The Republic of Korea Military Police (MP; in Korean: 군사경찰, "Gun-Sa Gyeong-Chal"), are the uniformed law enforcement agencies of each respective branch of the

Republic of Korea Armed Forces The Republic of Korea Armed Forces (), also known as the ROK Armed Forces, are the armed forces of South Korea. The ROK Armed Forces is one of the largest and most powerful standing armed forces in the world with a reported personnel strength of ...

. Once operated under a unified Military Police Command (헌병총사령부, "Heon-byeong Chong-sa-ryeong-bu") between 1953 and 1960, the ROK's MP units are now commanded by the

Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

Navy A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval warfare, naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral zone, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and ...

Marines Marines, or naval infantry, are typically a military force trained to operate in littoral zones in support of naval operations. Historically, tasks undertaken by marines have included helping maintain discipline and order aboard the ship (refle ...

and

Air Force An air force – in the broadest sense – is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an a ...

HQs separately. ROK Army MPs also function as a

border guard A border guard of a country is a national security agency that performs border security. Some of the national border guard agencies also perform coast guard (as in Federal Police (Germany), Germany, Guardia di Finanza, Italy or State Border Gua ...

s at the

Korean Demilitarized Zone The Korean Demilitarized Zone (Korean: ; Hanbando Bimujang Jidae) is a strip of land running across the Korean Peninsula near the 38th parallel north. The demilitarized zone (DMZ) is a border barrier that divides the peninsula roughly in ha ...

(DMZ).

DMZ Border Guards

All ROK troops guarding and patrolling inside the DMZ wears military police armband, although they are mainly members of army's infantry or light infantry units. (Reconnaissance Battalion/Company. The ones deployed in the JSA are members of the United Nations Command Security Battalion) their equipment is that of elite ROK-army units such as body-armor/combat vests,

night-vision Night vision is the ability to see in low-light conditions, either naturally with scotopic vision or through a night-vision device. Night vision requires both sufficient spectral range and sufficient intensity range. Humans have poor night v ...

equipment, optical sights for the

Daewoo K2 Daewoo Precision Industries K2 assault rifle is the standard service rifle of the South Korean military. It was developed by the South Korean Agency for Defense Development and manufactured by S&T Motiv (formerly Daewoo Precision Industries) and ...

, etc. The reason why these soldiers are MPs is because the

armistice An armistice is a formal agreement of warring parties to stop fighting. It is not necessarily the end of a war, as it may constitute only a cessation of hostilities while an attempt is made to negotiate a lasting peace. It is derived from the La ...

that was signed in 1953 that ended the

Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...

requires both sides (the North and the South) to restrict access inside the DMZ to MPs only, which means no vehicles, no squad-served weapons (such as

mortars Mortar may refer to: * Mortar (weapon), an indirect-fire infantry weapon * Mortar (masonry), a material used to fill the gaps between blocks and bind them together * Mortar and pestle, a tool pair used to crush or grind * Mortar, Bihar, a village i ...

and HMGs) and no regular units of the army.

Equipment

The ROK MP has the following small-arms in their inventory: *

Daewoo K1A The Daewoo Precision Industries K1/K1A is a South Korean selective-fire assault rifle developed by Agency for Defense Development (ADD) and manufactured by Daewoo Precision Industries (now S&T Motiv) and Dasan Machineries (since 2016). It enter ...

Daewoo K5 The Daewoo Precision Industries K5 or K5/DP51 series is a 9×19mm semi-automatic pistol produced by S&T Daewoo of South Korea. The K5 was introduced in 1989. It is recoil operated and uses a conventional Browning-type locking system. It is mos ...

* Various revolvers of U.S. origin

DMZ Border Guards

Equipment

References

See also