South Korea's Navy chief Choi Yoon-hee has been nominated the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS), the defense ministry said Wednesday. If confirmed, it will mark the first time that the head of the Navy has been appointed to the post.

Adm. Choi is expected to replace incumbent chief Gen. Jung Seung-jo, whose two-year term expires soon.

The high-level military reshuffle is the first for President Park Geun-hye, who took office in February. The appointment of JCS Chairman requres a parliamentary approval. 

The 59-year-old Navy chief, known as a military strategist, has carried out intensive naval reforms to bolster defense after a South Korean warship sank in a North Korean torpedo attack in March 2010, in which 46 sailors were killed.

"The first selection of a Navy chief as the new JCS chairman is aimed at enhancing interoperability between respective military services," said Park Dae-seop, a ministry official in charge of human resources and welfare. "The Navy chief is well qualified for the commander post considering recent North Korean provocations in the western sea."

The top military post has been dominated by Army generals. An Air Force chief has only once, in the 1990s, taken leadership of all three military branches.

Gen. Kwon Oh-sung, the deputy commander of the Combined Forces Command, was appointed as the Army chief, the ministry said. 

Kwon played a key role in establishing joint operational plans with U.S. forces to handle provocations in light of the North's shelling of the front-line island of Yeonpyeong in the tensely guarded Yellow Sea in November 2010.

Vice Adm. Hwang Ki-chul, the Naval Academy superintendent, was named as the new chief of the Naval Staff. 

While serving as the head of the naval operation command, Hwang successfully led Navy commando operations to rescue 21 South Korean sailors captured by Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden in January 2011.

The nomination needs to get approval at the Cabinet meeting slated for Thursday. (Yonhap News)