SEOUL – Rocky Korean mountainsides erupt in clouds of dust and smoke as high explosives from tanks, artillery and jet aircraft pound home.
Heavily loaded marines – complete with tanks and armored personnel carriers – hit beaches from landing craft under the cover of dense smoke screens.
And in a darkened underground command bunker, South Korean and US troops, attired in camouflage uniforms and flight suits, peruse giant digital maps and intel screens.
It is not war – thankfully.
But these kinds of stock TV segments showing joint US-Korea military drills showcase the kind of capabilities that would come into play if the 1950-53 Korean War ever bursts back into demonic life.
Exactly this kind of footage was airing on South Korean and international TV screens today, as Seoul and Washington kicked off summer military drills. They are the biggest joint exercises held by the two allies on and around the peninsula since 2018.
It is a move certain to infuriate North Korea – albeit, the isolated state itself has lately been engaged in its most active-ever missile testing spree. And for months, Pyongyangologists have fretted that the country is set to conduct a nuclear test – potentially its seventh – but have thus far been proven wrong.
The US-South Korea drills, customarily held in spring and summer, mark a return to a pre-Donald Trump, pre-Covid status quo.
They were significantly cut back in order to “give diplomacy space to work” as then-US president Trump, enthusiastically backed by previous South Korean president Moon Jae-in, engaged with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in 2018-2019.
That unprecedented dalliance ended in failure when Trump walked away from a 2019 summit: He refused to lift sanctions in return for the dismantling of the central North Korean nuclear complex at Yongbyon.
However, even in subsequent years, the drills remained low-key due to Covid-19.
Matters are different in 2022, however. On the public health front, both South Korea and the US are “living with Covid.” On the political front, with the liberal Moon having ended his term, the conservative Yoon Suk-yeol administration came into office promising to bring the drills back to life.
And it has. At the time of writing, North Korea has not reacted but it customarily rails against these exercises, which it considers “invasion preparation.”
While spokespersons for the Korea-US alliance insist that the drills are “defensive in nature,” some experts tell Asia Times that North Korea’s allegations are not entirely without foundation.
Action on all fronts
“Exercise Ulchi Freedom Shield” – actually a series of exercises, with troops engaged in both boots-on-ground and command-post simulations, while civic defense components also take place– started today (August 22) and will end on September 1.
They are taking place on the sea, in the air, on the ground and under it in command bunkers, and are broadly divided into two phases. The first involves repelling North Korean attacks and defending the greater Seoul area. The second is a non-specified “counterattack” phase.
Scenarios include dealing with the discovery of explosives at a nuclear power plant, a fire at a semiconductor fab, a paralyzed banking network, terrorism at airports and drone attacks, Yonhap News Agency reported, citing the South Korean defense ministry.
There will be 13 field training programs alongside simulated drills.
While the US Forces Korea website is silent on the drills and the number of assets and troops involved, US military newspaper Stars and Stripes reports further details. Ulchi Freedom Shield will include joint maneuvers, front-line reinforcement, resupply and refueling operations and removals of simulated weapons of mass destruction.
New developments seen during the ongoing Ukraine War will also be incorporated, the newspaper stated.
US military officers, speaking off the record, have grumbled for years about the lack of large-scale joint drills.
Retired officers, who are free to speak, told Asia Times that on-ground maneuvers are essential both for combat effectiveness and for generating up-to-date data to feed computer simulations.
“It is important to train hard in the environment you are going to fight in, to get a feel for Korea,” Steve Tharpe, a retired US Army lieutenant colonel with 26 years of experience in Korea, told Asia Times.
He recalled when two members of the US 82nd Airborne Division – often considered the US Army’s elite – were temporarily assigned to Tharp’s unit in Korea. “They talked a lot of trash about being airborne, and I said, ‘Shut up until you assault these mountains! It is nothing like North Carolina! It will take a toll on you,’” Tharpe recalled.
One of the pair subsequently fell out, with exhaustion, on a route march.
“Field training is important due to terrain and weather,” agreed Chun In-bum, a retired South Korean general. “You can simulate it but the individual and the unit need to feel it, and their equipment needs to be exposed to it.”
Field drills also feed computer drills.
“Having a field training exercise builds the data,” Chun told Asia Times. “So incorporating field training is integral in creating realistic simulations.”
Why North Korea frets
One concern when bringing US assets to the peninsula for training is that Pyongyang – which has no liaison officers with South Korean or US forces – will believe the moves to be a build-up for a real attack and respond kinetically.
This is the dreaded “war by accident.” However, that scenario has not eventuated since the Korean War ended, uneasily, in 1953.
Pyongyang also rails against the drills as “invasion preparation.” It has a point.
People charged with monitoring the exercises in years past told Asia Times that they agree – to a degree – with North Korea. The drills feature a counter-attack scenario, which could, in reality, carry the fight onto soil north of the DMZ.
“The real question is, ‘What is the objective?’ If it is to regain lost territory, that is regaining lost territory,” Chun said. “There might be instances where you want to take the opportunity to secure some more territory that will make you feel safer.”
But Chun stressed, “A counterattack is a counter to an attack, it is not an invasion. An invasion is what the Russians are trying to do to Ukraine.”
But where would a counterattack stop? With the North Korean attacking force being repelled? With a decapitation of the leadership? With a seizure of parts of North Korea? Or even a full-scale counter-invasion aimed at reunifying the peninsula?
All such matters are complicated by North Korea’s nuclear capabilities. But retired US officers have told Asia Times that at least one scenario calls for a US-led Marine landing in Wonsan Bay. That is a key harbor/resort, with excellent communication links, that lies just north of the DMZ on the east coast of the peninsula.
“We execute the war plan and the war plan has a counterattack: I can’t say much more,” Tharpe said. “But it does have a counterattack and an end state.”
The end state is subject, not just to US, but also to South Korean political decisions. Potentially, any states that joined the fight on the South Korean side under the war-era UN Command could also have a say.
“The North Koreans do their exercises with the end state being sipping drinks in Busan,” said Tharpe, referring to the port city on the southern coast of South Korea. “Our end state is to settle the conflict on ‘favorable terms.’”
What those terms constitute is classified.
Today’s drills are taking place at a time when the US alliance and US troop presence in South Korea are hugely popular with the public.
According to Seoul think tank the Asan Institute, citing annual polls, support of the South Korea-US alliance has not fallen below 91.9% since 2012. This year, as per a poll in May, support for US troops in Korea was 82.1%.
Even so, there is a segment within the South Korean polity that is opposed to the drills – be it from a belief that the exercises irk Pyongyang and imperil cross-border relations; that they represent militarism; or perhaps due to anti-American and/or pro-North Korean sentiment.
A modest demonstration took place against the drills over the weekend. But in a country where 100,000-strong demonstrations are not uncommon, and where million-strong protests do occasionally occur, the protest, with 6,000 attendees, generated little coverage.
And while there was one stand protesting the US military presence in Korea outside the US Embassy in Seoul today, there were two applauding the Korean-US alliance.
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