Gunchal
| Gundae Gyuyul Sichaldae | |
|---|---|
| File:Gunchal flag.png Revised flag used after 1995 | |
| Active | 1988-present |
| Country |  Menghe |
| Allegiance | Chairman of the Supreme Council |
| Type | Army, Navy |
| Role | Military Police |
| Nickname(s) | Gunchal, GGS |
| Motto(s) | 충성, 규율, 령예 Chungsŏng, Gyuyul, Ryŏngye |
| Colors | Grey, dark grey |
| Commanders | |
| Vice Marshal (Chasu) | Pyo Nam-Gi (표남기) |
The Gunchal (Menghean: 군찰 / 軍察) are the military police and gendarmerie of the Socialist Republic of Menghe. Their full title is Gundae Gyuyul Sichaldae (군대 규율 시찰대 / 軍隊規律視察隊), meaning "Military Disciplinary Inspection Force." Their duties include maintaining military and ideological discipline, providing security in rear areas, directing military traffic, and guarding prisoners of war. They also have limited authority over civilian policing, serving as guards around important buildings or installations and as a highly trained force for riot control and counterterrorism operations. Military units of the Gunchal are well-armed and well-trained, and are capable of serving in combat against enemy special forces and airborne units.
History
The Gundae Gyuyul Sichaldae were formally established in 1988 with the merger and expansion of the Inmin Hŏnbyŏng (People's Military Police) and the Bureau of Political Officers. In addition to covering the old agencies’ duties of inculcating ideological loyalty, controlling traffic, and handling criminal investigations involving military personnel, their new core role was to prevent the emergence of corruption and dissent among military officers, especially those who had not taken part in the Decembrist Revolution.
This covered a second, deeper mission, which was to survey and investigate military officers at all ranks and assess their loyalty to the new Socialist regime. For this purpose, they were immediately subjected to a major personnel shake-up, in which the old political officers were traded out for new individuals whose loyalty lay with Menghean traditionalism rather than Communism. After this, the Gunchal played a major role in the military purges of the 1990s, arresting officers charged with corruption and providing secret recommendations on which individuals to retain or fire.
Since the completion of the purges, and especially after the 2005 military reforms, the Gunchal has significantly relaxed its degree of control over the officer corps. Even so, it is still responsible for monitoring ideological loyalty and conducting criminal investigations against those accused of political disloyalty or other legal violations.
Organization
Though administratively the Gunchal are a single organization, they are further subdivided based on their deployment. Most Gunchal units serve in the Menghean Army, where they are further broken down based on function. Within each company there is usually a single Political Officer, who is tasked with providing regular ideological education. Additional political officers serve in the battalion headquarters, along with regular Gunchal units tasked with inspecting soldiers on and off duty; the same is true at the regimental level. Each Division contains an armed battalion of Gunchal soldiers, including two Companies in wheeled APCs, for patrolling rear areas; each Corps contains one to two battalions, and each Army one Brigade, for the same purpose. Some of the units in these formations may conduct independent patrols in search of enemy infiltration, while others are tasked with defending important installations. As such, although all personnel are administratively subordinate to the Gunchal Marshal (currently Pyo Nam-Gi), they may be operationally subordinate to different units depending on their post and level of command.
Menghean Army and Naval Aviation, formerly the Menghean People's Air Force, also have political officers, discipline inspection units, and traffic police, but do not contain independent security forces; these may instead be filled by units from an Army operating in their sector. The same is true of Menghean Naval Aviation, which operates its own land-based airfields in addition to shipborne aircraft. In the absence of (or in support of) a dedicated airfield defense unit, ground crews would be expected to defend against an attacking special forces team with their own assault rifles.
In the Menghean Navy and its coast guard arm, the Maritime Patrol Forces, each ship carries a number of political officers proportional to its crew; these also serve as discipline inspectors on board the ship and while the crew are ashore. Ships serving with the Maritime Patrol Forces may contain additional Gunchal officers to aid in the inspection of suspicious cargo vessels, though regular Maritime Patrol Forces personnel are also authorized to conduct searches and make arrests.
In peacetime, the Civil Military Police (국내 군대 경찰, Guknae Gundae Gyŏngchal) are an organizationally and administratively separate branch; these are the units tasked with maintaining public order and guarding government buildings, and they function more like a Gendarmerie proper than a military police force. In a major wartime situation, the government could redistribute their guard duties or transfer their personnel to partial reservist Gunchal units; this is believed to be the method by which the Coastal Defense Forces would bring their own Gunchal brigades up to full strength.
