Confidence on Korea withdrawal

Press, 13 June 1977, Page 9

Confidence on Korea withdrawal

NZPA-Reuter Washington. America’s top general has; rejected a colleague’s claim. th t the withdrawal of* United States troops from South Korea would prompt an attack from the communist North. General George Brown, chairman of the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff, has tola Congress that the Carter Administration c n u!d safely withdraw 32,000 ground troops from South Korea over five years if their departure was balanced by a strengthening of South Korean forces and deterrent United States air and sea power.

Major-General John Sin 6 - laub, the third-ranking United States officer in South Korea, was recently reassigned to a home command after attacking plans for the withdrawal. General Brown told a joint hearing of Congressional sub-committees that, on a recent Fa East tour, he “did not find any general officers who expressed those views.” He appeared at the hearing with the Undersecretary of State. Mr Philip Habib, who said that both South Korea and Japan accepted the Administration’s thinking.