By I love this headline, US Equipped With High-Tech Weapons, in the Korea Times. What did they expect, that we are armed with slingshots up here in 2ID land? We are the US Army, of course we have high-tech weapons. Anyway the article goes on to talk about the Second Infantry Division’s transformation into a Unit of Execution or UEX for short. By the way that is the same UEX I’m part of. A UEX is a slimmed down division that is more rapidly deployable than a bulky Division sized element:
In recent months, the 2nd Infantry Division has carried out its incorporation efforts. The 1st Brigade under the division was transformed into the 1st Heavy Brigade Combat Team, which U.S. officials describe as the army’s most powerful and rapidly deployable force. It also created an integrated artillery brigade, the Fires Brigade, which can control up to seven South Korean artillery battalions in addition to its MLRS battalions.
Here is something that IMHO we will not see happen anytime soon or possibly not at all:
The 2nd Infantry Division played a controversial “trip wire” function against possible North Korean invasion. The division is to be relocated to an area south of Seoul after 2006 with the U.S. Yongsan Garrison in Seoul.
There is so much politics involved in this I just don’t see it happening anytime soon.
4:29 am on January 7th, 2007 1
I wish that they'd pull 2ID (oops, sorry… I meant 2UEx) out of Korea–what's left of it anyway–and treat Korea like any other overseas rotational deployment. Have brigades from the states rotate over for six months at a time, then come back to their traditional duty locations.
In this way, brigades (sorry, brigade combat teams… no wait, I mean Units of Action!) could get their train up at local training areas, CTC rotations, and all their other qualifications/certifications prior to going to the ROK. Everyone that's been in Korea knows that the training areas available there are abysmal (Twin Bridges is hardly on par with NTC, JRTC, or CMTC) and that everyone would be better served if units came in freshly trained without the high personnel turnover rates experienced there now (the twelve-month short tour being a lingering draft-era dinosaur).
As each day passes it becomes harder and harder to justify not doing it this way. No command sponsorship north of Uijongbu, poor training areas, and overcrowded installations make this a more reasonable approach to keeping forces in Korea.
Plus, having different units rotating in every six months might actually give the Eight Army staff something constructive to do.
Just my thoughts on the matter anyway.
4:31 am on January 7th, 2007 2
How unit rotation would work in practice is a matter for considerable trial and error and consequent refinement. IMO, your objections can be worked around easily, espcially as the US forces currently stationed in Korea are withdrawn to the south and the ROK Army takes over the entire forward defense immediately south of the DMZ.
After this happens, I assume that for any unit rotation plan US forces would still be in rear area bases. Remember that many of the troops and leaders would have been to Korea before.
Take for example a 4 man M1 Abrams tank crew. Right now in ROK, 1 crewmember of the 4 turns over "on average" every 3 months, thus a tank battalion commander has to always be concerned about constantly reiterating certain training tasks, especially if the cdr knows that some of the new crewmen he is getting are straight from initial entry training (Fort Knox KY in this case).
As opposed to an entire tank battalion arriving in Korea from, say, Fort Hood (just a hypothetical example, I don't know from where they would actually come). The idea would be that almost all the tank crews (54 (?) M1's in a tank battalion) would arrive "in-country" having just completed extensive training together back at Fort Hood (such as "qualification", an annual (?) series of live-fire "tables" (8 of them?) where the crew gets to work together under stressful competitive conditions).
So instead of constant turnover the crew would be "stabilized" for the 6 month tour; much of what they need to train on could have been completed already stateside (where it is undoubtedly a lot easier to do, for example doing it at Fort Hood cuts down considerably on the need to have to roll the 60-ton beasts through the Korean countryside in the face of obtuse Korean pedestrians).
Indeed, in a perfectly resourced world the battalion commander would have enough civilian trucks to take his crews out on reconnaissance of prospective battle areas without having to roll the tanks at all. (I have to admit I've never seen anything like this actually happen, but maybe in the interest of Korean-American relations and pedestrian safety, the ROK would provide and maintain a fleet of used Hyundais and KIA SUV's for this purpose — you think?)
(In practice there would be exceptions to crew stability due to emergency reassignements, hospitalizations, etc., but still most of the crews would already have worked together prior to arrival in ROK). Plus many of the more senior small unit leaders would have prior Korea tours.
BTW, I'm hoping GI (or some other knowledgeable Korea-based military individual) will read this interchange of ours, and tell us how individual replacement is working currently in Korea, and what the plans are for the future.
The long-term commitment of the major ground forces of US Army/Marines to Iraq, for the last 2 years (and who knows how much longer) has probably scrambled whatever plans existed prior. Plus now that one of the 2nd ID brigades has been evidently been permanently withdrawn from ROK, that also has to be taken into account.
My "vision" of what Army ground force duty should be in ROK is an annual deployment of forces for a month or so each year, with Hawaii and various stateside US divisions sharing the burden over a multi-year period. But, if Uncle Sam decides he needs to keep a certain level of forces continually in ROK, then I suppose 6 month "rotations" would be necessary as a minimum.
I'm completely out of touch, haven't been reading the Army Times where this type of thing has undoubtedly been the subject of frequent articles. If the 6 month plan still exists somewhere as the hoped-for option for the future, I'm sure there's a lot of skepticism internally in the Army about it. The prospect of routine 6 month deployments to overseas bases would be extremely hard on families.
From what I've read, a 6 month deployment of Navy ships, or having Marines "on float" somewhere for that long, is considered very arduous. And it's my impression that such separations cause the Navy/USMC even more family problems than what the Army experiences.
Because of this, I don't agree with the idea of 6 month unit tours. It's long, long past the time for ROK citizens to take over the entire burden of ground defense of their own country, and it's time we told them that (politely but firmly, maybe even in a assertive masculine manner that would delight Sally).
We should set a date and give them a few years to get up to speed, as far as the purchase of needed equipment and training soldiers to take over advanced weapons systems. I gather some of this is happening now.
If they don't want to buy the equipment and don't want the additional defense expenditures, that's not a reason for us to linger on for more decades. Instead offer them operational control of a couple dozen nukes (which could remain under US control until a wartime situation, then be released for ROK use by Presidential directive. They could be guarded normally by a minimal US force which would remain "in-country").
That should be enough to provide deterrence, and with us gone ROK can get on with the long-term business of "engagement" with the North as evidently the majority of the populations longs for (in some manner). A US combat brigade can keep doing "Team Spirit" yearly to show solidarity.
We had such arrangements (quietly) for use of tactical nukes by NATO allies during the Cold War. In the case of ROK, I suppose such an arrangment could be considered a violation of the NPT, but why are we restraining ourselves when DPRK is so clearly in violation.
I don't think there will be a war on the Korean pensinsula, China won't support a DPRK 1950 style offensive. We should just leave and stop taking this abuse; if the ROK can defend itself with the same vigor their demonstrators attack the gates of Camp Humphreys, then they won't have any problems dealing with the North.