US to pullout 12,500 troops from S Korea

US Assistant Secretary of Defence Richard Lawless (L) talks with his South Korean counterpart Kwon Ahn-Doo before a meeting at the Defence Ministry in Seoul yesterday. A South Korean official announced yesterday that the US plans to withdraw 12,000 troops from South Korea by the end of next year. PHOTO: AFP

US officials maintain that the troop cut will not result in a weakening of its ability to deter the Stalinist member of President George W. Bush's "axis of evil."

"The United states informed us of its plan to pull out 12,500 troops by the end of December 2005. That figure includes 3,600 to be sent to Iraq," said Kim Sook, the head of the foreign ministry's North American affairs bureau.

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Kim said that South Korea had a counter-proposal to present to the United States, which would be delivered after consultations between related government agencies.

Washington currently stations more than 37,000 troops in South Korea under a five-decade-old mutual defence pact.

"US troops will eventually be reduced to 25,000," Kim added at a televised press conference here.

The announcement comes amid lingering uncertainty over the unresolved 20-month standoff over North Korea's nuclear weapons drive and amid growing concern about the health of the US-South Korean military alliance.

Kim said the US plan was disclosed at talks late Sunday with Richard Lawless, the US deputy assistant secretary of defence.

He said Lawless had explained that the troop realignment was part of Washington's ongoing Global Defence Posture Review (GPR) and would be pursued in such a way as to avoid weakening the capability of US and South Korean forces to deter a nuclear-armed North Korea.

"The United States has pushed for the GPR plan over the past two years according to the changing security environment affecting all US troops including those in Japan, Germany and elsewhere in the world," he said.

Under the GPR plan, Washington is seeking to transform its military into a leaner, more mobile force to deal with the shifting post-Cold War security environment.

The announcement came during scheduled talks on the military alliance between South Korea and the United States.

Those talks were to focus on long-standing US plans to realign its forces in South Korea by pulling front-line troops away from the border with communist North Korea to bases south of Seoul.

Part of the plan includes the relocation of the Yongsan military garrison, headquarters of US forces in South Korea, away from Seoul to an area further south.

The issue of wide-ranging troop withdrawals from the Korean peninsula was dealt with as a separate item and is certain to have a deep impact in South Korea, amid fears among conservatives that North Korea could exploit any security vacuum left by departing US troops.

North Korea fields a 1.1 million strong army arrayed close to the world's most heavily fortified border against South Korea's 700,000 troops.

Already Washington's recent announcement that it will redeploy 3,600 troops from its elite 2nd Infantry Division based in South Korea to reinforce the US-led coalition forces in Iraq triggered a backlash from some South Koreans.

Others, including many younger South Koreans, no longer see North Korea as a military threat and would welcome the departure of US troops, according to opinion polls.

The initial redeployment to Iraq scheduled to start around August marks the first reduction in US troop numbers in South Korea since the early 1990s.

Washington has repeatedly denied that its realignment plans and its broader strategy of re-evaluating its forces world-wide reflect a loosening of its commitment to the defence of South Korea.

Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said last week that despite changes in the alignment, there will be no weakening of US deterrent capabilities against North Korea.