Is South Korea Pursuing a Policy of Neutrality?
Over at the Lowy Institute which is an Australian think tank, they have article published speculating that South Korea could in the near future become a neutral nation:
Around five years ago, I submitted an article to a leading strategic studies journal detailing how options previously considered extreme – such as abandoning the US alliance, acceding to China’s dominance, declaring a position of neutrality and/or securing a nuclear weapons capacity – were entering strategic debate in South Korea. Their assessment was that such views were unrealistic and fanciful. One Trump administration later, and these views have entered mainstream political debate in South Korea. It’s time to realise that strategic change on the Korean peninsula will not come from North Korea – strategic change will come from South Korea.
Lowy Institute
You can read the rest at the link, but the author Jeffrey Robinson seems to be putting blame on the Trump administration for South Korea pursuing these different options. I would argue Trump has little to do with South Korea’s current political trajectory. I believe that current President Moon Jae-in is far more the reason for South Korea’s current political trajectory than Trump.
President Moon has long had a policy of appeasement with North Korea. His policy of appeasement stretches back to when he was former President Roh Moo-hyun’s Chief of Staff. Back in those days the ROK government was funding the North Korea regime more than they were contributing to the US-ROK alliance. The Kim regime of course used all that funding to further modernize their military, expand their nuclear weapons program, and build an ICBM capability instead of investing in the welfare of their people.
It has been effectively argued that the Moon administration’s ultimate goal if they are able to get sanctions eased is to pursue a confederacy with North Korea. To get to a confederacy a Korean War peace treaty is needed which would then pave the way for the end of the US-ROK alliance. That is why the South Korean left and the Kim regime has been relentlessly pushing for a Korean War peace treaty; if there is peace why is USFK needed? With sanctions eased and no USFK there is little reason to think the Korean left cannot push forward with their confederacy agenda.
A confederacy would leave the ROK at the mercy of the Kim regime’s nuclear weapons and China’s good will to keep North Korea in check. To keep North Korea in check the ROK would likely need to become a neutral nation in the strategic power competition in the region between China and the U.S. This would effectively Findlandize the ROK under China’s orbit. The anti-U.S. Korean left seems to prefer this inevitably instead of the current status quo that has brought unprecedented wealth and prosperity to South Korea.
The only thing that has stopped the confederacy agenda has been the Trump administration’s hardline stance on sanctions and denuclearization before any peace treaty. This clearly shows that Trump is not the cause, but instead the impediment to the Moon administration moving forward with their post-US-ROK alliance confederacy agenda.
Totalitarians always “redefine truth” to match their current narrative. George Orwell captured this eloquently in his short story, “Animal Farm,” written back in 1944.
TL;DR — Pay attention to how the words on the barn wall change.
www youtube com/watch?v=2b-CMtKhTl0
(it starts to repeat after 72 minutes, possibly to gain money or avoid copyright).
GI, I don’t think Finland is the right example from History. They were effective fighters without foreign help. That they later joined up with “Herr Schicklgruber” instead of “Uncle Joe” was understandable, if ultimately an unfortunate choice.
I rather think South Vietnam is a better analogy. They fought very well as long as the US was paying the bills. Then 600,000 were sold into slavery to the USSR to pay off the North’s war debt. Another 2-5 million emigrated anywhere they could, even on leaky boats.
And if anyone thinks the NorKs would hesitate a NY minute before making money off selling South Korean citizenry to Beijing to pay off debts, I’d like to offer them full ownership of the Brooklyn Bridge at a one time only bargain.
