SADJ 7#3

ROKMC dispatched a brigade to South
Vietnam during the Vietnam War.
One might ask why South Korea needs
an amphibious force, especially since the
country’s military is geared almost totally
to a conflagration with the Democratic
People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), whose
military looms threateningly across the
Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). In fact, South
Korea is a peninsula nation surrounded by
sea on three sides and with a number of
offshore islands. Thus, the possession of a
Marine Corps makes a lot of sense.
Marines are charged with conducting
landing operations in conjunction with the
ROK Navy, as well as conventional ground
warfare, special warfare and facility protection.
Indeed, the country must guard
against DPRK intrusions that might include
Special Forces infiltrating by small
craft or mini-submarine. Today the ROK-
MC poses a behind-the-lines threat to any
DPRK act of aggression, since it could
make an amphibious lodgement on either
the west or east coast of North Korea. To
guard the maritime approaches to the
capital Seoul and nearby port of Incheon,
Marines are also deployed on five islands
to the west of the South Korean mainland,
including Yeonpyeong Island that was
shelled in 2010.
The Marine Corps Command has an
estimated 27,000 personnel. Of these,
many are conscripts doing 24 months of
compulsory military service. The corps
comprises two divisions (1st and 2nd Marine
Divisions), one brigade (6th Marine
Brigade located in the northwest islands),
and the Yeonpyeong unit. South Korean
marines are acknowledged as being among
the best there are, and even their U.S.
counterparts speak glowingly of them as
being “very tough.”
After this brief introduction to the
ROKMC, let us turn our attention to the
service’s small arms. The following is not
designed as an exclusive list, but it does
highlight the weapons one would typically
expect to see within the Republic of Korea
Marine Corps. These small arms are almost
exclusively manufactured in South
Korea by S&T Motiv, a company belonging
to the Daewoo group. The company was
established in 1981 (then called Daewoo
Precision Industries Co. Ltd.) specifically
to build small arms for the country’s
armed forces. The company adopted its
current name in 2012. As well as having a
captive domestic market, S&T Motiv has
also achieved considerable weapon exports
to a variety of nations in Asia, Africa,
the Middle East and South America.
K5 9MM PISTOL
The K5 9mm semiautomatic pistol
from S&T Motiv is routinely carried by
officers as a sidearm. The weapon is also
used by tank crewmen, with the ROKMC
operating both K1 and M48 tank types.
The recoil-operated K5 was introduced to
the country’s military in 1989 after its development
from 1984-88.
A special aspect of the pistol is its
triple-action trigger, which includes a
‘fast-action’ trigger mechanism. The latter
permits the hammer to be decocked while
the mainspring is still compressed. Thus,
only a light trigger pull is needed to recock
the hammer and fire the pistol in a conventional
double-action mode. The advantage
is that the first shot is more accurate
because of the lighter trigger weight, plus
it is safer because longer trigger travel is
required to fire it. Alternatively, the hammer
can be recocked manually to fire it in
single-action mode.
The K5’s magazine contains 13
9x19mm Parabellum rounds. The pistol
weighs 728g (without a magazine) and its
total length is 190mm. The manufacturer
quotes its range as 50m.
K1A 5.56MM SUBMACHINE GUN
The K1A submachine gun has been
around for a long time, and its use is
widespread in the ROKMC as its compact
proportions make it easier to manhandle
within the confines of an amphibious
assault vehicle, for example. The K1 was
the first modern firearm developed by the
46 SADEFENSEJOURNAL.COM