A Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD, system arrives at Osan Air Base, South Korea, March 6, 2017. (U.S. Air Force)
The president of South Korea this week opposed the removal of U.S. air defense systems from his country to the Middle East but said doing so will not significantly affect Seoul’s ability to deter Pyongyang.
“While we have expressed opposition to the possible redeployment” of some U.S. air defense assets, “the reality is that we cannot fully impose our position,” President Lee Jae Myung said at a Tuesday cabinet meeting livestreamed online.
The Pentagon is moving parts of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system from South Korea to the Middle East, according to unnamed officials quoted by The Washington Post that day.
The military is also drawing on Patriot interceptors in the Indo-Pacific to counter Iranian drone and missile threats, the officials said in the report.
The U.S. was rushing to replace a THAAD radar — critical to shooting down ballistic missiles — that was damaged in an Iranian-backed drone strike in Jordan, according to an unnamed U.S. official quoted March 6 by the Wall Street Journal.
“For operational security reasons, we do not comment on the movement of specific military capabilities or assets,” the Pentagon and U.S. Forces Korea said in statements emailed Wednesday to Stars and Stripes. “United States Forces Korea remains focused on maintaining a combat-credible force posture on the Korean Peninsula.”
South Korea’s government expects USFK to fully contribute to peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula, Lee told the cabinet.
“However, one thing to consider is that if you ask whether this significantly disables our deterrence strategy against North Korea, my answer is absolutely not,” he said.
THAAD is too essential for North Korean deterrence to move off the peninsula, said Riki Ellison, founder of the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance, which lobbies for missile defense, deployment and development.
A $20,000 Iranian drone has destroyed THAAD radars and disabled the systems, Ellison wrote in an email Wednesday. The conflict shows layers of air defense are needed, including defense of fixed-site radars from drones, he added.
“If you cannot do that, why would you send any fixed-site radar to the Middle East?” he wrote.
The United States deployed air defense personnel from South Korea to the Middle East last year.
A Patriot missile battalion — 2nd Battalion, 1st Air Defense Artillery Regiment — returned to South Korea in October after a six-month deployment.
The mission’s timing and language in a statement announcing the unit’s return suggested its troops participated in missile defense operations at a U.S. base in Qatar after a June 22 strike by Air Force B-2 bombers on Iranian sites at Fordo, Natanz and Isfahan.
Soon after that attack, Patriot air defense crews reportedly intercepted a barrage of Iranian missiles targeting Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, home to Central Command’s forward headquarters.
U.S. commanders ordered an evacuation ahead of the assault, but 44 soldiers remained to defend the base. Patriot crews from South Korea and Japan were among those dispatched to reinforce air defenses.
