News | Sept. 16, 2024

ROK signed Letter of Intent to join the JCO

By Maj. Erin Leon

The Republic of Korea Ministry of National Defense hosted a joint signing ceremony of the ROK Letter of Intent to join U.S. Space Forces – Space Joint Commercial Operations in Seoul, Korea, Sept. 11, 2024.

The ROK initially expressed interest in joining the JCO after key personnel visited the JCO cell in Colorado Springs, Colo., during the National Space Symposium in April 2024. Since that time, the ROK has been working with the JCO to formulate an onboarding plan, which included sending two ROK Air Force operators to a JCO 200 Operational Integration and Certification course in Auckland, New Zealand from 2-27 September 2024. There are also plans for the JCO’s mobile training team to teach an additional course in Osan, ROK in May 2025, which will train and certify an additional six ROK operators.

Once a full contingent of operators has been trained, the ROK plans to establish a JCO-KOR National Cell co-located with the Space Operations Center at Osan AB.

The JCO provides timely and accurate identification, analysis and warning of potential counterspace activity by leveraging industry and allied capabilities at the non-classified level to enable maximum distribution and collaboration in support of operational and strategic objectives. Currently the JCO has over a dozen fully on-boarded countries helping to collect and analyze commercial space data 24 hours, 5 days a week, and look forward to the ROK’s participation in the JCO Pacific cell in the future.