It looks like the Korean peninsula is going to be seeing a heavier US Marine Corps presence in the future as military cooperation between the ROK & US Marine Corps expands:

South Korean and U.S. Marine Corps will increase joint exercises and strengthen measures for defending the islands near the northern limit line in the West Sea.

On Thursday, Commander of the South Korean Marines Lt. Gen. Lee Ho-yeon and U.S. Marine Corps in Korea Commander Maj. Gen. Michael Regner confirmed that the two forces will conduct the largest joint landing exercise in 23 years during the first half of 2012 as agreed last year.

The exercise will combine the joint brigade-level landing exercise and the U.S. marines’ Korea Marine Exercise Program.

In addition, Lee and Regner also discussed plans for increasing Korean Marine Corps’ involvement in multinational exercises.

Plans discussed include expanding Korean Marine Corps involvement in the U.S.-led multinational Cobra Gold Exercise to battalion-level units, and sending a platoon to take part in the Rim of the Pacific Exercise for the first time in the Korean Marine Corps’ history.   [Korea Herald]

For those of you who collect classic firearms it appears that you may have a good shot of buying a Korean War era M1 soon:

The U.S. is set to import antiquated firearms from South Korea that were previously banned from entry, officials here said Thursday.

Defense ministry officials said the United States has approved imports of M1 Garrand rifles, which were used by U.S. forces during the 1950-53 Korean War.

“The U.S. sent an approval letter in September last year,” a ministry official said. “The U.S. will be willing to review legal procedures once we seek to export the rifles.”

The official added that an exporter will be selected in an open bid at the end of this month at the earliest.

In 2010, the U.S. State Department rescinded a 2009 decision permitting Seoul to ship more than 87,000 M1 Garrands and about 770,000 M1 Carbines to the U.S. for possible distribution to U.S. gun collectors. Washington then said the decision was based on concerns of illicit use of the rifles.

Another ministry official said M1 rifles are viewed as collectibles among antique collectors in the United States.  [Korea Herald]

Is it just me or is it ridiculous that the US government was against the import of these rifles because of a fear of illicit use of these rifles?  Some how I don’t expect LA street gangs to be doing drive by shootings with an M1 Garand.  What is even more ridiculous is that the US government was allowing the sale of high powered weapons in the US to be trafficked to Mexican drug cartels while stopping the import of the M1′s from Korea.

Hopefully these fines and confiscation of their boats will be enough to get these thug Chinese fishermen to respect Korean waters:

The government will submit a bill next month for a law revision that would double fines against illegal fishing, in its latest effort to counteract Chinese fishing boats poaching in South Korean waters in the Yellow Sea, an official said Saturday.

Korea has vowed to take tougher measures against illegal fishing by Chinese vessels in the Yellow Sea after a coastguard officer was stabbed to death last month by a Chinese skipper during a raid on a Chinese boat for violating South Korean waters.

Under the revision that needs to be approved by the National Assembly, the maximum fine levied against illegal fishing would rise to 200 million won ($176,056) from the current 100 million won ceiling.

The revision would also allow coastguard officers to confiscate boats and equipment if they were captured being used for illegal fishing, according to the official at the Ministry of Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries.  [Korea Herald]

Kim Jong-nam is continuing to make headlines with his new book:

When North Korean leader Kim Jong Il died in December, his youngest son, Kim Jong Un, was quickly named as his replacement — fait accompli by all appearances.

But the elder Kim might not have wholeheartedly supported this all-in-the-family succession. At least, that’s the contention of the deceased leader’s eldest son, Kim Jong Nam, said Yoji Gomi, a Tokyo-based journalist and author of the just-released “My Father, Kim Jong Il and I: Kim Jong Nam’s Exclusive Confession.”

Kim Jong Nam has lived in China since 1995 in a self-imposed exile.

During a talk this week at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan, Gomi, through an English translator, quoted Kim Jong Nam: “My father was more opposed to the third-generation hereditary succession than anybody, and it must have been internal factors that forced him to change his view.”

The eldest son said that his father likely changed his mind because the “North Korean people are so used to obeying orders solely based on the belief of bloodline that they may have trouble accepting any successor outside of that bloodline,” according to Gomi.

Masayuki Suzuki, a professor at Shobi University in Saitama, said that a transfer of power outside of family would have been “unthinkable” because bloodline is the only legitimacy the regime possesses.  [Stars & Stripes]

Unless Kim Jong-il was losing his mental capacities after his stroke I find it hard to believe he was against the succession of one of his sons.  He had to have understood that the “Cult of Kim” that has been built up over the decades in North Korea was integral to the legitimacy of the ruling regime.  It just seems to me that Kim Jong-nam is trying to create a small seed of doubt about the legitimacy of Kim Jong-un while at the same time setting himself up as the alternative if he fails as the leader of North Korea.  Considering Kim Jong-nam’s close ties with the Chinese government he is probably their leadership Plan B if there is any instability in North Korea they may need to respond to.

