<Anchor> The

joint command post training for the second half of the year, a large-scale annual training for both ROK and US forces, began today (18th). It has been just a year since the training in the first half of the year was canceled due to Corona 19, but the number of troops participating in the training in the second half of this year was also reduced due to the re-proliferation of the corona, and the start was delayed by two days. OPCON, that is, verification to bring wartime operational control, was also broken, making it difficult to switch OPCON within the term of President Moon Jae-in's pledge.

This is Kim Tae-hoon, a reporter specializing in defense.

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The ROK-US combined command post training, which began today, was scheduled to verify the FOC's full operational capability, the second gateway for the transition of wartime operational control.

FOC verification is a joint inspection procedure to ensure that the ROK military has the ability to command both ROK and US forces during the war.

However, as the training was reduced, the FOC verification was lost.

Last year, the first stage IOC basic operational capability verification was completed and the second stage FOC was blocked. Even if the second stage FOC verification succeeds, the third stage FMC complete mission performance verification is required to obtain the omnipotence.

During the Moon Jae-in administration's term of office, the opportunity for large-scale Korean-US training remained three times until the first half of 2022. Considering the presidential election schedule in March 2022, the transition of OPCON is possible only after passing both FOC and FMC verification in the first and second half of next year's training.

However, it is an internal view of the military that it is "a situation where no one is sure" whether it will pass both the 2nd and 3rd steps next year.

[Kim Ki-ho/Professor of Graduate School of Political Science at Gyeonggi University: There are many evaluations that the first-stage IOC was also made to fly, but I think that if you train with irrational numbers while being chased by time, it cannot be verified properly.] For the

current government, joint training between the two Koreas It has been reduced or canceled several times in consideration of US-North Korea relations.

It was intended to bring North Korea into dialogue, but as training setbacks repeated, the transition of OPCON within the term of office became uncertain.

In the end, the transition within the term will depend on whether President Moon will make a strategic decision to speed up the verification process.

Who gets elected in the November US presidential election is just as important.

(Video coverage: Lee Jae-young, video editing: Lee Seung-jin)