Military Justice System
In line with standard military practice, regular Gunchal disciplinary units maintain the authority to assess and punish personnel for minor injunctions and lapses of discipline. Gundae Bŏbjŏng (군대법정), or Military Courts, are a separate organization within the Gunchal tasked with criminal investigations and court sentences for more serious offenses. Particularly high-profile cases such as war crimes or treason could pass to the Supreme Military Court (군대대법원, Gundae Daebŏbjŏng), which also played a prominent role in the 1990s military purges by trying high-ranking generals for embezzlement or misuse of authority.
If an individual is found guilty by the Gundae Bŏbjŏng, they may be sentenced to one of the Menghean government’s military prisons (군대 교도소, Gundae Gyodoso). Little is known about the organization of the military prison system, but accounts of ex-convicts suggest that it is separated into different prisons depending on rank and severity of offense; some officers convicted on corruption charges in the 1990s went into fairly comfortable containment, or were merely restricted to house arrest. At the extreme end of the spectrum, the Gundae Bŏbjŏng also carries out execution by firing squad, which is still a recommended punishment for severe offenses. Ernest Kovats, a prominent scholar of law and society, characterizes this as a division into "rehabilitation for minor offenses, isolation for corruption offenses, reformation for repeated offenses, and retribution for severe offenses."
More intense reformation is carried out through "disciplinary battalions," of which three are known to exist. According to some regime critics, these rely on long and grueling training schedules to “break and re-mold” persistently disobedient soldiers, wearing down their will to resist. The Menghean government denies these accusations, and insists that the entire military disciplinary system is geared toward rehabilitating offenders and introducing them back into service. Nevertheless, international civil society organizations have accused the military prison system of violating soldiers’ human rights, and estimate that the actual number of disciplinary battalions may be much higher than the government claims.
A separate sub-division exists for foreign prisoners of war, a category which includes spies and saboteurs captured in peacetime. This organization is known as the Prisoner of War Department (전쟁포로국, Jŏnjaengporoguk). In addition to running prison camps, which can be expanded through the addition of prefabricated structures to respond to an outbreak of conflict, the JPG is also responsible for interrogating POWs. This is usually the second round of interrogation that prisoners of war would face, the first having come shortly after capture. Unlike the more shadowy Military Intelligence Service (군대 정보 기관, Gundae Jŏngbo Gigwan), the JPG keeps its facilities relatively open to inspection, and its claims of refraining from torture were independently corroborated during and after the 2014 Innominadan Crisis – although many criticized the primitive conditions prisoners were held in during the early period of the war, when the flow of surrendering soldiers exceeded even the expanded capacity of prison facilities.
In addition to these institutions for administering trials and punishments, the Gunchal also maintains separate units for transporting suspects to court facilities and convicts between prisons, with varying levels of security based on the individuals being moved.
Duties
Military and Political Discipline
One of the main roles of the Gunchal is maintaining “military and ideological discipline” among the troops. Generally, each Battalion-size unit in the Menghean Army includes a squad of Gunchal personnel for this purpose. Their duties include conducting regular inspections of units at their posts to ensure that soldiers are following the proper rules and regulations. They also patrol areas frequented by off-duty soldiers to ensure that personnel are following Army regulations on general conduct, alcohol use, and improper use of weapons, as well as relevant civil laws.
Political officers in the Menghean military are officially affiliated with the Gunchal, though they are counted as members of their respective units. Their main duties relate to ideological education and inculcation of the troops in their unit, a politically important function of Menghe’s mandatory military service. They are authorized to issue a formal warning to a soldier for violations of ideological loyalty, but cannot administer punishments without the approval of the Battalion’s Gunchal unit or a higher Gunchal commander, depending on the severity of the offense.
Gunchal units at higher levels of command are responsible for a wider range of disciplinary duties, including tracking down and detaining deserters. They also investigate reported crimes involving soldiers, including war crimes, and enforce punishment after reaching a verdict. As described above, the crimes these units handle range from minor traffic violations by off-duty soldiers to charges of corruption or treason among high-ranking officers. At the national level, there are a few small Gunchal units tasked with confronting individuals who failed to show up for mandatory military service or reservist training, as well as searching for long-term deserters who may have slipped back into civilian life.
