Test Fwd: [Analysis] What’s behind the North’s opposition to Key Resolve?

* Informed in the website of the Solidarity for Peace And reunification of Korea(SPARK)

* Image caption as in the original article same as below*

'Members of Solidarity for Peace and Reunification Korea demonstrate against in Sungnam, Gyeonggi, as soldiers participating in the South Korea-U.S. Key Resolve training exercise pass by.'


http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_northkorea/343241.html
[Analysis] What’s behind the North’s opposition to Key Resolve?
N. Korea views the exercise as a threat of invasion, but is not likely to retaliate without provocation from the United States or Japan

With tensions rising on the Korean Peninsula due to the start of an annual training drill, the U.S.-led United Nations Command released a statement defending the drill as a “defensive exercise.” North Korea is again protesting the exercise, which takes place from March 9-20 at locations across South Korea, saying that it is preparation for an invasion of the North. But what is the reason for the North’s response and is it a reasonable one?

In a press release with the title “KR/FE is routine defensive readiness exercise” sent March 9 by the UN Command before its annual Key Resolve and Foal Eagle training exercise with the South Korean military got underway, General Walter Sharp, the head of the U.S. Forces South Korea, said, “KR/FE is a routine training exercise that takes place every year at about the same time. It is not tied in any way to any political or real-world event. The primary goal is to ensure the command is ready to defend the ROK (Republic of Korea) in the event it becomes necessary.”

Seoul and Washington have been conducting joint training exercises since 2008 to prepare for the return of wartime operational control from the USFK to the South Korean military on April 17, 2012, and the name has since gone through several changes. First known as Team Spirit, the drill later became the Reception, Staging, Onward Movement, Integration exercise in 1994. Last year, the joint military exercise became Key Resolve.

Key Resolve is designed to train the South Korean and U.S. forces and assumes a situation in which a full-blown war has broken out on the Korean Peninsula. Troops practice taking in U.S. reinforcements at seaports and airports, ordering them to wait until other troops and resources arrive and realigning troops to send them to the front line.

North Korea views the exercises as a threat because a fleet of U.S. battleships, including a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, an Aegis battle-cruiser, about 10 destroyers and a nuclear submarine, are stationed around the East Sea for the duration of the exercise.

Although the U.S.-led UN Command says that “Approximately 13,100 off-peninsula personnel are participating this year, which is consistent with previous years’ participation,” the U.S. Navy’s Aegis destroyer was deployed as well, amid fears that North Korea is preparing to test fire what is suspected to be a long-range missile.

At talks with generals from the UN Command on March 6, North Korea said that the United States was using “military pressure” by amassing “forces of agression” in the East Sea.

The North may also feel threatened by Key Resolve’s inclusion of OPLAN (operation plan) 5027, the military plan that it denounces as a plan to bring about the collapse of the North Korean regime.

North Korea has called on South Korea and the U.S. to stop the joint military drills at various meetings, including the six-party negotiations and talks with generals from South Korea. This year in particular, the North seems to be viewing Key Resolve as a touchstone of the U.S. administration of President Barack Obama’s North Korea policy. At recent talks with generals from the UN Command on March 2 and 6, North Korea claimed it would “judge whether the Obama administration will follow the previous hostile policy against the North depending on whether Key Resolve is canceled.”

In a statement on March 9, a spokesperson with the Supreme Command of the North’s Korean People’s Army said the North would retaliate if the United States and Japan shoot down the rocket it says is a satellite but which is presumed to be a long-range Taepodong-2 missile, further increasing tensions on the peninsula. The North does not have a missile capable of hitting U.S. bases in Alaska, its closest target, so if it were to retaliate it is likely it would instead target the U.S. Aegis destroyer stationed in the East Sea for the Key Resolve exercise.

But the North is not likely to do anything without provocation from the United States or Japan. Commenting on the North’s remark about a retaliatory strike, Won Tae-jae, a spokesman for the South’s Ministry of Defense, said, “The remark is close to political rhetoric. So far, there has bee no particular military movement by North Korea.”

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Posted on : Mar.10,2009 11:34 KST
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