A joint special advisory committee of the public, private and military sectors recommended to the Ministry of National Defense on the 20th that the Drone Operations Command be abolished. The advisory committee said its functions overlap with those of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps, and if the ministry accepts the recommendation, the Drone Operations Command will disappear after just over two years. The committee also recommended establishing a Joint Operations Command and a Space Command with the goal of transferring wartime operational control (OPCON).
The Ministry of National Defense said the Future Strategy Subcommittee of the joint special advisory committee of the public, private and military sectors completed its work and recommended these improvements. In its recommendation, the subcommittee said, "In an inefficient situation where each service's drone-related functions are duplicated, it is better to pursue an integrated plan for developing drone combat." Instead, considering the space security environment and the shape of future warfare, it noted the need to establish a Space Command.
The Drone Operations Command was established in Sep. 2023. At the time, the Yoon Suk-yeol administration created the Drone Operations Command, saying that if North Korea sent one unmanned aircraft over Seoul, the military would send more than 10 unmanned aircraft toward Pyongyang. It was set to command and control a force separate from each service's drone assets. Along with defense against North Korean unmanned aircraft, it carried out missions such as surveillance and reconnaissance and precision strikes.
If the Ministry of National Defense accepts the subcommittee's recommendation, the Drone Operations Command will be abolished and reorganized into a Drone Command without operational authority. Spokesperson Jeong Bit-na of the Ministry of National Defense said at a regular briefing that day, "This is the subcommittee's view and recommendation," adding, "We will review the subcommittee's content and validity and reflect it in defense reform policy."
The subcommittee also recommended establishing a Joint Operations Command in preparation for the transfer of OPCON. The aim is to unify the command structure and enhance the completeness of operational command in both wartime and peacetime. Accordingly, the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) would transfer its operational functions to the Joint Operations Command and presented an adjustment plan under which it would be responsible for strategic situation assessment, military strategy development and force build-up.
The subcommittee also proposed tasks such as early fielding of key assets to deter the North's nuclear program, including high-yield, ultra-precise ballistic missiles and the long-range surface-to-air missile L-SAM, and increasing the defense research and development budget by an average of at least 10% annually. In addition, amid a decline in the pool of conscripts, it recommended using civilian personnel such as government service employees and private military companies (PMCs) in noncombat areas such as cooking and transport, and later expanding that to some combat support areas.
It also called for improving the conscription system so that, upon enlistment, recruits can choose to serve as multi-year professional soldiers in addition to short-term conscripts, to prepare for a decrease in the conscription pool. Based on this design, the subcommittee proposed a defense workforce level totaling 500,000 by 2040, including 350,000 active-duty troops and 150,000 civilian defense personnel.
The subcommittee on entrenching constitutional values in the public, private and military sectors also announced its recommendations that day. It called for amending the Military Service Basic Act to specify the right to refuse unlawful orders and, at the same time, to present specific criteria so frontline personnel can determine what constitutes an unlawful order. It also called for an immunity clause so those who refuse an unlawful order are not punished for insubordination, among other charges.
The Ministry of National Defense plans to review each subcommittee's recommendations and reflect them in the basic plan for defense reform as short-, mid- and long-term tasks.