Like the Young Promoters of Virtue, the Gunchal disciplinary units in each Battalion maintain an official file on each soldier's record of compliance; these files are made available to government officials and certain employers, especially Jachi-hoesa. The system is designed to reward soldiers with good ideological and disciplinary records through preferential hiring and promotion later in life.
Military Security Duties
Gunchal units are also tasked with maintaining security in the rear areas of the Menghean Army. In peacetime this includes patrols and surveillance around radar sites, airfields, and other military installations. They also stand guard outside military administrative buildings and protect the convoys of high-ranking officers and political figures. In coordination with units handling discipline, they may be tasked with transporting prisoners of war or high-risk deserters to other locations. These duties often overlap with their civil policing duties (see below).
In wartime, Gunchal units would not only be expected to stop enemy saboteurs, but also to defend against paratroops or special forces deployed behind the front lines, and to actively patrol the Army’s rear areas in search of these units. In the event of an advance deep into enemy territory, the Gunchal would also assist regular Army units in hunting for guerrilla fighters and finding and destroying militia weapons caches. For this purpose, Army Gunchal units assigned to the rear-area patrol role tend to be armed, trained, and screened similarly to special forces units. Nearly all are transported in armored wheeled APCs and fire support vehicles on APC hulls, and many high-level units operate light helicopters to aid in search and patrol missions. During an offensive, an Army unit may draw personnel from these Gunchal units to take part in helicopter-borne assaults behind enemy lines, as they are already trained and motivated to a higher standard than regular troops, or it may instead draw them from other motorized units.
Civil Policing
Originally, the Gunchal held limited authority over domestic policing, serving as an armed gendarmerie alongside the standard police force. They mainly acted as an emergency reserve force for high-risk areas of domestic policing, such as riot control, counterterrorism operations, and operations against drug trafficking, weapons trafficking, and organized crime, where Civil Security may have inadequate military training. They also maintain a visible presence as uniformed guards at government buildings, military installations, diplomatic conferences, important historical sites, and high-security prisons.
In 2007, these gendarmerie duties were transferred to the newly formed Internal Security Forces, a subordinate body to the Ministry of Internal Security and its Rapid Response Brigades. Gunchal brigades still form rear-area patrol units in the Menghean Army, however, where their duty is to protect large-unit headquarters and eliminate enemy special forces and LRRP teams.
Traffic Control
In addition to ensuring that on- and off-duty soldiers remain in compliance with traffic laws and Army regulations on vehicle use, the Gunchal are also responsible for coordinating military traffic. This includes planning and marking convoy routes, directing traffic at intersections, and escorting oversize vehicles. They also inspect and escort vehicles carrying hazardous materials, particularly when the latter are traveling on civilian roads in populated areas.
Personnel
At the time of the organization’s merger and establishment, Gunchal recruits were closely screened for their military obedience and ideological loyalty, in order to ensure that they would maintain proper discipline against soldiers and commanders alike. All personnel were required to have membership in the Youth Vanguard, and were subjected to the heaviest ideological indoctrination.
Since the 2005 military reforms, the role of ideology in the organization has declined, though largely because the Gunchal has expanded its roles into other fields. Ideological and political screening is still necessary to serve in battalion-level disciplinary squads and as company-level political officers, as well as in crowd control units which might be expected to suppress riots or turn back a coup attempt. But it is not part of the recruitment process for rear security units and traffic direction personnel, with intermediate screening in place for peacetime security guards.
Training also differs based upon one’s role in the Gunchal. Most positions are open to first-time conscripts, provided that they have the necessary recommendations from their Youth Vanguard work groups. Gunchal rear-area patrol units, however, rely exclusively on volunteers with existing military experience, and require rigorous training in the field. This is because they need to maintain sufficient skill and motivation to engage enemy special forces or paratroops.
Uniforms
The standard Gunchal dress uniform, implemented in 1989, is based on the existing Army dress uniform but in grey rather than olive green. This same uniform is used by the Haegun Gunchal and was used by Gunchal in the Menghean People's Air Force until the latter organization’s dissolution. Gunchal personnel at all ranks are permitted to carry swords and wear peaked caps while on duty, rights which are traditionally reserved for commissioned officers. Gunchal personnel also wear dress uniform more often, especially in peacetime security guard units, though in recent years there has been a transition toward requiring field uniforms when on duty to avoid making officers and high-value personnel more prominent.
