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South Korea to become accompanied deployment
By Charlie
With the strains of the Iraq war, and repeated deployments, this seems like a good idea. Just keep the families out of artillery range:
The U.S. government is likely to accept a request by the top American commander in South Korea to extend the length of tours by U.S. troops here and have their families accompany them, a report said Thursday.South Korea welcomes the extended tours by U.S. forces, while some critics are worried that the family-accompanied program, along with a plan to pause the reduction of U.S. troops, would burden South Korean taxpayers.
The report said U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates will discuss the three-year, family-accompanied tour program for U.S. forces in Korea (USFK) when he visits Seoul in June.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, is also in support of the plan, which has been pushed ahead by USFK Commander Gen. B. B. Bell, it said.
Currently, most U.S. troops here are required to serve one-year tours without their families. A USFK official said only 10 percent of the 27,000 USFK members are with their families now.
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Comments
Who is going to build the infrastructure to support these families? It has been a while since I was stationed in Korea but at the time the infrastructure was barely adequate to support the Military members.
Accompanied tours require schools, housing, increased medical facilities, larger commisaries, PX's etc. GOV Housing would need to be built since I don't recall Korea having an excess of empty housing just waiting for renters. I doubt the ROK government will want to pay for this.
Put me down firmly in the column of supporting the removal of U.S. troops from Korea. We don't have a sufficient justification for being there. There is no reason that ROK can't defend themselves at this point in time. They have a robust economy, quality heavy-manufacturing, and large numbers of young men for military service. If they don't want to defend themselves, they need to live with that decision.
I'll agree with that.
I thought Korea was still a warzone, with only a truce currently stopping the combat.
No place for dependents.
From a person who spend three tours in Korea in the 50s and 60s.
The number of command sponsored slots in Korea are not scheduled to be increased for at least over a decade:
http://rokdrop.com/2008/03/13/accompanied-tours-in-korea-not-likely-for-over-a-decade/
There currently are not the facilities in Korea for increased command sponsored slots and the current relocation and transformation of USFK would have to be completed before more families could come to the peninsula.
Also keep in mind that just over a decade is best case, it could be longer if the South Korean government keeps playing their delay games.
My husband is active duty and we've been an Army family for 15 years. He did a year in Korea on the DMZ in 99-00. In two weeks he's going to Korea again. But this time it's an accompanied tour with the family for 2 years. We have several friends who are going there as well. It is definitely a good thing. With bases closing in Germany the logical replacement is Korea.
My husband is active duty and we've been an Army family for 15 years. He did a year in Korea on the DMZ in 99-00. In two weeks he's going to Korea again. But this time it's an accompanied tour with the family for 2 years. We have several friends who are going there as well. It is definitely a good thing. With bases closing in Germany the logical replacement is Korea.
Good to see so many friends in the same room (GI Korea, Amy). I have an even better idea. Let's stand down from any duties in SK.
That way, SK can feel the affects of their stupid sunshine diplomacy, get an Army, and prepare to defend themselves. We only enable their sunshine diplomacy by bearing the cost of their defense for them.
The cost to the taxpayer and the burden on the GI is reduced. The upshot is that we have more resources for the GWOT.
But since no one will listen to my commen sense advice, accompanied deployments are the next best thing.
I've quoted you and linked to you here: http://consul-at-arms.blogspot.com/2008/05/re-south-korea-to-become-accompanied.html
subject and content is clear and has been described.
and sharing of information was good. Thank you for contributions.
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Since when should the world's best protection be considered a "burden?" God forbid a few more cars hit the local roads and a little more demand be placed on their utility capacity from the extra families in town of those putting their butts on the line for those "taxpayers." How about the burden of a psychopath's military reigning down upon them...and Kim Jong himself dressed in his mechanics suit riding through their streets on his white stallion (like the paintings of him in N. Korea...he really does ride a white stallion, right?).
Maybe I'm not understanding the source of the "burden," but I get sick of hearing others who've been (or are being) shielded by our flag bitch and moan about how we do it wrong, inconvenience them, or some other deficiency. Let's see them grow their own defense and technology to support it...how about THAT burden?!