South Korea’s 2018 budget for developing its own missile defense system against North Korea’s ballistic missiles and nuclear attack has been slashed compared to this year, an opposition lawmaker claimed Tuesday. 　The government, instead, allotted more money to bankroll President Moon Jae-in’s election pledges -- a hike in enlisted soldiers’ wages and a cut in the mandatory service period, said Rep. Kim Hack-yong of Liberty Korea Party, citing next year’s budget plan of the Ministry of National D

 　Despite repeated rebuttals from the South Korean government, talk of bringing US tactical nuclear weapons here continues to grow, with signs of Washington warming to the idea amid North Korea’s persistent nuclear and missile threats. 　But experts here are still cautious, questioning whether the US would really have the intention to redeploy tactical nukes on the Korean Peninsula, risking sparking military tensions in Northeast Asia, and potentially, a regional nuclear arms race. 　Over the past

With public sentiment worsening over North Korea, South Korea’s main opposition party is revving up its call for the nation’s nuclear armament by bringing back the United States’ tactical nuclear weapons. 　However, Seoul’s presidential office Cheong Wa Dae on Sunday reiterated its opposition to the measure, saying that it would undermine the government’s effort to denuclearize Pyongyang and trigger an nuclear arms race in East Asia. 　The Liberty Korea Party, which has been boycotting parliamenta

Regional security policymakers on Thursday called for extended deterrence and international sanctions against North Korea, denouncing the country for destabilizing peace and security in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond. During the Seoul Defense Dialogue 2017, senior diplomats, military generals and security scholars called for enhanced multilateral cooperation, while stressing the need to prepare a “contingency plan” against a North Korean miscalculation.The annual security forum came amid ris

The United States does not support the idea of South Korea rearming with nuclear weapons to match North Korea, a high-ranking US military official said Thursday.“The US does not support the reintroduction of tactical nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula, although we certainly understand those feelings especially in light of the recent nuclear test (by the North),” said Lt. Gen. Thomas W. Bergeson, deputy commander of USFK and commander of the 7th Air Force, at a forum in Seoul. The US provide

[코리아헤럴드 여준석 기자] 북한 6차 핵실험으로 재부상한 ‘한국 전술핵 재배치론’에 주한미군 부사령관이 공식 반대했다. 미 현직 고위장성이 최근 붉어진 한반도 전술핵 배치론에 공식적인 반대 입장을 밝힌 건 이번이 처음이다.토마스 버거슨 주한미군 부사령관 겸 미7공군 사령관은 7일 서울 웨스틴조선호텔에서 열린 서울안보대화(SDD) ‘북한 핵ㆍ미사일 위협과 한반도 안보’ 세션에서 “미국은 한반도에 전술핵을 재배치하자는 입장을 지지하지 않는다. 다만 최근 북한 핵실험으로 인해 (한반도 전술핵 재배치를 주장하는 이들의) 심정을 이해한다”고 말했다. 7일 오전 서울 웨스틴조선호텔에서 국방부가 주최한 아시아태평양 지역 다자안보회의인 서울안보대화(SDD)가 열리고 있다. `북한 핵·미사일 위협과 한반도 안보 비전`이라는 주제로 열린 본회의에서 임성남 외교부 1차관(맨 오른쪽)이 연설하고 있다. 이 본회의에서는 임 차관과 대니얼 러셀 전 미 국무부 동아태 차관보, 토머스 버거슨 미 7공군사령관과

After US President Donald Trump’s recent tweets about his approval of selling military equipment to South Korea, a sense of uneasiness is growing here over what some see as the US leader’s attempts to use the ongoing security crisis as an opportunity to sell weapons. In a tweet posted Tuesday, Trump said he has allowed South Korea and Japan to purchase “a substantially increased amount” of sophisticated US military equipment to counter North Korea’s escalating nuclear and missile threats.  US Pr

South Korea’s rural town of Seongju was tense Wednesday evening, as activists and protestors converged and villagers built up a barricade with tractors and vehicles to block the imminent arrival of the equipment of a controversial US missile defense system.  　Seoul’s Defense Ministry announced Wednesday afternoon that four launchers of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system would be moved to a US military site in Seongju, North Gyeongsang Province, early Thursday morning. 　“As a result o

Faced with North Korea’s escalating nuclear and missile threats, South Korea is seeking to develop a ballistic missile capable of carrying warheads powerful enough to destroy the communist regime’s underground military facilities and wartime commands.　According to military sources familiar with the matter Tuesday, the government is considering a plan to build a new ground-to-ground ballistic missile that can reach the entire North Korea and load up to 2 tons of warheads. 　The measure was reveale

