The USFK: A Regional Force?

I have been completely underwhelmed with the controversy over the USFK having missions beyond South Korea. The Workers’ Party, Southern Branch Democratic Labor Party recently leaked a classified document as support for his accusation that the USFK might actually be planning for missions outside South Korea. My reaction: So?

This really comes down to the question of whether you consider the USFK to be part of the U.S. Army or a bunch of rented security guards. If you say they’re here because of U.S. interests, then you have to concede that the U.S. can decide what those interests are (such as a sudden North Korean collapse, followed by looting and chaos around a North Korean reactor, or thousands of boat people trying to sail to Japan and South Korea in stormy seas). If you consider them Korea’s rent-a-cops, then by all means pay rent and stop bitching about the cost of the land, in addition to the coffee and donuts.

And of course, if you want to share secrets, you have to have a government that can be trusted to keep them. At this point, I’m not confident they can keep secrets from Norbert Vollertsen.