S Korean president calls for bolstering military and US ties

"Our greater role is to prevent a war."

Lee Myung-bak, South Korean president

South Korean President Lee Myung-bak called yesterday for beefing up the country's military and strengthening ties with the US to deter any aggression from North Korea.

"Strengthening defense capability and becoming a strong army means we should win a war in the event it breaks out," Lee told top military leaders at an army headquarters south of Seoul, South Korean pool reports said.

"Our greater role is to prevent a war," he said.

Lee, a conservative who has pledged to take a tougher line on the North's nuclear threat, also said the South Korea-US alliance is "very important" to deter aggression from Pyongyang.

He expressed pride that the Seoul area has developed into a world-class metropolis "despite facing the North's military -- one of the world's strongest -- only 40 miles [60km] away."

Under the government of Lee's liberal predecessor -- former president Roh Moo-hyun -- South Korea agreed to retake wartime operational control of its 680,000-member military from the US by 2012.

The US also plans to reduce its troops level in South Korea to 25,000 by December from the current 28,500 under a global troop realignment program.

The US troop-reduction plans stoked security jitters among many South Koreans who argue that a nuclear-armed North Korea still poses a formidable treat to South Korea. The US says the introduction of sophisticated weapons would offset the reduced boots on the ground.

Regaining military wartime command was key to Roh's drive to seek an equal footing in relations with the US, which took full operational control of the South Korean military shortly after the Korean War broke out in 1950. South Korea took back the peacetime control in 1994 but the wartime operational control still lies in the hands of the chief of US troops here.

Under Roh's government, South Korea's ties with the US also underwent tense moments mainly because of Roh's engagement policy with the North.

Lee, who took office last month, has said he will restore frayed ties with Washington. His aides have indicated they will seek to delay the schedule for the wartime control transfer.

During Roh's tenure, South Korea also began downsizing its military troop levels.