By Robert Stanley | 2025-10-29

South Korean President Jae Myung has pledged to invest major state funding through 2030 in a bid to make South Korea the world's fourth-largest defense manufacturer.

Speaking at the Seoul International Aerospace and Defense Exhibition (ADEX) on October 20, Lee outlined a long-term strategy to "secure core technologies and weapons systems essential for the future of national defense."

South Korea must achieve self-reliance in defense as global security becomes more unpredictable, committing to substantial investments in defense and aerospace research and development to build an indigenous deterrent and reduce reliance on external powers, he said.

"It is hard for me to accept that there are still some who believe South Korea cannot secure self-reliant national defense and must rely on others for its defense," Lee said.

Lee linked the initiative to his broader goal of regaining wartime operational control of South Korean forces from the United States and building what he called "technological sovereignty" through homegrown military semiconductors and space-based systems.

His government already has approved an 8.2% increase in defense spending through 2026, lifting next year's budget to 66.3 trillion KRW ($47.1 billion). Longer term, Seoul aims to raise defense outlays to 3.5% of GDP before 2035, according to Defense Minister Ahn Gyu-back.

Path to self-reliance

The army will begin mass production and deployment of the Hyunmoo-5, Ahn said in an October 17 interview with Yonhap News Agency.

The missile can carry an eight-ton conventional warhead powerful enough to collapse hardened underground bunkers. Unveiled publicly during Armed Forces Day 2024, it is a cornerstone of Seoul's "three-axis" deterrence structure: preemptive strike, missile defense and massive retaliation.

"As South Korea is a member of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) that cannot own nuclear arms, I firmly believe we should possess a considerable amount of Hyunmoo-5 monster missiles to achieve a balance of terror," Ahn said, confirming the deployment will start at the end of 2025. He added that an upgraded version with longer range and greater payload is under development.

The new missile provides Seoul with what analysts call a conventional strategic deterrent, a means of offsetting Pyongyang's expanding arsenal without breaching its non-nuclear commitments.

"We don't have nuclear weapons, so the only defense we have is to develop the most powerful conventional weapons possible," Yang Uk, a defense analyst at the Asan Institute for Policy Studies in Seoul, told the London Guardian.

On October 10, North Korea unveiled its new Hwasong-20 intercontinental ballistic missile at a military parade attended by top officials from Russia and China. Pyongyang called it its "most powerful" nuclear weapon. On October 22, South Korea reported short-range missile tests by Pyongyang.

Seoul has a formidable task in guarding its border. Its 450,000 troops, supported by 28,500 US service members, are facing 1.3 million North Korean troops across the Demilitarized Zone. Yet Washington has many Indo-Pacific flashpoints to watch.

"South Korea is going to have to take primary, essentially overwhelming responsibility for its own self-defense," Elbridge Colby told Yonhap News Agency in 2024, when he was a former US Defense Department official. He is presently under secretary of defense for policy.

By boosting domestic missile, air-defense and command-and-control capabilities, Seoul reduces the need for US strike assets to remain tied to the peninsula. In turn, those forces can reinforce collective stability across nearby sea lanes and regional trade routes, areas that have seen growing tension amid competing territorial and maritime claims.

In this sense, South Korea's move toward self-sufficiency contributes not only to deterring Pyongyang but also to building wider regional security resilience.

Export power

Lee's administration views the defense sector as both a security pillar and export engine, with South Korea ranking 10th in global arms exports from 2019 to 2023, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

Seoul is pursuing $56.2 billion in new contracts in Europe. Domestic firms are expanding sales of artillery, armored vehicles and aircraft to Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia.

"Being one of the top four powerhouses in the defense industry is by no means an impossible dream," Lee said.

Lee has urged integration of civilian and military innovation, linking Korea's electronics, shipbuilding and artificial intelligence industries to defense needs. He added that he would build an ecosystem with small and medium-sized companies and startups, citing defense development as the core of self-defense.

Seoul's pursuit of operational control transfer from Washington will proceed during Lee's five-year term, said Ahn. He dismissed speculation that an eventual handover would prompt a reduction in US forces, saying any change "should be mutually discussed" and would not occur unilaterally.

The annual US–South Korean defense ministers' meeting this November will address both alliance modernization and the timetable for switching of operational control, said Ahn.

Meanwhile, South Korea is cultivating ties with countries beyond the Indo-Pacific.

During ADEX, Ahn held talks on security with officials from NATO, Romania and Saudi Arabia, according to the Korea Herald.