This assessment was first published in Risk Intelligence’s regular Strategic Insight (# 20) in December 2009.

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By Mingi Hyun, Research Fellow, Korea Institute for Maritime Strategy

In recent years, the security of the sea lines of communication (SLOC) has surfaced as a highly publicised international issue largely due to the former insecurity within the Malacca Strait as well as the ongoing multinational anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden. However, threats against SLOCs are by no means new, and they have emerged in one form or another for centuries. The recent threats against SLOCs have come from non-state actors, namely pirates and terrorists. When viewed within the context of both post-Cold War western military operations and the ongoing global war against terrorism, contemporary SLOC security may appear to involve largely, if not exclusively, non-state, or asymmetric, threats. However, the tendency to accentuate the asymmetric at the expense of the symmetric increasingly appears to be a Western manoeuvre. In East Asia, SLOC security has been perceived as an issue with both asymmetric and symmetric dimensions. The Republic of Korea (ROK) is one country that faces such threats and challenges near and abroad.

Korea’s blue-water construction

Since the end of the Cold War, international attention on Korean security has revolved heavily around North Korea’s nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) programs. Under this shadow, South Korea has quietly and rapidly modernised its armed forces to take on threats beyond North Korea, namely neighbouring countries. While the South Korean Ministry of National Defence does not name the individual countries, recent opinions expressed by South Korean security experts indicate the countries of foremost concern to be China and Japan. Additionally, a 2006 survey conducted by the state-run Korea Institute for Defence Analyses reveals the South Korean general public selecting China as the greatest threat to their future.

Such threat perceptions have pushed all branches of the South Korean military into a comprehensive modernisation program. While the country’s army and air force have made noticeable developments, no other service has been as heavily influenced by the expanding threat perception as the navy.

The Republic of Korea Navy (ROKN) began its blue-water construction during the late 1990’s, when its procurement programmes for major surface combatants, such as ocean-going destroyers and flat-deck helicopter carriers, saw noticeable increases in quantity. Since then, the ROKN has procured six 4,500-ton Chungmugong Yi Sun-Shin class (KDX-2) destroyers and is in the process of acquiring three 7,500-ton Sejong the Great class (KDX-3) AEGIS-equipped destroyers. Additionally, the country’s submarine capabilities have been drastically enhanced with the ongoing pursuit of nine 1,800-ton Son Won-Il class (Type 214) air-independent propulsion submarines. The most telling sign of all has been the ROKN’s procurement of the 18,000-ton helicopter carrier, ROKS Dokdo. Equipped with a flat flight deck, ROKS Dokdo has been subject to debates on whether it was built as an aircraft carrier. In addition to these vessels, the ROKN’s ocean-going vessels will likely increase in quantity and quality over the next several decades.

The reasons behind the ROKN’s unprecedented expansion are manifold. The ROKN does indeed intend to conduct multinational peace/stability operations in distant waters on behalf of the country’s national interest while under the aegis of both the United Nations and multinational coalitions. This is evident in the ROKN’s ongoing deployment in the Gulf of Aden as a member of Combined Task Force 151 (CTF-151).

However, the ROKN faces the task of undertaking another type of operation in distant waters: symmetric naval operations. As is the case with the country’s army and air force, the ROKN was modernised with conventional armed forces as its primary concern. These conventional capabilities face a realistic possibility of being employed to confront locally originating threats in distant theatres of operation. In other words, the ROKN may need to address concerns posed by other North East Asian navies in extra-regional theatres. Such concerns may emerge in the shape of threats against South Korea’s use of SLOCs outside of North East Asia.

North-East Asia’s naval build-up & South Korea

While global reach may not be the aim of a neighbouring country’s army or air force, all North-East Asian navies, aside from North Korea, have aspirations to conduct maritime operations outside of the immediate area. In the case of China and Japan, their likely areas of operation appear primarily to reside in North-East Asia, South-East Asia and the Indian Ocean. These desired areas of operation consist of SLOCs through which the vast majority of South Korean oil and gas imports pass.

Such build-ups have occurred while in the midst of brewing tensions in the maritime domain that many perceive may lead to conflict. These include the Sino-Japanese dispute over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Island, Sino-Taiwanese dispute over Taiwan’s independence and the multi-party dispute over the Spratly Islands between China and several South-East Asian countries.

Should any of these tensions fruition into war, South Korea’s access to SLOCs may become jeopardised for an uncertain period of time. For a country which depends almost entirely on the sea for its energy imports, South Korean observers have noted that in such instances, the ROKN may need to be deployed to provide support or escort of commercial vessels headed to and from South Korea.

The political instruments to be employed by the conflicting governments will be navies. In turn, should the South Korean government, or any other third party, desire to contribute in efforts to resolve, or at least temporarily halt, these seabourne conflicts, the deployment of their own navies may be required to either assist in enforcing peace during conflict or “keeping peace” after conflict so that stability may be reestablished in waters which consist of or are near key SLOCs.

