United Nations Command–Rear (also known as UN Command–Rear or UNC–Rear) is a rump military command headquartered in Japan, and a subordinate element of United Nations Command. UN Command–Rear was established in 1957 as a result of the relocation of UN Command from Japan to South Korea following the Korean War. It is nominally in control of the rear elements of what the United States and South Korea contend are United Nations military forces in northeast Asia.
In practice, UN Command–Rear is a legal cover created to prevent the expiration of the 1954 Status of Forces Agreement between the United States (operating as the "Unified Command") and Japan, which provides for its self-termination upon the withdrawal of United Nations forces from Japan. As of 2018, UN Command–Rear had a strength of four personnel.
History
Background
The defeat of Japan in World War II led to the collapse of the Government of Korea under Japanese rule and the territorial bifurcation of the Korean Peninsula between the Pyongyang-based and Soviet-backed Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) and the Seoul-headquartered and United States-supported Republic of Korea (South Korea).
On June 12, 1950, the South Korean Army informed the United States' Korean Military Advisory Group to the Republic of Korea that North Korea's Korean People's Army (KPA) was massing for an invasion. Approximately two weeks later, according to the United States and South Korea, the KPA staged a surprise assault against South Korean military positions along the border, easily overwhelming the South's defenses. North Korea advanced the alternate explanation that the entry of its forces into South Korea was done for the purposes of arresting Syngman Rhee due to what it claimed was a preemptive South Korean incursion that had taken place near Haeju. The ensuing conflagration sparked the Korean War between North and South Korea and their respective allies and patrons.
Following the outbreak of hostilities, the United Nations Security Council voted to authorize armed intervention on the side of South Korea. The United States agreed to be named "executive agent" of the United Nations and, subsequently, formed United Nations Command. UN Command, under General Douglas MacArthur and his wartime successors, oversaw military operations on the Korean Peninsula from headquarters in Japan.
Formation
Active hostilities concluded in 1953 and UN Command relocated from Japan to South Korea four years later. A 1954 Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) between the United States (signed as "the Government of the United States of America acting as the Unified Command") with Japan required UN Command to maintain a presence in that nation as a precondition for continued use of Japanese territory for military purposes. A break in the presence of forces under UN command in Japan would cause the termination of the SOFA and allow Japan to reassert total sovereignty over its territory. Specifically, Article 15 of the 1954 Status of Forces Agreement specifies that "this Agreement and agreed revisions thereof shall terminate on the date by which all the United Nations forces shall be withdrawn from Japan".
United Nations Command–Rear was created as a legal construct to ensure the treaty requirements needed for indefinite use of Japanese territory were met, or what The Mandarin has described as "a form of legal trickery". UN Command–Rear describes its existence as one designed "to maintain the UN‐GOJ SOFA [United Nations-Government of Japan Status of Forces Agreement]".
Upon formation of UN Command–Rear, it was decided that it should be placed under an officer who was not American so that it would not appear to be "a parochial US organisation". From 1957 to 1976, Thailand supplied an officer to UN Command–Rear, following which command responsibilities were assumed by the United Kingdom for two years. From 1978 until at least 1987, the Philippines provided an officer to lead UN Command Rear. Since 2010, Australia has made an officer available to the United States to be placed in command of UN Command–Rear.
In 2007, UN Command–Rear relocated from its longtime headquarters at Camp Zama to Yokota Air Base.