"The minister was pushing back on the lawmaker's premise that the US struggles in war"
Joint Chiefs: GOP alert operations and civilian control line are distinct concepts
South Korea's Defense Ministry on Tuesday asked the public to consider the full context of remarks by Defense Minister Kang Shin-chul, who appeared to question whether US forces could be trusted if war broke out with North Korea, during a comprehensive audit by the National Assembly's defense committee.
Defense Ministry spokesperson Jeong Bit-na said at a regular briefing Tuesday that it would be best to watch the full video of the exchange. "The lawmaker's question itself was premised on the idea that the United States was struggling in the Middle East war, and the minister was pushing back on that premise," she said.
Jeong added that Kang's intended meaning was: "If we follow the lawmaker's logic in assessing the US-Iran war, it seems like you're saying we can't trust US forces if war breaks out with North Korea either — but that's not the case." She said the minister immediately followed the remark by stressing trust in the alliance, and that Kang had emphasized the importance and reliability of the South Korea-US alliance since his time as a nominee.
Jang Do-young, chief of public affairs at the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addressed questions about a woman in her 30s who allegedly crossed the civilian control line in Cheorwon, Gangwon Province without authorization and damaged fencing at a front-line general outpost. He said the primary mission of the military's GOP is to guard against enemy threats from the front, while the civilian control line "is not a line for monitoring or surveilling our own citizens — it is a concept operated with the cooperation of the public to ensure the smooth conduct of military operations, maintain military security, and protect citizens from hazards such as unconfirmed minefields."
"Accordingly, our military operates checkpoints focused mainly on road control along the civilian control line," Jang said. "Front-line GOP alert operations, which are directed at the enemy, and the operation of the civilian control line, which is premised on public cooperation, are fundamentally different in nature." He said describing the incident as the civilian control line being "breached" conflated the two distinct concepts.
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