ROK-U.S. Unify Evaluation of NK Military Power

Korea and the U.S. agreed on the unification of the evaluation standard to judge the degree of the threat for the conventional military weapons of the North Korean People`s Army.

This is the first step for the detail measures based on the Korea-U.S. agreement, at the meeting of the Korea-U.S. Defense Ministers in Washington on June 21, on the close cooperation with each other for the matters of the North Korean conventional weapons.

According to a military authority, the Joint Chiefs of Staffs recently agreed with the U.S. Military Headquarters in Korea on the unification of the evaluation standards for the North Korean military drills such as the participating units and the duration of the drills.

While the Korean Military has evaluated the North Korean military drills based on the highest units participated in the drills up to now, the U.S. has set up a standard for the evaluation on the Battalions. Both have agreed to evaluate the North Korean military drills based on the Battalion units, considering the companies of the Tank units and the mechanized units.

In addition, the Korean Military, which has never considered the duration of the military drills for the evaluation, will add the item following the method of the U.S.

The Korean and the U.S. officials will meet to adjust the evaluations of the both sides after the end of the large-scale North Korean military drills, including the regular military drills in summer and winter.

A military source said that ``the evaluation standards for the degrees of threat from the North Korean military drills have been varying between the Korean military and the U.S. army. Even in the U.S. army, the standards of the U.S. Army in Korea, the Pacific Headquarters, and the Intelligence Bureau of the Defense Department have had different standards. However, according to the new agreement, the U.S. side will adjust its evaluation standard and will apply the new standard from September this year.``

Another military source analyzed that ``the South will be able to go for the negotiation with the North based on the unified evaluation on the North Korean Army. However, the differences between Korea and the U.S. for the evaluation of the North Korean military drills have been slight.`` Meanwhile, Thomas Schwartz the commander of the Combined Forces Command visited Korea`s Defense Minister Kim Dong-Shin to express his full support for the Defense Ministers` agreement that Korea would lead the dialogues with the North about the conventional weapons in close cooperation with the U.S.

Lee Chol-Hi klimt@donga.com