It will be interesting to see how reliable the drones will be in the mountains during the winter months if they do move forward with this plan:
The Defense Ministry says it plans to use drones to transport military supplies to mountainous areas.
A South Korean military official says starting this year, the military will begin testing drone transport of common military items like ammunition and first aid equipment.
Drones are far cheaper and can reach difficult or denied areas.
If the testing works out, all branches of the military would eventually adopt drone transport technology and the military would aim to commercialize it within five years. [KBS World Radio]
USFK has some new capability forward deployed on the peninsula:
The U.S. is to deploy new attack drones in South Korea that could be used to kill North Korean leaders and launch pinpoint strikes on its missile launch pads.
Twelve Gray Eagle/MQ-1Cs will arrive at an air base in Gunsan, North Jeolla Province in March and April. Their deployment coincides with joint South Korea-U.S. drills that will be staged in early April right after the closing of the Winter Paralympics in Pyeongchang.
Construction of a hangar and other support facilities was completed late last month, and support personnel have already arrived. [Chosun Ilbo]
The ROK military is embracing the future of combat by using swarms of cheaply made and weaponized drones to attack enemy targets:
South Korean troops use reconnaissance drones during training in this file photo provided by the Korea Army Academy at Yeong-Cheon. (Yonhap)
South Korea’s Army will create a combat unit of weaponized drones next year to help counter North Korea’s threats, an official said Tuesday.
The Army calls the envisioned defense asset a “dronebot,” a combination of the words “drone” and “robot.”
“The Army plans to set up a special organization to lead the development of dronebots, establish a standard platform and expand the dronebot program by function,” the Army official said, requesting anonymity. “To begin with, we will launch a dronebot combat unit next year and use it as a ‘game changer’ in warfare.”
The team will operate reconnaissance dronebots against such core North Korean targets as nuclear and missile sites. In case of a contingency, swarms of dronebots will be mobilized to launch attacks. [Yonhap]
It looks like the newspaper delivery boy is on the verge of becoming obsolete:
A drone operated by Korea Post takes off from a port in Goheung, South Jeolla, to deliver mail and packages to the residents of Deungnyang Island, which is about 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) off the coast. [KOREA POST]Jang In-kil, the lone mailman on Deungnyang Island off the coast of South Jeolla, travels to a port in Goheung, some 40 minutes away from the island, by boat at 8 a.m. every day to pick up mail and packages for the residents of the island. By the time Jang returns with the mail, it’s already 3 p.m., which means it takes over eight hours every day for him to collect the mail for his neighbors on the island.
That eight-hour trip may be shortened to just one hour, thanks to a new delivery service by government-operated drones.
Korea Post, the national postal service provider, on Tuesday started a trial run of its delivery drone on Jang’s daily route. The drone flew the 3.8-kilometer (2.4-mile) trip from the port in Goheung to a community center on the island in just 10 minutes, half an hour less than the time Jang had to spend on the sea every day. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but I wonder if South Korea will have the same regulatory issues preventing drone delivery that Amazon is experiencing in the US?
This makes me wonder how many drones have successfully completed their reconnaissance missions over South Korea?:
THAAD site on former South Korean golf course outside of Seongju.
A North Korean drone found last week by a South Korean civilian had spied on the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (Thaad) antimissile site in Seongju County, North Gyeongsang, before crashing into a mountain in Inje, Gangwon, on its way back to the North, according to local military officials.
The drone had traveled at least 270 kilometers (168 miles), the distance between the demilitarized zone and Seongju, to reach the Thaad field.
The South Korean military had not known about the flight until an Inje resident retrieved the drone from a mountain last Thursday at 11 a.m. and reported it to authorities the following day.
“Around 10 photos were found in the Japan-made Sony camera attached to the drone,” said a South Korean military official Monday, who embargoed the story until Tuesday. The photos of Thaad, he said, were among “several hundred,” which mostly featured mountains and civilian areas.
Local officials had to restore the camera because it was initialized, or formatted, by the time they got it. Further analysis was underway.
The South Korean military said the drone had started taking photos from the north side of Seongju all the way down to the south, then continued as it flew back towards North Korea. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but these drones are so cheap to make it seems like the Kim regime can just keep sending them over the DMZ until they are successful at capturing the imagery they want. It looks like the US military needs to consider getting one of these systems to counter North Korea’s drones.
The place is equidistant from Chuncheon (about 40 miles from Seoul) & Sokcho on the coast. Several NK drones crashed nearby in the past. pic.twitter.com/uFCG1pnWEx
It looks like the North Koreans have flown another drone over the DMZ:
South Korean troops fired warning shots at an “unidentified object” flying across the heavily fortified border from North Korea Tuesday afternoon, the South’s military announced.
The military detected the object traversing the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) southward in the Chorwon area in the eastern province of Gangwon at around 4 p.m., according to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).
It added the South’s military fired warning shots along with dispatching a warning broadcast.
A defense source said the military fired more than 90 K-3 machine gun rounds, adding it may have been a drone.
The South’s military is analyzing the object and its route and has beefed up its air defense posture, said the JCS. [Yonhap]
It looks like the ROK military needs to get themselves fielded with these systems to counter the drones North Korea is increasingly using.
