ROK Air Force Announces Closure of Suwon Airbase
It will be interesting to see where this important airbase is relocated to and if the Patriot missile units located there will follow them:
U.S. military officials have yet to determine where a Patriot missile battery will be stationed after its current site, a South Korean air base, closes.
Suwon Air Base, roughly 20 miles south of Seoul, will be relocated following noise and damage complaints and a formal request from the local government, South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense recently announced.
Four batteries with the U.S. 35th Air Defense Artillery Brigade are stationed there along with South Korea’s 10th Fighter Wing. A U.S. airman from the 607th Materiel Maintenance Squadron is also permanently stationed at Suwon.
The base’s relocation, which could take a decade, is projected to cost $6.3 million, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency has reported. The defense ministry said the search for a new site will begin soon. No particular sites are under consideration for the relocation of the base or the U.S. forces stationed there, an MND spokesman said. [Stars & Stripes]
You can read more at the link, but fortunately the ROK Air Force has given themselves 10 years to figure out where the new airbase will go.
Only $6.3 million to close down a Korean airbase? I guess they don’t have to be bothered with all the environmental cleanups and such things that are required for bases operated but the U.S . military.
Just hand over the keys to the gates and go. 🙄
I doubt most people realize just how big Suwon AB is. Behind the airfield there is a HUGE “outback.” It’s mostly unused besides the golf course….
and 6.3 million seems an exceedingly low number… The relocation of main commo trunks which pass through, both US and ROK, alone would likely triple that number.
Noise and damage my eye! This is about real estate.
3. Of course it is. When they flew F-4’s out of there in the 90’s though, those things are loud! Sounded like freedom to me.
I was stationed there 85-6, and the RoKaf flew F-86Ds, F100s, and F-4Ds. They were transitioning to the F-16A.
When I was there in ’69 in support of a F-102 interceptor squadron there was a small village across from the main gate and little else but rice fields for miles. The growth is amazing and is undoubtedly the reason for relocating the base. But you would think the sale of the land would significantly defray the costs of relocation.