America’s Occupation of Korea: Where Are US Troops Based and What Scandals Have They Been Mired in

How many troops does the US have in South Korea? Where are they? What are they doing there? Which US politicians have called for them to be pulled out and why? Sputnik explores.

The US and South Korea are “deepening our nuclear and strategic planning efforts” and “increasing the regular deployment of US strategic assets on the Korean Peninsula,” DoD chief Lloyd Austin announced in a press conference with his South Korean counterpart in Washington this week.

The Pentagon began turning South Korea into its own regional military bridgehead from 1945 onward, with the roughly 25,400 US troops currently stationed there constituting the US’ third-largest permanent deployment abroad after Japan and Germany.

The US Army alone occupies about two dozen bases and nearly 140 command posts along the mountainous Kaesong-Munsan Corridor. This includes Camp Humphreys – America’s largest overseas base, located about 65 km south of Seoul.

The US Navy operates bases in the strategic Korean coastal cities of Busan, Chinhae, and Pyeongtaek, with the Busan base capable of servicing up to 30 vessels at once, including Nimitz-class supercarriers and nuclear missile subs. US naval deployments in the region have been a constant source of consternation for North Korea – which has often staged large-scale artillery drills and tested missiles while US warships are present to let the Pentagon know Pyongyang is on guard.

The US Air Force flies its missions predominantly out of the Osan and Kunsan air bases in South Korea’s southwest. During the Korean War of 1950-1953, US aviation bombed Korea into the stone age, dropping more explosives on the country than in the entire Pacific theater during all of WWII (635,000 tons vs. 500,000 tons, respectively).

US Marines operate their own base – Camp Mujuk in the southeast – but also have access to bases used by the Army.

The Pentagon requires an entire separate command to coordinate all these forces, known as United States Forces Korea (USFK), headquartered at Camp Humphreys. USFK is currently commanded by four-star Army General Paul LaCamera.

US Nukes in Korea

During the Cold War, the United States deployed as many as 950 nuclear warheads in South Korea – enough firepower to obliterate Seoul’s neighbor and wreak havoc on the neighboring Soviet Union and China. The USSR and China did not put nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula during the Cold War

Costly Presence

The Pentagon’s footprint in Korea doesn’t come cheap. A 2021 report by the Congressional Government Accountability Office found that between 2016 and 2019 alone, the US spent $13.4 billion in the country on military salaries, base construction, and maintenance. Seoul spent $5.8 billion to support the US presence during the same period.

Scandals Involving US Troops

From the reputational standpoint as well, the US presence in Korea has had its consequences, with US soldiers both historically and today regularly implicated in crimes ranging from prostitution and human trafficking to rape, abuse of minors, and drug-related offences.

Time to Go Home

There are a few proponents of an exit from Korea in Washington. “How long do we have to stay in Korea? We were there since I was in high school,” then-76-year-old GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul quipped at a campaign event in 2011.

In 2022, former Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Donald Trump had proposed the “complete withdrawal of US forces from South Korea,” which Esper explained prompted him to pacify the president into reneging on the idea.

Earlier this year, Trump said in an interview that the US might withdraw troops from “wealthy” South Korea if it doesn’t pay its share for defense. “I want South Korea to treat us properly,” Trump said, adding that the current US commitment to the country “doesn’t make any sense.”

North Korea has often cited the US troop presence, and “provocative” exercises of American forces alongside their South Korean counterparts near the Demilitarized Zone frontier, as one of the reasons for its heightened security posture, and development of nuclear weapons. During the Trump administration and the presidency of South Korean leader Moon Jae-in, important steps, including a series of historic, high-profile meetings between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his South Korean and US counterparts, were taken to try to defuse regional tensions.

But tensions ramped back up again under President Joe Biden, with the US leader opting not to meet with Kim, as well as resuming and expanding military drills in the region, including exercises incorporating forces from Japan, and signing a trilateral security pact with Seoul and Tokyo in 2023. The measure prompted North Korea to ink the historic Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Treaty with Russia.

“Now the situation and security of our country due to the machinations of the United States and its satellites, all this is in a very dangerous and unstable state…The military alliance of the United States and South Korea is turning into a military alliance with a nuclear component. This shows that the situation on the Korean Peninsula can become explosive at any moment. This is very dangerous for the security of the Korean Peninsula and for the Northeast Asian region as a whole,” North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui said at a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow on Friday.

“Very close cooperation has been established between military and security services of the two countries. This also allows us to effectively address important issues related to the safety of our and your citizens,” Lavrov said.