You’re missing the point entirely. The Trump administration may not be the entire reason for South Korea moving towards neutrality, but he certainly did a lot to convince those Koreans who were on the US side, into being more neutral. And more importantly, Trump enabled and made it more easier for Moon to move the country towards neutrality. In essence, Trump essentially snuffed out the forces that held strong opposition towards Moon’s move towards neutrality. Trump basically helped Moon’s policy. I bet Moon probably wanted Trump to win the election badly. Moon’s move towards neutrality means the US military is being needed less and less. South Korea’s great military expansion from 2017 and on is what is going enable South Korea to become self-sufficient military superpower which it already is. The expansion of military budget coupled with strengthening of the country’s military research/production means that South Korea’s military power is now 6th most powerful in the world (according to Global Firepower), and it will be even far more powerful in the next 5 years as the country is going under a wholesale military upgrade that will challenge China’s military in Asia Pacific . The only thing that South Korea doesn’t have is a nuclear weapon. But that can easily be circumvented if and when South Korea is facing a nuclear crisis because of its first rate nuclear technology. South Korea doesn’t need the US military in South Korea, that mode is outdated. What sped up all this up by ten times, was Trump. Even though I think he’s a complete moron, at least I can give him credit on making South Korea great.
And I’m not the only one saying this. Trump essentially snuffed out all the Korean conservatives and made them completely discredited. That’s why the Korean Conservatives are in complete disarray as Trump made them look like complete fools for blindly supporting the US on everything and anything. Now most Koreans realize, that the Moon’s Democratic party was right all along. The damage done by Trump to Korean Conservative movement was HUGE.
Korean military is shrinking, in the sad hope technology can take the place of manpower. Their tech keeps failing however, as demonstrated by the repeated undetected people crossing the DMZ.
Neutrality historically doesn’t work most of the time. It worked for the Swiss in WWII but generally every country that calls itself neutral becomes prey when the bullets fly. I think Hitler left Switzerland alone in WWI as they had a strong military and were strategically unimportant. If South Korea declares herself neutral and asked and/or boots the USFK out, they are quickly setting themselves up for becoming prey for North Korea via Beijing. kim fatty the third will have no problems moving into the Blue House (after widening the doors) and hosting emperor xi for tea while negotiating how many south Koreans will be force marched into China with commie moon pie leading the parade…
For all his faults Trump is the only President with the stones to met with kim fatty face to face. Obviously the first meeting was a size-up, play nice and lavish praise, the second meeting “the failure” as the MSM characterized it was the nuts and bolts let’s work the art of the deal. kim fatty wasn’t dealing, Trump walked away from the table. Trump realized in the second meeting the working something out wasn’t going to happen, despite his and the State Department’s efforts.
@Korean Man, Mickey Mouse could have been the U.S. President and the Moon administration would have still moved forward with their appeasement policy with North Korea.
What discredited South Korean conservatives with the impeachment of Park Geun-hye. By the Korean conservatives agreeing to impeach her, they unwittingly made themselves look incompetent for supporting her for years. Since then they haven’t had a charismatic leader to rally around which why the flavor of the month for them is Yoon Seok-youl.
Korean media press asks: “Where’s America, when Australia is getting hammered by China’s threats and trade actions?”
https://n.news.naver.com/article/008/0004506448
You think Koreans reading this wouldn’t be convinced even further, it would be better to be just go neutral rather than to cozy up to either China or USA? To pick a side means you have to face threats from the other sides. What China is doing is very smart. They are picking apart all the allies of the US, and separating them from the US whose only focus is America First, hell with others policy. The country that is getting isolated is not China, it’s the US. And even if Trump is out of office, this will continue because traditional US allies no longer trusts the US. US lost EU, pretty soon Australia will eventually give in because their economic growth is totally depended on China. US list of friends that they can depend on keeping China checked, are starting to shrink.
flyingsword, you might as well start learning speaking Chinese who’s going to be your boss in few years. America is too weak within, it’s obvious.
“America has literally left the building. Australia faces the brunt of China’s economic coercion with little backup or support from America.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/06/a-dysfunctional-america-helps-china-but-hurts-australia-and-our-region
Just like what happened to South Korea when Trump sold South Korea down the river when he agreed with Xie that South Korea is part of China.
Appears our Chinese troll still doesn’t understand either “America First”, “Australia is a sovereign nation, not part of the USA”, nor “Australia rebuffed Trump’s diplomatic attempt to present a unified front against China.”
He doesn’t crow much about India, either. I wonder why?
America doesn’t need to spend our treasure to defend the world against the Chinese. Each nation needs to decide for themselves to be sovereign or vassal.
Perhaps a course on “How To Be An Actual Adult” should be added to the training Beijing’s trolls receive.