Republic of Korea’s Yeongcheon Army academy turns 50
Felix Kim
More than 50 years ago, on January 21, 1968, a group of North Korean commandos targeted the South Korean presidential headquarters, the Blue House, with the intention of assassinating then-President Park Chung-hee. After nearly a week of fighting, the raid failed, but not before North Korean commandos came within 100 meters of the Blue House. The Republic of Korea (ROK) leadership and the military command were badly shaken by the close call and resolved to prevent a recurrence.
“After the incident, there were needs to strengthen national security, but we lacked good middle-ranking officers,” said Moon Seong-mook, chief of the Unification Strategy Center at the Korea Research Institute for National Strategy in Seoul. “So, they founded Army academies in two regions, Gwangju and Yeongcheon, in order to intensively train would-be officers in a short period of time.”
The new ROK Army academies founded in 1968 complemented the existing Korean Military Academy in Seoul, the ROK’s foremost Army academy that was founded in 1946 for educating and training officer cadets. The two newer academies later would merge into one to become known as the Korea Army Academy at Yeongcheon.
Moon, a graduate of the 13th class of the Yeongcheon academy, after it had absorbed the academy at Gwangju, shared his thoughts with FORUM from his office in Seoul.
“In the first few years, more than 1,000 cadets graduated from the academy each year, who then became middle-ranking officers,” he said. “In the first decade or so, the academy accepted high school graduates and gave them a two-year college degree upon their graduation. But now applicants must be graduates from two-year colleges or those who complete their first two years in their original university. In 2015, they also accepted female cadets for the first time.”
On February 12, 2018, to mark the 50th anniversary of its foundation, the Korea Army Academy at Yeongcheon held an entrance ceremony at its military training ground for its current class of 534 cadets, including 20 women. Bracing a wind chill of minus 20 degrees Celsius, a crowd of approximately 4,000 watched as the cadets marched past, fresh from four weeks of intensive basic military training. The academy’s superintendent, Maj. Gen. Seo Jeong-yeol, congratulated the cadets on their “never, never give up” spirit.
“It is a big achievement and milestone for the ROK military as well as cadets and all the alumni,” Moon said of the 50th anniversary. “For the past five decades, the academy has produced outstanding individuals who have contributed to the national defense, including hundreds of generals. Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Lee Sun-jin is also an alumnus.” Today, the academy trains junior and senior cadets. (Pictured: Cadets march during a graduation ceremony at the Korea Army Academy in Yeongcheon in February 2014).
Moon emphasized the need for the academy to focus on cultivating elite leaders in conjunction with other institutions, such as the Korean Military Academy and the ROK Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC), and equipping them with the skills and knowledge they need for modernized warfare.
“That means cadets should have upright personalities as leaders and special skills required in modern war situations,” Moon concluded. “In short, the academy and its program should keep changing and improving to reflect reality.”
Felix Kim is a FORUM contributor reporting from Seoul, South Korea.
