April 25th, 2013 at 5:52 pm » Comments (3)

Col. Paul J. Laughlin II, the commander of the U.S. Armor School at Fort Benning, will serve as an assistant division commander for the 2nd Infantry Division, 8th U.S. Army, in his new assignment in South Korea, an Army spokesman at the Pentagon said. Laughlin’s new assignment will be at Camp Red Cloud in Uijeongbu, South Korea, said Lt. Col. Stephen J. Platt, a Pentagon spokesman. The Army announced on Monday that Laughlin had been reassigned six months after arriving as Fort Bennning’s 47th chief of armor. Laughlin’s promotion to
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March 8th, 2013 at 2:25 am » Comments (18)

This was a pretty predictable response to the recently announced UN sanctions: SEOUL, March 8 (Yonhap) — North Korea said Friday that it will sever its emergency hot line with Seoul and nullify non-aggression agreements between the two countries, amid escalating tensions over the North’s nuclear test last month. “The DPRK abrogates all agreements on nonaggressions reached between the North and the South,” the North’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea (CPRK), a propaganda organ against the South, said in an English statement carried by the North’s Korean Central
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January 18th, 2013 at 6:01 pm » Comments (8)

This is a collection of articles from my ongoing series describing the various attacks and other provocations carried out by the North Korean regime over the decades.  Some of these provocations are well known while many others have been long forgotten.  This ongoing series is an attempt to help people today remember the sacrifices of those who came before us that stood their watch to ensure freedom in South Korea. The 2002 West Sea Naval Battle The 1996 Spy Submarine Incident The 1976 DMZ Axe Murder Incident The 1969 EC-121
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December 26th, 2012 at 1:55 pm » Comments (1)

North Korea has hit back at South Korea’s weekend lighting of a frontline, Christmas-tree-shaped tower, accusing its rival of using the illuminated structure as part of a campaign of psychological warfare. North Korean state media on Monday, according to the Associated Press, said that South Korea decided to light the “tree” which is made of steel and sits on the tense border dividing the two nations because of Pyongyang’s success in putting a satellite into orbit earlier this month. (…) On Sunday, Seoul’s Defense Ministry said it allowed Christian groups
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November 28th, 2012 at 3:46 am » Comments (15)

No Christmas tree will be lit up this year on the DMZ: In the spirit of love and peace, the Demilitarized Zone will not be lit up like a Christmas tree this holiday season as it has in years past. The Military Evangelical Association of Korea had sought approval from the South Korea Ministry of National Defense to light three giant towers in the shape of Christmas trees at different points about two miles south of the North Korean border. However, the request has been withdrawn in the wake of
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November 19th, 2012 at 1:34 pm » Comments (3)

Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission Swiss member, Maj. Gen. Jean-Jacques Joss, speaks at the 58th anniversary of the signing of the Korean War Armistice Agreement on July 27, 2011 held at the Joint Security Area located along the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea. U.S. Army photo by Spc. Amber Smith.  [USFK Flickr page]

October 21st, 2012 at 1:17 pm » Comments (1)

October 15th, 2012 at 5:34 am » Comments (4)

It seems like the fallout from the recent North Korean soldier defection is continuing to spread:  South Korea’s defense chief apologized publicly Monday after his military failed to spot a North Korean soldier defecting to the South across their heavily guarded border. No one detected the soldier – even though he scaled barbed wire fences on the South Korean side of the border – until he knocked on the door of front-line South Korean barracks to say he was defecting. The Oct. 2 incident raised serious questions about South Korea’s
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October 13th, 2012 at 6:33 pm » Comments (25)

The details of the recent North Korean defection scandal continue to make DMZ security look worse and worse: A North Korean soldier who crossed 4 km of heavily armed border when he defected on Oct. 2 had to go to some trouble to draw attention to himself. Initial reports said that South Korean soldiers were oblivious until he knocked on the door of barracks, but in fact he had already knocked on the door of a guard post, to no avail. In an emergency audit at the request of the
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October 6th, 2012 at 5:17 am » Comments (24)

We will have to wait and see what caused a North Korean soldier to shoot two of his leaders before deciding to defect, but I would be very surprised if this becomes some kind of new trend in regards to defection from the country: A North Korean soldier killed two of his officers Saturday and defected toSouth Korea across the countries’ heavily armed border in a rare crossing that prompted South Korean troops to immediately beef up their border patrol, officials said. The soldier shot his platoon and company commanders before crossing the western
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