Military Innovation in Small States by Michael Raska

Author:Michael Raska [Raska, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Military, General, Strategy, Political Science, Security (National & International), International Relations
ISBN: 9781317661306
Google: z7nhCgAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2015-11-06T16:11:59+00:00

Three pillars of South Korea’s defense strategy

The above conditioning factors have subsequently defined South Korea’s defense strategy and its three key pillars: (1) defensive deterrence, (2) U.S.–ROK alliance, and (3) forward active defense. While their core characteristics have not been codified or explicitly presented in any official “Korean” strategic doctrines, its contours can be extrapolated from analyses of ROK defense white papers and a range of studies concomitant with South Korea’s national security issues and defense planning dynamics during and post-Cold War (Clough 1976; Johnson and Yager 1979; Curtis and Han 1983; Lee, McLaurin, and Moon 1988; Olsen 1988; Simon 1993; Blackwill and Dibb 2000). The first pillar underscoring South Korea’s traditional defense strategy – defensive deterrence – emphasizes two objectives: deterring military threats in peacetime and defending South Korea in wartime (Han 1999). In other words, the strategy implies preventing a major war by effectively deterring North Korea-initiated military provocations and, if deterrence fails, winning the war. According to the 1994 ROK defense white paper, “the enemy’s will to provoke war can be undermined only when our own stance shows clearly that we are capable of and will employ an effective deterrence in times of contingency” (ROK Ministry of National Defense [MND] 1995, 84). Defensive deterrence thus stipulates the need for a “visible combat capability that would deter any offensive military moves by North Korea” (Moon 2000, 96). In the context of South Korea’s traditional security paradigm, visible combat capability essentially means the primacy of conventional ground forces – the ROKA, which has accounted for the majority of South Korea’s total military manpower and dominated strategic and operational planning, resource allocation, and force structure. The ROKA has trained to counter a potential North Korean attack immediately by blocking KPA’s first echelon forces, defending the capital and rear areas, and executing coordinated air-ground attacks from the initial stages of war – prior to the arrival of U.S. reinforcements (Han 1999).

In order to amplify a credible defensive deterrent posture, the second element in South Korea’s traditional military strategy has focused on effective external management, coalition-style warfare, and bilateral alliance with the United States. According to Chung-in Moon, “if South Korea was to survive in the tough security environment, effective external management was as critical as military self-help because of the country’s inherent military weakness … military deterrence through the alliance with the U.S., therefore, was the backbone of South Korea’s external security management during the Cold War, limiting the utility of other alternatives” (1998, 270). Codified in the framework of the 1953 U.S.–ROK Mutual Defense Treaty, operationalized through the U.S.–ROK Combined Forces Command (CFC), created in 1978, and, perhaps more importantly, solidified through the tangible presence of U.S. forces in South Korea (USFK – 2nd Infantry Division, 8th Army, 7th Air Force, and an array of C3I networks), the U.S.–ROK security cooperation has served as “the fundamental axis for security on the Korean Peninsula” (ROK MND 1996, 108). Any major scenario of North Korea’s military aggression would automatically activate U.S. involvement

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