020 and full mission capability (FMC) in 2021.

A crucial step in the CFC relocation is the construction of an operations center. This center, which creates a link to Indo-Pacific Command in Hawaii and US Forces Japan (USFJ) Command in Yokota, Japan, is necessary for CFC to function properly. “The operations center serves as CFC’s brain. Building the command center could take longer and cost more than expected, so at the moment we can’t nail down the precise timing of the relocation,” said an official at South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense.

The initial plan had been for CFC to be moved onto the grounds of South Korea’s Defense Ministry, which is also at Yongsan, but the two sides ultimately decided to move CFC to Pyeongtaek during a meeting of the South Korean defense minister and the US secretary of state this past June. At the time, the US reportedly pointed out that leaving CFC at Yongsan would create problems for housing the families of American military personnel and would also decrease connectivity with Camp Humphreys.

The CFC offices will reportedly be set up in an existing building, eliminating the need for constructing a new building at Camp Humphreys. The details of the CFC relocation are likely to be hashed out during the 51st Security Consultative Meeting, which will be held in Seoul in late October or early November.

Since USFK Command and the US 8th Army Command moved to Pyeongtaek, services for American military personnel at the Yongsan Garrison have been shutting down, one after the other. The movie theater shut its doors back in July, followed by the Yongsan office that manages career transition programs for soldiers in active duty and in the reserves at the end of August. The military hospital will stop seeing patients and the laundry service will shut down on Oct. 1. American schools for children of military personnel at the Yongsan Garrison — namely, the Seoul American Elementary School and Seoul American Middle High School — held their final classes during its 2018-2019 semester.

The Dragon Hill Lodge at the South Post of the Yongsan Garrison. (by Kim Kyu-won

Even after the process of handing over the Yongsan Garrison to South Korea begins, it’s expected to take a considerable amount of time. The South Korean government had initially planned to initiate a clean-up at the Yongsan Garrison in 2019, start building a park there in 2022, and finish construction by 2027, but deliberations are stalled because of a disagreement about which side should foot the bill for cleaning up environmental contamination.

“Even if the Yongsan Garrison transfer process is initiated this year, there are still a lot of steps in that process, including drafting a plan for the transfer, carrying out an environmental survey, holding environmental deliberations, and cleaning up pollutants. We’ve still got a lot of hurdles to clear before the garrison returns to South Korean control,” said an official at the Defense Ministry.

By Yoo Kang-moon, senior staff writer

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