The US has established a space force in South Korea. The US military sent off a space force unit in South Korea on Wednesday that will assist better with distinguishing long-range rocket dispatches from North Korea.
This year, North Korea has tested a record number of weapons, including its most recent intercontinental ballistic missile last month.
A statement from US Forces Korea (USFK) states that the new unit will provide “near-real-time detection and warning of ballistic missile launches.”
“An existential threat exists just 48 miles (77 kilometers) north of us; a threat that we must be prepared to prevent, defend against, and, if necessary, defeat,” said the new space force unit’s leader, Lieutenant Colonel Joshua McCullion.
He stated that the new unit increases the “ironclad commitment to the US-Korea alliance.”
Read: What is behind the growing militarisation of South Korea?
Since the Korean War ended in an armistice rather than a peace treaty in 1950–53, approximately 28,500 US troops are stationed in the South to assist in protecting it from the nuclear-armed North. The South is technically still at war with the North.
In 2018, former President Donald Trump directed the establishment of the Space Force, arguing that the Pentagon required it to address space vulnerabilities and establish US dominance in space. One of the few space force units that operate outside of the US mainland is the new unit in South Korea.
At its Indo-Pacific Command in Hawaii, the United States armed forces put in place a space force component command last month.
In an effort to improve US-South Korean coordination in space command, the Air Force of South Korea established its own space squadron earlier this month.
