Ministry of National Defense Republic of Korea

The Ministry of Defense has entered the beginning stage of a reform of Korea’s defense. On August 31st, a spokesperson for the Ministry announced: "President Moon Jae-in decided to start the National Defense Reform Initiative early this month in order to accelerate defense reform, which he strongly advocated for in the core policy debate on the 28th. For this reason, we decided to launch the National Defense Reform 2.0 early, to reflect President Moon's intent, which he himself called ‘an order from the people that cannot be further delayed.’ "

Organized under the direct control of the Minister of Defense, the Defense Reform Bureau will be composed of three groups: the military structure reform team, the defense operation reform team, and the defense acquisition reform team. The Bureau will be organized based on the existing organization, and will cooperate organically with the Task Force (TF), which is organized by the JCS and each army.

The reform proposals that will be developed by the project team include the reorganization of troops and power structures based on the "how to fight" concept that has been expressed by the Ministry of Defense in key policy discussions. In addition, intensive reforms such as military structural reform and power generation plans for the early establishment of North Korea's nuclear and missile threat control capabilities, protection of human rights for military personnel, improvement of service conditions, eliminating corruption in the defense industry and improving the defense acquisition system will be chosen as agenda items.

The Ministry of National Defense said, "We will actively cooperate with the Defense Reform TF of the Blue House, which will be operational from early this month, through a mutual review and adjustment process, and develop defense reform 2.0 plans by the end of the year, after which we will continue the process of collecting opinions through public hearings until next March. "

By Su-Yeol, Maeng <guns13@dema.mil.kr >

<Copyright ⓒ The Korea Defense Daily, All rights reserved>