U.S. to press Korea on boosting troop levels in Afghanistan at summit

Posted on : 2008-08-06 13:14 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
S. Korea likely to be resistant due to last year’s hostage crisis and protests against U.S. beef
 something the South Korean government is likely to resist.
something the South Korean government is likely to resist.

U.S. President George W. Bush will reportedly ask that Korea send troops and police to Afghanistan when he meets with President Lee Myung-bak today.

The Associated Press reported that Dennis Wilder, White House National Security Council senior director for Asian affairs, said Monday (local time) during an in-flight press conference held on Air Force One that Bush would convince President Lee to take on greater responsibility in dealing with the resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan.

The White House has consistently raised the issue of boosting Korean cooperation in Iraq and Afghanistan every time the issue of a Korea-U.S. summit comes up. This is believed to be because the U.S. leadership, citing the unstable political situation in Afghanistan, is repeatedly raising the necessity of concentrating its efforts.

The Afghanistan situation has recently become a major U.S. election issue with not only Republican candidate John McCain, but also Democratic candidate Barack Obama calling for boosting U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan. That Wilder mentioned that Bush would try to convince Lee to send troops at a time when bilateral working-level talks are not underway is believed to be due to this and other situations.

Korean government officials are initially taking a defensive posture amidst an atmosphere of embarrassment concerning the White House attitude. One Cheong Wa Dae official said he did not know whether Bush would talk to Lee about Afghanistan, but currently there was nothing concerning a possible deployment of Korean troops on the official summit agenda. A high-ranking Cheong Wa Dae foreign affairs and security official curtly said that while Korea would make clear its intentions concerning Iraqi and Afghan reconstruction, there would be no talk of additional troop deployments.

The government’s defensiveness is due to the explosive nature of the Afghanistan deployment issue. Having had a rough time of it thanks to the U.S. beef import issue, the government finds even mentioning the fairly unpopular issue of overseas troop deployments burdensome. This is even more so in the case of Afghanistan, as the scars from last year’s Korean hostage situation have not healed. Moreover, the U.S. presidential election is a mere three months away, and with no telling how U.S. foreign policy may unfold under the next White House administration, Korean officials feel it inappropriate to discuss the issue of troop deployments with a U.S. president at the end of his term.

Cheong Wa Dae believes it cannot, however, rule out the possibility that Bush will raise the issue during the summit. One official said the troop deployment was not on the summit agenda, but during the actual talks, if one side brings it up, it becomes an agenda item.

A government official, premising his words as a personal opinion, gave a hopeful prediction, saying that even if the government decided to send troops to Afghanistan, the actual deployment would not happen until after Bush’s term ended, and the United States, knowing this full well, would not make a strong demand for such a deployment. He said Bush might mention it as a generalization concerning the future for which the United States hopes for the alliance.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]