By Ryu Jin
Staff Reporter

The United States will not remove military hardware from South Korea, despite its plan to pull out 12,500 troops, a senior South Korean official said on Thursday.

``Hardware will be mothballed in storage facilities in Pyongtaek and Pusan,’’ the official said on condition of anonymity. ``It will save time for hardware transportation to the Korean theater in the case of North Korean provocation.’’

Pyongtaek will be home to U.S. troops relocated south of Seoul, and Pusan, the southern port city, will be the staging area for reinforcements from the U.S. mainland in the event of a North Korean attack.

As a deterrent against the communist North’s 1.1-million-strong military, the United States has kept some 37,000 soldiers here to back South Korea’s 650,000-strong armed forces since the 1950-53 Korean War, with high-tech military arsenals such as Patriot missiles and Apache helicopters deployed near the heavily fortified border.

The 8th U.S. Army has about 140 new M1A1 armored vehicles and 170 M2 Bradley combat vehicles, as well as 300 ATACMS tactical missiles and 70 AH-64 Apache helicopters. In its Air Force in Korea, the United States also possesses 70 F-16 jet fighters and 20 A-10 planes, as well as three U-2 reconnaissance planes.

In connection with this, a senior South Korean diplomat said he was told by U.S. officials that the United States is planning to minimize the amount of hardware that will be taken by the 3,600 U.S. troops scheduled to shifted from here to Iraq.

``Weapons and equipment will be left behind and maintained by the remaining brigade for use by troops to be deployed here in contingencies,’’ Kim Sook, director general of the Foreign Ministry’s North American affairs bureau, said during an interview with a radio news program.

Though the 2nd brigade of the 2nd U.S. Infantry Division (2nd ID) will leave for Iraq in August, the 1st brigade will remain here as the main warhorse, he added.

The 2nd ID, a 14,000-strong U.S. unit located near the border with the North, has been considered the backbone of the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK). Seoul and Washington earlier agreed to move the 2nd ID, made up of two infantry brigades plus artillery, aviation, engineering and support units, to a location south of Seoul after 2007.

But the United States decided last month to send an infantry brigade of 3,600 troops for a mission in Iraq, part of the recently revealed U.S. plan to remove some 12,500 soldiers from the total number of the USFK. The troop pullout plan has even prompted concern that the United States may withdraw the entire 2nd ID from the Korean Peninsula.

Kim’s remark was seen as an attempt to brush off concerns about more troop reductions for the 2nd ID in Korea.

One of the key figures involved in negotiations on the troop reduction, Kim said he was told by U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Lawless that the 1st infantry brigade of the division, which is larger than the 2nd brigade to be sent to Iraq, will remain on the peninsula even if troops levels are cut.

He added it appears that Washington is not considering any cuts to the number of troops here in addition to those outlined in the plan for the withdrawal of 12,500 soldiers announced last Sunday.

jinryu@koreatimes.co.kr