Im Tae-hoon, director of the Center for Military Human Rights (right), presents the civil society proposal for military system reform at a press conference held at the Center for Military Human Rights in Nogosan-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul, on November 10, 2021. This reform proposal also included suggestions regarding the operation of the integrated service academy, which is currently a contentious issue. [Photo=Yonhap News]
The Ministry of National Defense is accelerating the integration of military educational institutions based on the president's pledge. Last year, the ministry established a consultative committee directly under the minister to review proposals for integrating service academies and recently officially presented a legislative plan to gradually integrate the Army, Navy, and Air Force service academies.

The reform proposal outlines a structure where the first and second years of service academy cadets would receive joint education at a newly established integrated service academy in Seoul, and from the third and fourth years, they would move to their respective service academies for specialized military education. The Ministry of National Defense cites the strengthening of jointness and improvement of educational efficiency as justifications for this initiative and plans to simultaneously enact a 'Law on the Establishment of an Integrated Service Academy' to amend the current regulations on establishing service academies by branch.

We need to reflect on whether policies previously pursued under the guise of 'reform' have actually strengthened the military. Reforms have often been hastily pushed for political expediency, frequently resulting in chaos and weakening of military capabilities, turning into atrocities. We need a sober review to determine if the current debate over the integrated service academy is following the same path.

The Integrated Service Academy Concept Needs Reconsideration from a Jointness Perspective

Currently, each service academy bears clear responsibility for educational quality and producing talent. However, after integration, the entity responsible may become ambiguous. When responsibility in the military becomes blurred, military capabilities also weaken. There are strong concerns that integrating military educational institutions will adversely affect the roots of the military education system and organization.

Jointness is not about putting everyone into the same mold.

Jointness functions when different specialized units combine through clear role division and information sharing. However, as seen in past cases with the Joint Forces Command (Defense Attache Jointness Education), jointness is not achieved by forcibly lumping different organizations into one framework.

Jointness functions only when clear role division and information sharing occur while maintaining the expertise of each service. Jointness is like the principle of twelve strings of a geomungo producing subtle sounds when separated from each other.

Given the structural characteristic that greater diversity leads to greater joint effects, concerns are being raised that an integrated service academy model, which standardizes education from the initial officer training stage, may weaken inter-service specialization and exacerbate confusion rather than cooperation.

While greater diversity enhances joint effects, the integrated service academy is designed to reduce diversity under the pretext of jointness. Cooperation between organizations with weakened specialization is not jointness but a muddle incapable of exerting combat power.

The Integrated Service Academy Proposal Runs Counter to Future Battlefield Trends

The Russia-Ukraine war demonstrates that victory or defeat is not determined by the size of an organization or its formal integration. Drones, satellite intelligence, electronic warfare, cyber warfare, real-time decision-making, and on-the-spot judgments dictate combat effectiveness. The battlefield demands not a 'unified organization' but the 'rapid integration of specialized capabilities' by each service.

The integrated service academy operates under the premise that two years of common education will solidify an officer's foundational expertise.

However, service academy education is meant to impart basic officer qualities suited to the military's characteristics, not to create complete soldiers. An officer's specialization is forged not in classrooms but in the field. It is built over time within the operational environments each service faces, the equipment it uses, and the accumulated tactical experience. Blurring the distinctions between service branches at the initial stage can lead to dilution rather than enhancement of specialization.

Pushing for an Integrated Service Academy is Inefficient in Terms of Innovation and Cost

Education is said to be a hundred-year plan. What does the consultative committee aim to achieve through the integration of service academies? What can it achieve? If they have a conscience, they should answer.

War is a battle of speed, and education and doctrine must change rapidly. However, in an integrated system, if standardization takes precedence over specialization, the response to change is likely to be slow. Considering the costs of campus reorganization, facility relocation, and administrative and personnel integration, policies promoting efficiency may end up wasting national funds and increasing inefficiency.

There is a deeper issue underlying this debate.

Following the discussion on the integrated service academy, one trend emerges. This trend has led to the persistent relocation of the Korea Military Academy, the integration of the Korea Military Academy and the Korea Army Academy, and the launch of the integrated service academy. The core of this process of change is the dismantling of the Korea Military Academy. If that is the case, this is a political choice, not a military solution.

Military reform must be quiet, meticulous, and have clear justification. If speed is prioritized by destroying symbols of certain organizations simply because they are disliked, reform becomes an atrocity.

Reform Should Focus on Software, Not Physical Integration

We need to refine the common curriculum of the service academies, expand joint operational simulations based on specialization, and materialize higher-level joint staff education. It is also important for key personnel in each service to gain joint experience through exchange in the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Cultivating the ability to combine while preserving the specialization of each service is true jointness.

The integrated service academy is not reform but a political perversion.

This idea is as absurd and short-sighted as proposing to integrate SKY universities (Seoul, Korea, Yonsei) to abolish Seoul National University. Gathering 10,000 pieces of broken pottery will not create a single vase. The talent needed by each service should be recruited by each service and nurtured according to its traditions.

The Current International Situation is Already a State of War

We are engaged in unseen warfare in all domains, and while the concept of Space Force, which paralyzes the enemy's command and control and initiates combat, is being applied in actual operations, our debate remains stuck in political calculations and the imagined retaliatory martial law of politicians.

We urge an immediate halt to attempts to dismantle the military's foundational organizational structure by seeking to dismantle the 78-year-old service academy education system of each service under the guise of reform. Politicians should pursue a national, magnanimous direction that serves the nation and its people, not political infighting. The consultative committee for the integrated service academy should ask itself what can be gained by shaking up the military.