However, aside from the Sino-Japanese dispute, there exists a noticeable gap in naval capabilities between China and the countries with whom it is in dispute. Further exacerbating this gap are two developments: the build-up of the People’s Liberation Army Navy Air Force (PLANAF) and the pursuit of naval facilities outside of mainland China. Such drastic differences between the disputing parties place a higher capability requirement for intervening third-party navies.

PLANAF air bases along China’s eastern and southern coastlines enable the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) to project three dimensional capabilities into these areas of dispute. Currently, of the East Asian powers, only China is capable of deploying such large air assets into these areas in a sustained and prolonged manner. It is also public knowledge that the PLAN will be adding a fleet of aircraft carriers over the mid to long term. In other words, aside from the United States Navy (USN), no East Asian armed force has the three-dimensional capability to match, or balance, China at sea in order to enforce peace or to mediate between disputing governments. Only the pursuit of aircraft carriers would assist the likes of South Korea and Japan in balancing Chinese capabilities in order to deter or water down a conflict involving China. Both countries are rumoured to be interested in converting existing ships into a carrier or pursuing a carrier platform, as evident in the ROKN’s Dokdo class vessel and Japan’s 14,000-ton Hyuga class and the planned 28,000-ton 22DDH vessels. However, whether carrier-based fighter jets will be employed aboard these ships remains unknown.

China has also been constructing naval installations and deep-water ports accessible by major surface combatants along key sea lanes and within close proximity of key chokepoints. In addition to the Chinese territory of Hainan Island, publicly available sources indicate China to have completed or currently pursuing such facilities in Burma, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. These facilities are stretched across waters that connect East Asia with the Middle East, Africa and Europe, and they may very well thicken China’s force gradient along key SLOCs.

While it has been understood that China intends to use its island and overseas facilities to defend against potential hostility against its distant interests, East Asian countries engaged in disputes with China may face difficulty accepting such reasoning as wholly sincere. While China may be able to defend its maritime assets against potential hostility, China’s acquisition of these facilities provides China with the ability to engage in naval warfare against the navies and maritime assets, such as transiting commercial vessels and stationary oil and gas platforms, belonging to countries over whom China may wish to exercise a degree of political control. While naval facilities on Hainan may directly affect conflicts in South-East Asia, the other facilities may be used in an indirect manner to coerce the seabourne commercial assets of opposing countries so as to test and reduce their political will in a given conflict or dispute.

As a result, third-party interventions into these theatres of conflict, whether in the form of peace enforcement or peace-keeping, may be a greater likelihood for countries that possess sophisticated naval capabilities at par or beyond those had by a future PLAN. Additionally, these navies must possess the ability to deploy a quantity of vessels for a prolonged period of time in an overseas theatre. Not only do the candidate countries include regional countries, namely South Korea, Japan and Singapore, but also include European navies which may experience a greater degree of ease exercising neutrality.

For South Korea, as well as Japan, should they desire to act as regional leaders in leading efforts to secure regional stability, it is important they maintain a certain level of naval presence close to or within those theatres, as the timing of the aforementioned conflicts may very well be uncertain. Should they occur, they may break out unexpectedly and without little or no prior warning. Forward deployment may permit the ability to suppress the scale of a sudden conflict by minimising the possibility of escalation.

A prime example may be found in South Korea’s West Sea, where the ROKN engaged the Korean People’s Navy (KPN) during the First and Second Yeonpyeong naval battles of 1999 and 2002 and the recent Daecheong Naval Battle of 2009. The West Sea has been an area ripe with tension for several decades, due to a maritime boundary dispute between the two Koreas.

The three incidents remain the only violent altercations between East Asian navies in recent memory, and all of them occurred suddenly and unexpectedly. While North Korean intentions behind instigating these incidents are unknown, South Korean experts remain divided as to whether these skirmishes were pre-meditated by North Korean leaders with political intentions or were voluntary actions committed by the sailors onboard. In other words, while political leaders may order minor skirmishes to test the opponent’s political will, it is also possible that sailors operating in tense waters may have acted on their own initiative absent of authorization. With regards to the latter, it is important to note that while governments may have more time to ponder decisions, the uniformed servicemen and servicewomen have mere seconds to make decisions when operating in areas ripe with tension, all the while pursuing the simultaneous duty of protecting their country and their own personnel. Should such minor altercations break out in disputed areas, the oft-uncontrollable fate of escalation remains a possibility.

The resulting casualties and collateral damage of the Korean naval battles were quite limited, while further escalations were fortunately prevented. Nevertheless, despite their significantly limited nature, these incidents were followed by temporary cessation of commercial activity in surrounding waters. Due to the location of the Korean naval skirmishes, the affected commercial vessels were known to have been fishing vessels. However, should such sudden seabourne conflicts occur around Taiwan or in the South China Sea, the effects are likely to influence commercial access to SLOCs, while their after effects may be far greater than those seen in the West Sea. Simply put, while the two Koreas fortunately decided against escalation, forward deployment of a third party navy in future regional conflicts may be crucial in maintaining or re-establishing SLOC security, as doing so may create opportunities to limit a conflict in its early stages prior to the commencement of escalation.