With Sunday’s nuclear test, North Korea might have succeeded in making nuclear warheads small enough to be mounted on an intercontinental ballistic missile, South Korea’s defense chief said Monday. 　In a parliamentary inquiry a day after the North conducted its sixth and largest nuclear test at Punggye-ri site, Defense Minister Song Young-moo told lawmakers that the military suspects the North may have secured technology to produce miniaturized nuclear warheads that weigh less than 500 kilograms

　On an afternoon in February 1998, Army 1st Lt. Kim Hun was found dead inside an underground military outpost along the border with North Korea. A gunshot wound was found on the right side of his head and a 9mm Beretta pistol was near his body. 　The South Korean military determined that the then-25-year-old Army officer had committed suicide. But questions and doubts have mushroomed that he may have been murdered because of no apparent motive for suicide and evidence of a physical fight inside t

Talk of South Korea’s nuclear armament resurfaced Thursday, after Seoul’s defense chief raised the issue in a meeting with his US counterpart.Meeting US Defense Secretary James Mattis on Wednesday, Seoul’s Defense Minister Song Young-moo floated the idea of South Korea manufacturing indigenous nuclear-powered submarines and bringing back US tactical nukes that were withdrawn from the Korean Peninsula in 1991. 　The proposal was discussed in the context of the allies’ efforts to enhance their dete

The top US military commander in the Asia-Pacific region said Tuesday that the diplomatic approach is the “stronger and more powerful” means to resolve the standoff with North Korea, adding such efforts should be backed by credible military capability. “Diplomatic maneuver has to be applied first and diplomacy is stronger, effective and more powerful if it is backed by credible military power,” said Adm. Harry Harris, commander of the US Pacific Command, during a press conference at Osan Air Bas

The top US military commander in the Asia-Pacific region said Tuesday that the diplomatic approach is the “stronger and more powerful” means to resolve the standoff with North Korea, adding such efforts should be backed by credible military capability. “Diplomatic maneuver has to be applied first and diplomacy is stronger, effective and more powerful if it is backed by credible military power,” said Adm. Harry Harris, commander of the US Pacific Command, during a press conference at Osan Air Bas

The explosion of a self-propelled howitzer that killed South Korean soldiers last week has sparked controversy over the reliability of the weapon system designed to counter North Korea’s long-range artillery units across the border. 　Two South Korean soldiers were killed and five injured in an explosion inside a K-9 Thunder during artillery training Friday in Cheorwon, Gangwon Province. The training was designed to improve the accuracy of counter-artillery attacks in the event of a war with Nort

Despite under a constant threat of war from the communist North Korea, South Korea has remained a nuclear weapons-free zone since 1991. But with Pyongyang nearing the finish line in its atomic weapons program, politicians and security experts in Seoul are calling for “a balancing act” to adapt to the new security environment on the Korean Peninsula: A North Korean nuclear weapon can only be deterred by a nuclear weapon -- by either South Korea’s own or the US, they said. “We can’t fight against

Military tensions are expected to come to a critical juncture on the Korean Peninsula this week, with South Korea and the United Sates beginning Monday their annual military exercise in the wake of a standoff between Washington and Pyongyang over the latter’s threat to launch missiles toward the US island of Guam.　The Ulchi Freedom Guardian exercise, a computer-based military drill, is to kick off with some 50,000 South Korean and 17,500 US troops participating to simulate a war with North Korea

South Korea has no plans to reduce the scale of an annual joint military exercise with the United States or demand the withdrawal of US troops stationed on the Korean Peninsula, the man set to become Seoul’s chief of Joint Chiefs of Staff said Friday. 　The Ministry of National Defense announced later in the day that the annual Korea-US Ulchi Freedom Guardian exercise will take place between Aug. 21 and 31. The command post drill will be played out on a similar scale to that of last year, when 50

　North Korea’s latest launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile appeared to be a failure, a Seoul-based missile expert claimed Thursday, suggesting that the Hwasong-14 was not equipped with a stable re-entry system that would allow it to survive the heat-intensive process of re-entering the atmosphere.　Lee Sang-min, a researcher at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, said there are “three pieces of scientific evidence” that show the Hwasong-14 test-fired on July 28 lacked the capabil

Following his crushing defeat for the People’s Party at presidential polls in May, Ahn Cheol-soo has been scrambling to find ways to bring back the popularity that had catapulted the former business tycoon to the political arena. But such efforts barley got off to a start, with some of Ahn’s aides being indicated for engaging in an illegal smear campaign during the presidential election and the party’s approval ratings plummeting to a record low since its establishment in 2016. Alarmed by the fe