This is a picture of an army encampment from India near Daegu during the Korean War.  The picture is from a collection of photographs donated by a Indian Korean War veteran to the Korean embassy in New Dehli.  During the war 16 nations deployed combat troops under the United Nations banner while another 5 sent medical units.  India was one of the nations that sent a medical unit to Korea.  India deployed the 60th Parachute Field Ambulance platoon that consisted of 627 medical personnel under the command of Lieutenant Colonel A.G. Rangaraj.

HT: Marmot’s Hole

Who knows the name of this body of water?

Korea Finder Leader’s Board:

1. Ut Videam – 1

2. Sturgee – 1

3. Kushibo – 1

The person with the most points at the end of the year of the weekly Korea Finder contest will be rewarded with a book or DVD of their choice from Amazon.com. Also note that if you have a picture that you think would make a great Korea Finder feel free to send it in to me.

Is this a sign that North Koreans may slowly but surely turning on the regime?

A source in North Hamgyung Province told Daily NK on January 19, “During the mourning period, one official from the provincial NSA, one from the prosecutor’s office and two from the People’s Safety Agency were murdered in Cheongjin.” The source added, “There was a note found lying next to the body of the executed NSA official which said ‘Punished in the name of the people.’”

North Korean authorities have not released the identities of the victims or any information about the case fearing public disturbances, but authorities are said to be using all resources at their disposal to find the people responsible. The Defense Security Command is helping the other three agencies with the investigation, while a report on the murders has been elevated to the Central Party in Pyongyang.

In December 2010, also in Cheongjin, the retired head of the PSA office in the Sunam district died after being attacked on the street by an unknown assailant. This however is the first time that active serving officers have been slain. The likelihood seems to be that the murders were planned by somebody with a political motive rather than a personal grudge.  [Daily NK via OFK]

The normal caveats apply when it comes to any information coming out of North Korea, but you can read more about why killings of the secret police in Cheongjin should be condoned over at One Free Korea.

Over the past week the media has been breathlessly reporting an increase in military sexual assaults and how this is because of PTSD though no context of what is really going on is provided:

Military leaders vowed this week to curb sexual assaults by and against U.S. soldiers after the release of a new report revealing that violent sex crimes committed by Army personnel nearly doubled since 2006. The majority of reported sex crimes occurred on U.S. soil, the Army said.

A U.S soldier committed a violent sex crime every six hours and 40 minutes in 2011, a rate far above that of the general population, the report found.

“This is unacceptable. We have zero tolerance for this,” Gen. Peter Chiarelli, Army vice chief of staff, said at a press conference Thursday. “Army leaders take sexual assault seriously.”

Chiarelli said the Army was confronting the problem by stepping up surveillance of barracks and cracking down on drug and alcohol abuse, a key factor in sexual assault.  [Huffington Post]

Most of the articles in the media report that there was roughly 3,200 sexual assaults were reported by servicemembers in 2011.  This is a huge increase from the 2,039 sexual assault allegations between 2009-2010.  Considering all the sexual assault training and programs put in place in the past 5 years is it any wonder that the reports have gone up?  I am willing to bet that servicemembers spend more time receiving sexual assault training than time at the range in recent years.  So of course the reports are going to go up and it shouldn’t be looked at as a bad thing.

What I found most interesting after reading a number of mainstream media articles about this report none of them mention how many servicemembers were convicted of sexual assaults after having allegations made against them.  According to McClatchy who is really the only mainstream media source doing actual journalism on this issue, between 2009-2010 only 147 of the 2,039 allegations led to a sexual assault or rape conviction.  If you read the series of “Military Injustice” articles published by McClatchy in recent weeks they clearly show that the reason for the low conviction rate is because commanders are increasingly prosecuting any allegations of sexual assault despite flimsy evidence because they don’t want to be accused of being soft on rape:

Such results are provoking cynicism within the armed forces that the politics of rape are tainting a military justice system that’s as old as the country itself.

“In the media and on Capital Hill, there’s this myth that the military doesn’t take sexual assault seriously,” said Michael Waddington, a former Army judge advocate who now defends the cases. “But the reality is they’re charging more and more people with bogus cases just to show that they do take it seriously.”

McClatchy’s review of nearly 4,000 sexual assault allegations demonstrates that the military has taken a more aggressive stance. Last year, military commanders sent about 70 percent more cases to courts-martial that started as rape or aggravated sexual-assault allegations than they did in 2009.  [McClatchy]

Despite this clear evidence of over prosecution of sexual assaults a member of Congress wants to establish what appears to be a kangaroo court in order to get more convictions:

Rep. Jackie Speier, a California Democrat, said in an interview the day of Panetta’s announcement that the military culture has “run amok” and the rules for handling sexual abuse need an overhaul. She has introduced a bill that would create a separate system within the military to investigate and prosecute sex crimes.

