Sluggish reaction to defectors raises questions over South's military readiness

The South Korean military’s readiness against a possible attack from North Korea is being questioned since North Koreans have defected by sea.

Democratic Party Rep. Kim Byung-joo asks questions at the Korean military during the National Assembly audit on Tuesday. [YONHAP]

The South Korean military’s readiness against a possible attack from North Korea is being questioned since North Koreans have defected by sea.

The criticism is raised on the wake of Israeli defense rendered useless by the unexpected incursion by the Palestinian militant group Hamas that killed or captured civilians earlier this month.

“The navy has to detect objects that cross over the Northern Limit Line (NLL) and travels 40 to 50 kilometers from it,” Democratic Party Rep. Kim Byung-joo said at the National Assembly’s audit on Tuesday. “One could only consider the operation a failure as it took place after the resident made the initial report.”

On Tuesday a fisherman in Sokcho, Gangwon, reported a suspicious wooden ship drifting at 7:10 a.m.

An hour later the North Koreans were picked up by the South Korean coast guard, which was roughly 11 kilometers offshore of Dongbuk harbor in Sokcho.

The South Korean military has said it has been monitoring the wooden boat since it had been detected it.

The Joint Chief of Staff reported that it had detected unusual movements from the North Korean military around 4 a.m. and sent in the South Korean navy’s patrol vessel and naval vessel.

Around 5:30 a.m. the military radar detected an object traveling at a low speed southwest roughly 40 to 50 kilometers from the NLL.

The military said since 6:30 a.m. it had started to closely follow the object with a thermal observation device.

“The movement by the North Korean military could have been related to chasing after the wooden boat,” said a military official.

However, the military is facing criticism over taking more than two hours to take actions since detecting the object from North Korea.

South Korean security might have been critically damaged if North Korean military made an infiltration much like the attack tactics that Hamas took.

The Korean military claimed that it is difficult to deploy the South Korean navy on the numerous spots that show up on radar.

It added that although it took a while, the South Korean military was able to closely track down the object and responded accordingly as it is difficult to distinguish a wooden boat.

“The boat was very small and we concluded that its threat level was low,” said a military officer, who requested anonymity. “We had plans to send a high-speed boat if it reaches close to shore. We didn’t start our operation after the report [by the fisherman] was made.”

The military official also emphasized the challenges in trying to secure an extensive NLL as the de facto maritime boundary in the East Sea alone is 400 kilometers.

At the National Assembly audit the South Korean Navy Fleet Commander Kim Myung-soo told lawmakers that the boat that traveled down to South Korea was smaller than the boat that two North Koreans traveled by in 2019, making it hard to detect.

He especially noted the vastness of the East Sea compared to the West Sea.

In 2019 two North Korean defected through the East Sea. However, the Moon Jae-in government at the time repatriated the two men back to North Korea claiming that they were wanted for murder.

It was later found that the two men had expressed their will to defect.

BY LEE HO-JEONG [lee.hojeong@joongang.co.kr]