By Jim Garamone DoD News, Defense Media Activity
OSAN AIR BASE, South Korea, Oct. 26, 2017 — Marine Corps
Gen. Joe Dunford arrived here to participate in the U.S.-South Korean Military
Committee Meeting tomorrow.
Just getting off the airplane put the chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff about 50 miles south of one of the most bizarre borders in the
world -- the demilitarized zone.
The DMZ stretches from the Yellow Sea across the peninsula
to the East China Sea. It is one of the most heavily militarized borders on
Earth.
On the other side of that border is North Korean leader Kim
Jong Un and his army of almost a million active duty soldiers. There are also
600,000 reservists, and the North says it has almost 6 million people in
paramilitary formations.
Not content with the fourth largest army in the world, Kim
also wants nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them.
This land was scarred 67 years ago when North Korea invaded
South Korea in June 1950. Osan Air Base was the site of one of the battles of
that war when Easy Company of the 27th Infantry Regiment, low on ammunition,
charged up Hill 180 with fixed bayonets.
That war is still going on and Dunford will meet with Korean
Air Force Gen. Jeong Kyeong-doo, the chairman of South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of
Staff, to examine strategies, plans and means needed to deter any North Korean
aggression.
The Military Committee Meeting is the way U.S. and South
Korean leaders chart the way ahead for the alliance. Held each year since 1978,
senior military officials gather to discuss what has occurred over the past
year and the best ways to move ahead.
The Security Consultative Meeting takes place immediately
after the MCM. Leading their respective delegations this year are Defense
Secretary Jim Mattis and South Korean Defense Minister Song Young-moo.
Military Committee Meeting
The annual Military Committee Meeting looks at all the
issues that affect the U.S.-South Korean alliance. “We look at things like
missile defense, command and control, capability development, installation of
linked systems,” Dunford said to reporters traveling with him. “It is a wide
range of technical issues that get carried on year after year.”
They will also discuss the threat.
It is a dangerous time on the Korean Peninsula as North
Korean dictator Kim Jong Un pushes his country toward developing nuclear
weapons and the means to launch them. The North Korean Foreign Minister said
the nation threatened to explode a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific Ocean. Kim
began nuclear testing in 2006 and the most recent test was Sept. 3.
North Korea also tested an intercontinental ballistic missile
with the last test of the road transportable missile on July 29.
The rhetoric coming from North Korea is examined carefully,
Dunford said. “I am not complacent about anything that comes out of the
regime,” the general said. “What’s fair to say is with the unprecedented
missile testing and nuclear testing by Kim Jong Un this is certainly a tense
period on the peninsula and we are doing everything we can to emphasize we seek
a political and diplomatic and economic solution to this. The military dimension
is in support of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s diplomatic and economic
effort.”
But the military aspect must be credible. The MCM is a
report card highlighting capabilities and capacities. “We will review the
things that were accomplished since and we will put some milestones out there:
this is the meeting that drives the staff for the subsequent year,” Dunford
said.
Expanding Capability
Dunford said he expects the two nations will discuss command
and control capabilities, precision munitions, the maritime capability and
anti-submarine capability. He also expects cyber capabilities and space
resilience to be discussed in depth. “We have been on a path of increased South
Korean military capability for a long time,” the general said. “The more they can
do for themselves the better. “
Dunford and Jeong will present the results of the MCM to
Mattis and Song at the Security Consultative Talks. He will then leave for
Honolulu, where he will participate in a Tri-Chiefs of Defense meeting with
Jeong and Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force Adm. Katsutoshi Kawano, the chief
of staff for the Joint Staff. Both Japan and South Korea are treaty allies of
the United States and the South Korean military and the Japan Self-Defense
Forces are working to improve their interoperability.
In answer to a question, Dunford said having three carriers
operating in the Pacific -- the USS Nimitz, the USS Reagan, the USS Theodore
Roosevelt -- is coincidental, but, he added, “It gives us an opportunity to
demonstrate our commitment to the region, it gives us the opportunity to
demonstrate our ability to meet our alliance commitments, and then from an
operational perspective I think there is some utility in bringing together the
three carriers and operating in every yard.”
The Nimitz finished a deployment to the Middle East and is
transiting to its home port in Washington. The Roosevelt, based in San Diego,
will replace the Nimitz in the Middle East, but will exercise while in transit.
The Reagan is based in Yokosuka, Japan. It has just finished an exercise with
the South Korean Navy.
“This was scheduled months and months in advance. This is a
routine demonstration of our commitment to the region,” Dunford said.
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