Challenges of symmetric SLOC security operations

In order for South Korea to undertake SLOC security operations to address the aforementioned symmetric concerns, South Korea may need to continue on a path it has pursued to combat piracy in the Gulf of Aden: multinational coalitions.

Through CTF-151, the ROKN, along with a host of other navies, has already benefited international interests. However, the ROKN could not have achieved such a feat had it pursued a unilateral path. Having to defend South Korea’s land and maritime territories from neighbouring countries, the ROKN is currently incapable of deploying a significant portion of its ocean-going fleet for overseas operations. Additionally, due to differing interest groups within the South Korean defence community, the ROKN is unable to pursue naval construction of desired scale. In turn, whether the ROKN is to confront asymmetric or symmetric opponents in distant waters, a coalition approach is a requisite. However, forming coalitions to confront symmetric threats will not be an easy task.

Asymmetric threats can be tackled through multinational coalitions. In turn, contributing navies tend to deploy a rather small portion of their overall capabilities to multinational coalitions that essentially burden-shares across a number of governments. Additionally, because non-state groups are often not sponsored by a national government, deploying national military capabilities against them may possess a greater degree of acceptance amongst a wider group of countries. The ongoing UN-sanctioned operations in the Gulf of Aden are an ideal example. After all, it is usually difficult to imagine the USN and the PLAN operating on the same side in the same theatre on behalf of a similar cause.

However, symmetric threats against SLOCs will likely occur in a rather different political environment. The aforementioned symmetric SLOC security operations will involve national navies. In turn, political sensitivities may make the formation of multinational coalitions relatively difficult. Additionally, while sophisticated ship design and weapons capabilities are not required for the likes of anti-piracy operations, symmetric naval operations will most likely require the more sophisticated navies as long as great power navies are involved in a given conflict or dispute. Therefore, not only will reluctance for participation in multinational coalitions stem from political factors but many governments may find it difficult to participate due to their own limited naval capabilities. In turn, the burden sharing as seen in anti-piracy operations may be far less likely to achieve in symmetric SLOC security operations.

Given such a political environment, the ROKN will likely need to work with navies of a relatively similar level of capability and, equally important, a similar level of political will to engage in such operations on a prolonged and consistent basis. The most likely solution may be found in the framework provided by the USN’s ‘Cooperative Maritime Strategy,’ namely the USN and its “partner” navies.

In January 2008, the South Korean media reported that a ROKN officer was dispatched to the USN’s 5th Fleet Headquarters in Bahrain, in order to expand the reach of the US-ROK alliance, as well as to establish an operational framework to enable US-ROK naval operations in the Indian Ocean. While a new development for South Korea, navy officers from approximately 20 other countries are known to be already working with the USN in Bahrain. Though belated, efforts undergoing between the two countries in Bahrain may prove to be the very beginning of a prolonged effort to maintain the security of key SLOCs relevant to the interests of both countries. While the US-ROK alliance has looked toward the Asian continent for decades, the focus of the alliance has recently, but slowly, begun adjusting to contemporary developments by also shifting more “outward” and into the global maritime domain.

The past two decades have seen what some claim to be an end in conventional conflicts. Some have proclaimed war to be “transformed” and stated “old” wars to be over. Such conclusions amount only to simplified generalisations of warfare. War is a political activity that must be observed and predicted with cultural sensitivity. General trends may provide indications, but trends do not always last nor are they always universally applicable.

The same applies to SLOC security. Threats to SLOC security and the operations undertaken to stabilise SLOCs may have thus far required modest naval capabilities to target grossly asymmetric opponents. However, this trend may not endure. North-East Asia is often proclaimed as the centre of the future global economy, while East Asia is often recognised as the burgeoning gem of international economic development. As the more powerful East Asian countries grow wealthier, they will gain a wider array and more powerful policy instruments to exercise their political influence in the manner of their choice. For a region whose member countries are connected mostly through the sea, a key policy instrument will be the navy. And, the behaviour of these navies may dictate regional stability, as they often tread upon the key lifeline of any developed country; SLOCs.

South Korea stands amongst the countries facing such concerns, and these concerns have been reflected in the form of a navy undergoing bluewater construction. As one of few East Asian navies with increasingly expansive capabilities, the ROKN is on path to potentially play a significant role contributing to the interests and stability of South Korea as well as the wider region. However, South Korea cannot pursue such a path alone. In turn, the US-ROK alliance’s burgeoning focus upon the maritime domain is a timely and welcome development. Though belated, it would only be fitting for the two maritime countries, as they look to address shared concerns which may soon no longer reside over the horizon.