Currently, a victim’s commander might be part of the decision-making process. That creates a conflict of interest; the commander could suffer career damage if a subordinate is victimized; the commander could be a friend of the suspect; or the commander could be the suspect, Speier said.  [Associated Press]

A military culture that has “run amok”?  I wish some one in the media would ask her to explain that remark.  Is she insinuating that military leaders advocate for its servicemembers to rape each other?  If so I find that deplorable coming from a member of Congress.  I believe there isn’t an institution in America that has done more to address sexual assault than the military.  What other organization does as much sexual assault training and has as many programs in place as the military?  As McClatchy reported the vast majority of the sexual assaults happen between two drunk acquaintances:

 It’s often the toxic ingredient of a military rape allegation: binge drinking. Many times, the woman knows the man and was drinking alcohol with him. Lots of it.

As a result, she says she doesn’t remember the entire encounter because she was drunk. Sometimes, she’s not even sure herself whether she was sexually assaulted. The man says it was consensual. No other witnesses can say either way.  [McClatchy]

The military is not the only place where drunk people have sex and afterwards have unclear memories of what happened or he said she said situations.  It seems like the military is the only place though that a member of Congress wants to establish a court to convict people in.  Why isn’t there a special court to try civilians in for sex crimes?  Better yet as you will see below why aren’t these same politicians trying to create unconstitutional laws to convict civilians of sex crimes?

It is because of people like Representative Speier that the US Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces ruled a change made in the UCMJ back in 2006 in regards to military sexual assaults to be unconstitutional and has overturned convictions because of this.  If you can believe this, the court had to overturn the change to the UCMJ because it put the burden on the defense to prove the accused servicemember is not guilty instead of on the prosecution to prove the guilt of the accused.

Trying to crack down, Congress six years ago changed sexual assault provisions by shifting the burden of proof to defendants who were claiming the sex was consensual, and it made it easier for prosecutors to claim an alleged victim was incapacitated because of intoxication.

“One of the reasons we made the effort to change (the law) was to get prosecutions,” Rep. Loretta Sanchez, D-Calif. said at the time.

But in a February 2011 ruling that dismissed the conviction of former Travis Air Force Base enlisted man Stephen Prather, judges declared that shifting the burden of proof as Congress did was unconstitutional. The ruling following harsh denunciations of the law by myriad military judges.

“This law has messed up a lot of people’s lives,” Prather, who now lives in Houston, told McClatchy earlier this year. “My life is ruined, all for something that should have never been a crime to begin with.”  [McClatchy]

A basic fundamental right of being an American citizen that you are innocent until proven guilty was denied to servicemembers by their own Congress.  Once again this is deplorable.  Quietly though the Congress has changed this unconstitutional law:

Congress is quietly giving itself a do-over on the military sexual assault law it botched the last time around.

The changes included in a massive defense bill attempt to correct Congress’ own mistakes, which baffled military judges called “arguably absurd,” “almost incomprehensible” and ultimately “unconstitutional.”

But unlike their last ill-fated effort, when lawmakers trumpeted their revisions to the military’s criminal code, this rewrite is flying below the political radar. Discreetly folded into the middle of a 1,844-page defense bill, the new changes have never been debated publicly.

“It wouldn’t have been such a mess had Congress decided to hold some real hearings before enacting this legislation,” said Eugene Fidell, a former military attorney who now teaches military law at Yale Law School. “I don’t have any confidence in what they’re going to do. It’ll be guesswork or luck if Congress gets this right.”   [McClatchy]

You would think that an issue as important as sexual assaults in the military would at least get some hearings but it appears to do so would cause certain politicians to admit they were wrong about the 2006 UCMJ changes and instead have quietly slipped this into the latest defense bill.  Hopefully there won’t be any unintended consequences as we saw with the 2006 changes but if you read the McClatchy article lawyers say the latest change is better, but still not perfect.

Overall the thing to keep in mind when reading anything about military sexual assault statistics is that they are inflated compared to the civilian statistics for the reasons shown above not because of PTSD crazed criminals wanting to rape the first woman they see.  The media and certain politicians should not further stigmatize people who suffer from PTSD with such accusations without valid proof to back it up.  The military takes sexual assaults very seriously and anyone claiming otherwise is out of touch with today’s military culture.   Those who are accused of sexual assault should receive due process with the expectation that they are innocent until proven guilty and be severely punished if found guilty.

To commemorate the first anniversary of the rescue operation “Daybreak in Gulf of Aden,” the Korean Navy re-enacts the mission yesterday at a naval base in Busan. On Jan. 21, 2011, the Korean Navy’s antipiracy Cheonghae Unit rescued the Samho Jewelry and its 21 sailors from Somali pirates in the Arabian Sea. By Song Bong-geun

Via the Joong Ang Ilbo.

For those of you that regularly use the subway system in Seoul, the cost of a ticket is going to go up a little:

 The Seoul Metropolitan Government plans to raise public transportation fares by 150 won (US$0.13) next month to make up for rising deficits from transfer fee discounts and energy costs, officials said Wednesday.

The city government has come up with a proposal to raise bus and subway fares from 900 won to 1,150 won (traffic card fares for adult) next month, while freezing prices for students and children, officials said.  [Yonhap]