The original Gunchal field uniform, gradually established in the early 1990s, consists of the same grey dress uniform but with body armor, knee pads, and a Kevlar helmet. For more than a decade this was the standard uniform of Gunchal units in the field, whether as rear-area patrol troops or as armed guards at a military installation. Contemporary with the above regulations on dress uniforms, there has been a trend toward requiring Gunchal soldiers to wear standard Army uniforms in the field, in order to improve their camouflage and hinder their identification by enemy scouts or snipers. In this case they are still distinguished by the organization's emblem on their sleeve and helmet. Traffic-control units may also don bright orange armbands, helmet bands, and reflective vests while directing traffic.
Employment of Ethnic Units
In December 2005, partially as delayed retaliation for Menghe's military intervention in Ummayah but also as a response to perceived instability within the Menghean Army, insurgents associated with the secessionist organization Brotherhood of the Eight-Pointed Star staged a series of attacks throughout the province of Siyadag. These included the armed seizure of a number of towns and strategic mountain passes, intended to forestall the movement of troops back into select areas. Embarrassed by the failure of local police units to restrain the violence, the Menghean leadership decided to restore control quickly by sending in the Army. They attacked first with the 504th and 506th Gunchal brigades, who were fought to a standstill in January and February. The Army then committed the 34th, 15th, and 28th Mechanized Divisions to the offensive, but muddy roads from rain and melting snow delayed their advance until April, by which time the Brotherhood had established de facto control of several minor cities including the provincial capital.
By the time the offensive did come, it proved a reassuring success, restoring government control over the entire province by September 5th. Yet the Brotherhood's insurgency remained a severe problem, especially for Army troops still trained and equipped for conventional warfare. In order to compensate for this, the political leadership relied heavily on the Gunchal to maintain order and root out insurgents.
From the start, the 504th and 506th Brigades relied on a strategy of "isolation sweeps," in which a unit (usually Company-size) would surround a village or neighborhood and search every household for arms, explosives, and suspected insurgents. Early isolation sweeps often turned up evidence, especially when conducted at random hours with little warning, but they were also characterized by summary executions and extensive damage to local property. More worryingly, intelligence records suggested that they were not reliably successful at picking out known insurgents or reducing the number of attacks in a district.
In 2009, after three years of perceived failure, the Army leadership decided to adapt its strategy. It established the 514th Gunchal Brigade, which resembled its predecessors in equipment and organization but was staffed almost entirely by Siyadagi enlisted personnel (initially all of the officers were from the Ourin ethnic majority). The initial purpose of such a unit was to diffuse ethnic hatred against ethnic Mengese, who many locals increasingly associated with the brutal searches. Yet in the years that followed, the 514th Brigade proved markedly more effective at identifying and capturing suspected insurgents, in large part because its members were more familiar with the local terrain and had established ties with social networks within the population. As time went on, the brigade also began enlisting ex-insurgents who had defected from the Brotherhood, using their experience to track down known contacts and improve knowledge of the enemy's strategies. In 2012, at the peak of the 514th's involvement, the strength of the insurgency reached an all-time low, and after a brief resurgence in 2013 the Brotherhood of the Eight Pointed Star was declared a defeated threat.
Owing to the 514th Brigade's success, the Menghean government established two more Gunchal brigades, the 515th and 516th, which would be composed of Uzeris, and began incorporating immigrant and ethnic Battalions and Companies into other selected Gunchal units. In 2015, after the invasion of Firmador, it established the Firmadore and Shahadist 517th Gunchal Brigade to patrol areas of the Republic of Firmador, and the all-Firmadore 518th Brigade to oversee security operations elsewhere in the country. All of these units received additional training in counter-insurgency and civilian-search missions, and specialize as a domestic Gendarme force, although they are also capable of performing rear-area security missions if necessary. Notably, these are among the only ethnically homogeneous units in the Menghean Army.
Initially, the creation of these specialized Gunchal brigades triggered opposition from powerful figures within the Menghean Army's High Command, which saw service in mixed units as an important way to overcome differences and instill national cohesiveness in each generation of soldiers. Many political figures objected on similar grounds, although Marshal Choe tentatively gave his approval. Initial hopes that Siyadagi units would be welcomed more openly were dashed in 2011, when the Brotherhood began posting online threats against the "blood traitors" serving in Menghean military units, although as the conflict wore on there were signs that the local population was more willing to cooperate with the 514th than with other Gunchal formations. As additional evidence of the unit's efficacy came about, however, much of this opposition quieted down, especially after the Army imposed a "compromise deal" mandating that ethnic units use returning volunteers where possible.