South Korea proposes USD271 billion defence plan

South Korea's Ministry of National Defense (MND) plans to allocate KRW315.2 trillion (USD271.5 billion) towards defence during its latest five-year plan, announced on 2 September.

Funding during the MND's 2022–26 Mid-Term Defense Plan represents a 5% increase over the proposed allocation of KRW300.7 trillion in the 2021–25 plan. The new plan will necessitate average annual defence-budget increases of 5.8% over the period, said the MND.

The 2022–26 plan includes KRW208.5 trillion for military operations and KRW106.7 trillion for force modernisation including procurement and research and development (R&D). These allocations represent increases of 4% and 6.5% compared with the 2021–25 plan.

The R&D element will expand from KRW4.3 trillion in 2021 to KRW7.1 trillion by 2026. This spending plan is aligned with efforts to develop local industry, said the MND. It added that it will aim to spend at least 80% of its force modernisation budget on locally sourced products and technologies.

The defence plan also outlined a requirement to develop and acquire priority capabilities including surveillance, reconnaissance, mobility, command-and-control, satellites, precision-strike, missiles, and missile defence. As part of these plans, the MND indicated that it is developing longer-range ballistic missiles but did not elaborate.

The MND said these requirements are driven by a need to respond to North Korean military modernisation. It said the emphasis on missiles is supported by the scrapping of US-South Korean guidelines that restricted Seoul from developing or possessing missiles with a maximum range greater than 800 km.