Ministry of Defense Trying to Decrease Mandatory Service Exemptions
The Ministry of Science does not want to give up their free labor to the Ministry of Defense:
The Ministry of Science and ICT and the Ministry of National Defense have come into conflict over the latter’s move to reduce the number of military duty exemptions for science and engineering majors by half.
While all able-bodied South Korean men must serve in the military for about two years as the two Koreas remain technically at war, those with master’s degrees or doctorates in natural sciences or engineering have been allowed to spend their military service working at R&D departments of state-designated research institutes.
The defense ministry is claiming that downsizing such special exemptions, which were introduced in 1973, is necessary to make up for the expected shortage in the number of active-duty personnel amid a constantly declining population.
But the science ministry as well as universities, research institutes and students are arguing that the exemptions have effectively contributed to the development of the nation’s R&D sector and thus must be retained.
Korea Times
You can read more at the link.
The communist Chinese, during the so-called Cultural Revolution, had surgeons slopping hogs… so this move almost fits our cynicism.
2IDdoc may know this but general question for the group: What vaccines does ROK MND require for their military? More to the point, are they required the anthrax series? On some level, I’m trying to make sense why the US military is required to have it before going to Korea when the ROK military doesn’t give it to their own troops.