F-16s Accidentally Bomb South Korean Village: Fifteen Casualties Confirmed

South Korean F-16 fighter aircraft accidentally bombed the village of Pocheon, in an incident that coincided with the initiation of Freedom Shield joint military exercises with the United States. The cause of the incident was reported to be incorrect entry of coordinates by pilots, resulting in eight Mark 82 bombs being dropped by two F-16s. The incident caused fifteen civilian casualties and caused significant damage to property. It followed years of complaints by local residents regarding the tremendous disturbances caused by military exercises. Concerns regarding the dangers to civilians from local and U.S. forces have been a significant and longstanding issue, with the latest incident being the latest in a long line of controversies.

In October 2022 a South Korean Hyunmoo-2 short range ballistic missile launched in 2022 accidentally crashed into a golf course in the eastern Gangwon province, after it was intended to serve as a show of force to North Korea during a period of intensified tensions that year. Most significantly, however, the deployment of the THAAD long range air defence system by the U.S. Army from 2017 raised concerns not only that radiation from the systems could negatively affect the health of local communities, but also because it places them in the firing line in the event of a regional war. The result was a series of major protests, and efforts by the U.S. Army to conceal the deployment of more THAAD systems from newly elected President Moon Jae In in early 2017.

Significant questions regarding the safety of F-16s in South Korea have been raised in the past, albeit primarily surrounding those operated by the U.S. Air Force at Kunsan Air Base. A spate of three F-16 crashes at the facility occurred in just nine months from May 2023 to January 2024. The safety record of Republic of Korea Air Force F-16s has been significantly better however. The F-16 is currently the second most widely fielded fighter class in the country other than the F-5, with 161 of the aircraft in service the large majority of which were produced locally under license. Although during the 1980s the fighters were considered to be comfortably outmatched by Soviet MiG-29s supplied to North Korea, and had more limited beyond beyond visual range capabilities than even the older MiG-23ML fighters fielded by the north, their standing would improve significantly with incremental modernisation and the integration of AIM-120 air to air missiles.

South Korean F-16s have recently been modernised to the F-16U standard, a Korean version of the internationally offered F-16V upgrade package, which has seen the aircraft integrate fifth generation level avionics including a new mission computer, entirely new cockpit displays and a new electronic warfare suite, as well as most significantly an AN/APG-83 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar. Unlike most operators of the F-16 in the developed world, which have consistently opted to replace the fighters with F-35s fifth generation fighters, the Republic of Korea Air Force has ordered F-35s only in limited numbers, and will instead replace the majority of its F-16s with the locally developed KF-21 stealth fighter.