As climate change intensifies wildfire frequency and severity, developing effective mitigation strategies is essential for climate adaptation policy. This study evaluates the effectiveness of three wildfire mitigation measures in South Korea from 2015 to 2022 – disaster prevention forests (afforestation), forest thinning, and wildfire fighter deployment – using panel generalized estimating equations (GEEs) across 229 municipalities. Results show that both afforestation and thinning significantly reduce wildfire-damaged areas, with thinning having a stronger effect (6.4% vs. 1.8% per 100 hectares). Conversely, increased firefighter deployment does not consistently reduce damage, suggesting resources are concentrated in high-risk areas rather than reducing overall vulnerability. Spatial and climatic heterogeneity analysis indicates that afforestation is most effective in urban areas, while thinning remains robust across all land cover types and under extreme drought conditions. These findings underscore the need for region- and climate-specific mitigation approaches and offer insights transferable to other countries with similar environmental, climatic, and land-use contexts.