The South Korean military plans to establish a command to be in charge of the Army's ground operations in 2018 as part of efforts to guarantee more efficient and stronger field operations, government sources said Wednesday.

Under its comprehensive plan to reform the military structure to ensure more flexible troop management, the government has pushed to merge its 1st and 3rd Armies to create the Ground Operations Command to lead frontline units.

"At the end of last year, the defense ministry decided to set the target year of its establishment in 2018," a source said, requesting anonymity.

Having control over six corps, including a maneuver legion, the envisioned command would be tasked with dealing with intelligence and carrying out field operations under the command of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, he noted.

The move to set the new command will reduce the number of four-star generals to seven from the current eight under the reform plan designed to streamline the current military structure and to cut the troops level from the current 630,000 to 522,000 by 2022.

Though it has not made official the exact timeline for the plan, the government had targeted 2015 as the year for setting up the new command after two delays since 2010.

"The authorities would think that more time is needed for the military and the government to secure capabilities enough to re-take the operational control (OPCON) of its troops during the wartime from Washington to Seoul," another source said.

Last October, Seoul and Washington agreed to keep the U.S. in control of South Korean troops in case of war until the South builds capabilities strong enough to counter nuclear and missile threats from North Korea. That countered a previous decision to transfer OPCON this year. (Yonhap)