Civilian Guards Getting the Job Done in South Korea

The Stars and Stripes today is running an article the Korean contracted security guards providing proper force protection for US Army camps here in Korea:

Recent news reports blasting civilian contracted security at a handful of Army bases in the States and the U.S. European Command’s decision last week to conduct a comprehensive force protection assessment of all installations and facilities in the theater should not worry base residents in South Korea, officials here said.

That’s because anyone seeking to enter an installation here illegally would be up against multiple layers of gate security controls, including Korean National Police who patrol outside the bases, the 1,400 civilian guards who work inside the gates and the soldiers and technology that round out the package.

When I read this I began to immediately think of all the Koreans illegal on post gambling away despite all the security measures. The article did address this at least:

Stuart said 99.9 percent of the (contracted guards) are top notch. But anytime you gather a large group of people, he added, you’re going to have a few bad apples.

One example is the occasional television news story in which a reporter will secretly film himself bribing his way onto a U.S. installation usually the first step in getting footage of South Koreans illegally gambling on base slot machines.

The amount of Koreans gambling away at on post slot machine areas is due also to a systematic problem of people being signed in on post by ID card holders who then allow them to go to the slots, as well as corruption. Some may remember this scam uncovered last April when a Korean woman who was an ID card holder was signing people on to Yongsan for $30 a pop. The police found her bank account containing $1.2 million dollars from the scam.

You would think somebody would have noticed this woman coming in and out of Yongsan continuously with new customers the past three years. Not to mention employees at the casino noticing her dropping people off at the casino every day. That is why I think there was probably Korean employees complacent in this scam. I am willing to bet these activities are continuing on today. Just go to the on post slots or golf course. You think everyone in there is a valid ID card holder?