[News analysis] S. Korea’s role in the shifting Northeast Asian order

Posted on : 2019-08-15 15:23 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
Seoul needs to stop relying solely on Washington and follows its own path
South Korean President Moon Jae-in heads to a meeting with policy chiefs at the Blue House on Aug. 14. (Yonhap News)
South Korean President Moon Jae-in heads to a meeting with policy chiefs at the Blue House on Aug. 14. (Yonhap News)

The conflict that was set off by Japan’s export controls on South Korea, imposed in retaliation for a South Korean Supreme Court ruling awarding damages to victims of forced labor, is rooted in the disconnect between Seoul’s efforts to bring peace to the Korean Peninsula and Tokyo’s strategy of making Japan a “normal” country.

With the passage of a raft of security legislation in 2015, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe gave Japan’s alliance with the US global reach and declared its ambition to actively participate in affairs on the Korean Peninsula. Since that time, the Abe administration has been pushing to amend the Japanese constitution, in order to recast Japan as a country capable of waging war.

But the Korean Peninsula Peace Process crafted by South Korean President Moon Jae-in is a plan to transform the security landscape in Northeast Asia through improving inter-Korean relations. The main players in that plan are South Korea and the US, leaving Japan’s role unclear.

“The Moon administration’s strategy is working with the US to advance North Korea’s denuclearization and improve inter-Korean relations, with the goal of creating a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula capable of surviving interference by neighboring powers as the US and China move toward a full-fledged hegemonic struggle,” said Cho Sung-ryul, a research consultant for the Institute for National Security Strategy.

While Cho thinks that strategy is “the right direction,” he added that “its mismatch with Japan’s strategy has manifested as the current crisis between South Korea and Japan.”

“The Northeast Asian order is in flux, and the South Korean government needs to take another look at its strategy and make adjustments,” Cho said.

On the macro level, the South Korea-Japan dispute is also the product of a time of change that is forcing countries around the world to forge new strategies and find their own way as the existing order trembles and a new order is born. In order to move toward peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula, South Korea must be attuned to developments on the global chessboard and adopt a foreign policy tailored to its strategic goals.

“The “1965 system” is in jeopardy

In the 1965 agreement that was supposed to settle outstanding claims, the agreement that represents the current framework for South Korea-Japan relations, the two countries failed to agree on the illegality of Japan’s colonial rule. Japan holds to the interpretation that its colonization of Korea was legal. In 2018, the South Korean Supreme Court explicitly stated that Japan’s colonial occupation was illegal and took that as the grounds for ordering Japanese companies to compensate Koreans illegally mobilized for forced labor during the colonial occupation.

More than 50 years have passed since the claims agreement was concluded, which was biased in favor of Japan. When that agreement was called into question, the Abe administration branded South Korea as a country that can’t be trusted with security matters and took punitive economic measures targeting South Korean industry at its weak points.

This move was strategically motivated as well: Japan is concerned that, if inter-Korean relations and North Korea-US relations are improved through the Moon administration’s Korean Peninsula Peace Process, Japan might forfeit its status as the second-most powerful player in the Northeast Asian security order, after the US. Japan’s strategy is aimed at forcing South Korea to abide within the framework of the “1965 system” and prevent it from having an independent voice on East Asian strategy and on the issue of colonial occupation.

Rather than giving in to Japan’s demands and hurriedly patching things over, experts suggest, South Korea needs to definitely analyze the roots of the current conflict and build a new framework for relations with Japan in line with its principles and a long-term strategy. “We need to take our time and work on holding Japan responsible for its illegal colonial occupation while maintaining the principle of forcing Japanese companies to compensate the victims of forced labor, according to the Supreme Court’s ruling,” said Kim Chang-rok, a professor at the Kyungpook National University law school.

Others called for the creation of a way for Japan to work with South Korea on the Korean Peninsula Peace Process. “While pushing forward with the Korean Peninsula Peace Process, we need to ensure that Japan has a role to play there,” said Nam Gi-jeong, a professor at Seoul National University.

Indo-Pacific Strategy: a trap

South Korea’s shifting status in the US and Japan’s strategy for Asia also demands a closer look. Under the “San Francisco system” — designed by the US and modeled on the 1951 Treaty of San Francisco, which was signed by the allied powers and Japan to conclude World War II — the US was the hub and South Korea and Japan were the spokes, enjoying an equal relationship with the US. But in the Indo-Pacific Strategy that the US and Japan have framed to contain the rise of China in the 21st century, the four key countries are the US, Japan, India, and Australia, with South Korea, Taiwan, and the ASEAN countries relegated to the periphery, as junior partners.

“Through the Indo-Pacific Strategy, the US hopes to strengthen the San Francisco system, while Japan wants to convert its horizontal relationship with South Korea into a vertical one. If South Korea participates in the military aspects of this strategy, it’s likely to be subordinated to Japan. As such, South Korea needs to maintain a principle of ‘harmonious engagement,’ in which it only cooperates on initiatives in which the Indo-Pacific Strategy overlaps with [South Korea’s] New Southern Policy,” said Cho, the research consultant.

“South Korea can be seen as quite a low priority in the Japanese plan. South Korea’s response to the Indo-Pacific Strategy should be cautious about efforts to contain China and selective participation in non-traditional security areas, such as the environment and cybersecurity,” said Lee Gi-tae, an analyst for the Korea Institute for National Unification.

A steady hand needed in inter-Korean relations

Improving inter-Korean relations is a key component of the Korean Peninsula Peace Process. The challenge facing South Korean diplomats today is that inter-Korean relations and the denuclearization talks have entered some choppy waters, after a period of smooth sailing: from last year until the end of February, three inter-Korean summits and two North Korea-US summits were held. North Korea and the US are at odds over the roadmap to denuclearization and the issue of relaxing or lifting sanctions, and North Korea has been vociferously criticizing South Korea’s joint military exercises with the US and its acquisition of cutting-edge weaponry such as the F-35.

“We must not abandon efforts to improve relations while responding firmly when North Korea treats us unfairly. So far, the agenda of inter-Korean dialogue has been limited to the topics of denuclearization and the peace regime. But given the changes underway in the international order, we need to create an arrangement under which the most senior officials in South and North Korea can share their attitudes about developments on the Korean Peninsula and candidly discuss the future of the Korean people,” Cho said.

New questions about the trilateral alliance

In the end, this all boils down to how South Korea can maintain balance and respond to the challenges facing the international order. Failure to adjust to the rapid changes in the outdated international order — established after World War II and now more than 70 years old — is creating chaos around the world. The Trump administration’s position that South Korea and Japan need to handle their dispute themselves shows that the San Francisco system isn’t functioning the way it used to.

“We need to move away from our current complete dependence on our alliance [with the US] for foreign policy and security and make it clear that the destiny of the Korean Peninsula is in the hands of South Korea. We need to take good care of our alliance with the US, but being allies doesn’t mean that we always go down the same path. We need a strategy of sometimes going along with the US and sometimes going in a different direction, depending on whether or not a given course contributes to our strategic goal of peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula,” said Lee Su-hyeong, head of research at the Institute for National Security Strategy (INSS).

South Korea shouldn’t choose to stand either with the US or China in their hegemonic rivalry, which is shaping up to be a protracted struggle. Rather, South Korea needs to devise a long-term strategy for security and foreign policy in a new era, carefully adjusting its relationships with North Korea, the US, China, and Japan as one might move pieces around a chessboard, while focusing on its goals of peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula and, at some point down the road, reunification.

By Park Min-hee and Noh Ji-won, staff reporters

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