Air Force Community - Air Force Times

South Korea is family-friendly, but airmen needed elsewhere

Lt. Gen. Jeffrey A. Remington is out to change airmen’s perception of South Korea, where he’s the top U.S. air commander.

Remington insists the Asian nation isn’t a remote posting that demands personal sacrifice and separation from family. Airmen can bring their loved ones, and those who do will find plenty of support to help their spouses and children adjust to living in a foreign country.

“We have a goal that 50 percent of U.S. airmen will be able to bring their families when they come here,” Remington said in a Feb.25 telephone interview.

The general makes it clear he wants airmen to come to South Korea, to see it as he sees it — a place filled with culture and friendly people.

What Remington wouldn’t acknowledge in the interview is the growing number of young South Koreans who don’t like the U.S. This anti-American sentiment is a new phenomenon in a traditionally and still largely hospitable country, but it’s there nonetheless.

And North Korea has been — and remains — both hostile and a formidable threat to the U.S.

Kim Jong Il’s military equipment is old but plentiful, including 1,200 tanks. Remington has three squadrons of upgraded F-16C/D block 40 Fighting Falcons, one squadron of A-10A Thunderbolt IIs, or “Warthogs,” and a detachment of U-2 reconnaissance aircraft.

Comparing the numbers raises questions: Why is the Air Force moving so slowly to replace the U-2 with the RQ-4 Global Hawk? And why doesn’t South Korea rate the A-10C “precision engagement” version of the Warthog? Remington argued the C models are needed in Iraq and Afghanistan, but those countries don’t have tanks.

Contrary to his portrayal in the media, North Korea’s Kim is rational and probably won’t attack. Still, we should treat the Korean peninsula as a potential war zone because the threat is there, and it is colossal. We shouldn’t turn South Korea into a playground for families as we did with West Germany during the Cold War.

Some military thinkers argue it’s time to “reset” our armed forces, give troops a break, and modernize the equipment and tactics we need for a “peer” war of the kind we’d wage against North Korea.

As a former Korea specialist in the Air Force and the State Department, I believe the “reset” should include reducing our footprint in South Korea while we catch a breather and reorganize.

Remington thinks America’s forward presence in Asia encourages regional stability. Any talk of withdrawal “becomes a political discussion inside the United States,” but he is against it.

From my standpoint, cutting U.S. presence in South Korea — rather than building it up to accommodate spouses and children — could help a government already drowning in debt and borrowing billions more.

———

The writer, an air Force veteran, is co-author of “Hell Hawks,” a history of an American fighter group. He lives in Oakton, Va. His e-mail address is robert.f.dorr@cox.net.