hankyoreh

The United States embassy in Seoul has issued a statement it is calling the “U.S. government’s official position,” in which it says there exist no plans for any meeting between Grand National Party presidential candidate Lee Myung-bak and U.S. President George W. Bush. It is a straight repudiation of the GNP’s official announcement that Lee would be visiting the United States October 14-17 and, while there, be given an audience with Bush. While one can of course not entirely exclude the possibility that a meeting might happen anyway, since it ends up having been the GNP announcing something that had not been a sure thing, Lee and the GNP find themselves in a disgraceful position.

Even back when the GNP first announced there would be such a meeting, there were many who doubted whether it would really happen. It would have taken place ahead of Korea’s presidential election so the timing would have been inappropriate, and the way Lee’s people went about it was irregular as well, having gone through personal routes and not diplomatic channels. The fact that the U.S. State Department and the White House reacted with displeasure and began “reconsidering” things immediately after the GNP’s announcement must be seen as something related to that. This kind of mood in the United States could potentially have a negative influence on U.S.-Korean relations. The GNP’s attempts to blame pressure on the United States on the part of the current government, or the pro-government party, for the fact things went amiss is, therefore, as pathetic an attempt to pass the buck as there can be. The blame should start with the GNP itself for such a lack of reasoned discernment.

The very idea of pursuing such a meeting was a problem. Whatever its intentions were, when a presidential candidate tries to meet with the president of the United States you are forced to suspect he is trying to use the United States to help his campaign. During the military dictatorships and at the time of the Three Party Merger of 1990, from which came the GNP we know today, ruling party candidates lacking political legitimacy tried to fill the void with American support and score meetings with U.S. presidents. It begs the question of whether Lee is in so desperate a situation that his campaign needs a picture of him standing together with Bush.

Even if you assume it was an attempt by Lee to show off some foreign policy credentials or stress the importance of the U.S.-Korea alliance, such a meeting would not have been very appropriate. There are major changes taking place in the political situation for the Korean peninsula, with the United States changing to take a more proactive approach to the six-party talks on the North Korean nuclear issue and the normalization of ties with Pyongyang. It also appears that a unilateralist U.S. foreign policy based on strength will have to go through serious revisions after the next U.S. presidential election, too. The situation is such that the GNP could get itself tangled up the wrong way and get left behind if it approaches international relations with the old style of doing things, ways that worked in the Korea of yesteryear. We would like to suggest to the GNP that it behave in a composed fashion, instead of being hasty about differentiating itself and its candidate.
Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]