Military to promote drastic restructuring

The Defense Ministry is pushing ahead with a drastic restructuring for a 10 percent reduction in personnel expenses.

Defense Minister Cho Seong-Tae has ordered the related ministry officials to work out a concrete action plan for the reduction of personnel expenses in the Army, Navy and Air Force. The ministry plans to study programs to be worked out by the three military services and establish a comprehensive plan within the next month for the gradual implementation of the programs.

This policy was launched to cope with the public criticism that the military is idle while other sectors are embroiled in the vortex of structural reforms. In particular, it was pointed out that personnel expenses stand at 4.48 trillion won this year, 42.1 percent of the total defense ministry budget, or 15.38 trillion won, while the budget for strengthening defense capabilities is decreasing continuously.

With a goal of cutting about 38 percent of the personnel expenses out of the total ministry budget over the coming five years, the defense ministry is considering an initial plan to reduce the number of high-ranking military officials including generals and colonels.

To this end, the ministry is studying plans to readjust ranks and positions downward and not to fill vacancies being left by transfers. At the same time, a revision to the military management act will be considered in order to facilitate early retirements of the military personnel. In the proposed measure, the officials who fail to get assignments for a certain period will be automatically dismissed.

However, the military restructuring plan will face considerable difficulty in its actual implementation, in conjunction with the ongoing program for the army reduction and military reinforcement.