Standards will soon drop for ROK Army conscription:
The South Korean military said Sunday it plans to lower the bar for the conscription of active duty soldiers, as the country’s population is widely expected to shrink drastically.
The Ministry of National Defense and the Military Manpower Administration are currently in the process of revising related regulations to lower the physical requirements and standards for active duty troops.
The measure under review comes amid a precipitate fall in the country’s population. The phenomenon is likely to drastically cut the number of men in their 20s to less than 250,000 after 2022, compared to some 350,000 as of 2017, leaving far fewer able-bodied young men eligible for the mandatory military service.
“The Military Manpower Administration and other related bodies predict a major problem in securing manpower (for active duty troops) from around 2021. They plan to revise (the conscription standards) next year,” a government official said.
Under the revised plan, the government will use a new set of medical standards that are less strict than those currently applied, such as those on body mass index and high blood pressure.
The new standards are likely to be finalized in early 2021, and the military will continue to take steps to gradually further loosen the requirements, according to the official.
Yonhap
You can read more at the link.
It looks like there is going to be a surge of Jehovah’s Witnesses in South Korea after this court ruling:
South Korea’s Supreme Court ruled Thursday that moral scruples and religious beliefs are valid reasons to refuse compulsory military service, a landmark change in the court’s decades-long stance on conscientious objection and one that’s expected to impact the fate of over 900 men.
Thursday’s verdict concerned only one defendant, a 34-year-old Jehovah’s Witness named Oh Seung-heon. In a nine to four vote, the full bench ordered an appellate court to retry his case, effectively clearing him of charges that he violated the Military Service Act. (…….)
Conscientious objection has long been a subject of public debate in South Korea.
More than 19,000 conscientious objectors were criminally punished under South Korean law since the 1950s, mostly serving 18 months in jail. A majority of those objectors were Jehovah’s Witnesses, a Christian sect that bases its refusal to serve in the military on Isaiah 2:4, a part of which reads, “Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore.”
South Korea’s Supreme Court said Thursday that it “violates the practice of tolerance towards minorities, a spirit of free democracy, to uniformly force the implementation of mandatory military service and criminally charge those who fail to fulfill.” In that sense, the court continued, conscientious objection falls into the category of a “valid reason” not to comply with the military’s call for enlistment. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but the Jehovah’s Witness defendant did say he is willing to do mandatory civilian service. I wonder if there is a religious reason not to be part of the riot police?
The people most needed to fight the North Koreans, the younger generation are the ones the least likely to want to fight according to the below survey. I guess this survey could be used to justify why the ROK continues to need the mandatory service requirement:
A government survey finds that 72 percent of South Koreans are willing to fight for the country if a war breaks out.
According to the survey by the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, those in their 50s were the most willing to participate at 83-point-five percent, followed by those in their 60s at 81-point-five percent.
The rate was 50-point-seven percent among those in their 20s, with the rate for those in their 30s reaching 59 percent.
The rate was lower among younger people, white-collar workers, students and highly-educated people.
Fifty-five percent of the respondents said that the country should side with the U.S. if a war breaks out between the U.S. and North Korea. Twenty-four percent said the country should remain neutral, while five-point-eight percent said the country should side with North Korea.
About half of the respondents viewed the country’s security conditions as serious.
The ministry conducted the survey on about one-thousand people age 15 or order in November last year. [KBS World Radio]
I did not realize that in Korea that it is actually illegal to give a veteran hiring preference, but this governmental committee is trying to change this in an effort to reform ROK military culture:
A committee meant to reform the military culture recommended that the government give extra points to job applicants who complete military service, a move that could reignite the controversy over the divide between men and women.
The committee recommended that such applicants be given a bonus 2 percent on company examinations, but that only 10 percent of successful applicants at a single company can receive the benefit.
It also said an individual can only receive the benefit five times in his lifetime while those who received heavy punishment for serious wrongdoings will be excluded from the proposed benefits, according to the committee.
“To help encourage draftees to successfully carry out their military duty, the ministry will review the recommendation that calls for giving extra credits to enlistees when they apply for a job,” the defense ministry said.
The move, however, could draw opposition from women, who are not obligated to serve in the military, at a time when the job market remains tight.
In 1999, the Constitutional Court ruled as unconstitutional the law giving males who served in the military an advantage in applying for public service positions, saying it was unfair to women and the disabled. [Yonhap]
You can read more at the link, but if the ROK is serious about changing the military culture then spend the money to professionalize more of the military.
