History of Civil Affairs in The United States Armed Forces - Korea

Korea

During the Korean War (1950–1953), U.S. Army CA found itself involved for the first time in a subsistence agrarian society. Complex and changing organization of U.S. Army command hampered CA activities, as did the attitude of sensitive Republic of Korea (ROK) government officials. According to Henry Kissinger, “the first civil affairs efforts were in the fields of public health, welfare and sanitation, for the purpose of preventing disease, starvation, and unrest. In the winter of 1950-51 the movement of several million refugees threatened interference with the use of vital communication lines. Later still, removal of civilians from combat areas and their subsequent care and disposition were deemed necessary, not only for humanitarian reasons, but as a security measure as well.” Among the more dramatic events was the evacuation of over 90,000 North Korean Christians and anti-communists from Hamhung province to Busan and Koje in December 1950 using ships of the ROK and U.S. Navy and Merchant Marines.

During the height of the war, U.S. civil affairs staff grew to approximately 400 officers and men who administered approximately $150 million in humanitarian and economic assistance.

Kissinger viewed American CMO efforts in Korea with a critical eye, judging it a qualified success. Minimum objectives were obtained: Epidemics were prevented; no significant unrest on the part of the civilian population occurred. While insurgency or epidemics would indicate the failure of civil affairs policies, their absence does not indicate more than a minimum effectiveness.”

The ROK Army has developed an extensive civil affairs structure, with trained active-duty CMO staff officers down to the division level and many thousands of reserve component civil affairs officers and soldiers that train annually to respond to humanitarian disasters at home and abroad. Tens of thousands of ROK government employees participate in annual CMO training as well. The U.S. has always had a strong civil-military presence in Korea and after a generation of successful civic action missions, CA soldiers work side-by-side with their South Korean counterparts. As of 2007, the ROK Army had hundreds of soldiers assisting with CMO in Afghanistan and over several thousand soldiers conducting CMO in northern Iraq.