hankyoreh

Experts from South Korea, the US, China, and Japan discuss strategic competition between the US and China and peace and cooperation throughout East Asia during the Hankyoreh-Busan International Symposium at the Busan Exhibition and Convention Center on Nov. 21. (Shin So-young, staff photographer)

For the second day of the Hankyoreh-Busan International Symposium on Nov. 21, experts from South Korea, the US, China, and Japan sat down together to discuss the issues of strategic competition between the US and China and peace and cooperation in East Asia. The debate was moderated by Seo Joo-seok, a senior research fellow at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses (KIDA) and former vice minister of defense, and included discussions of weighty topics that included the rivalry for dominance between Washington and Beijing, the North Korean denuclearization issue, and the possible of US Forces Korea (USFK) troops being withdrawn.

Ken Gause, director of the International Affairs Group at the Center for Naval Analyses, , a research organization in Arlington, Virginia, suggested a need to move beyond the conventional wisdom and consider the nuclear issue from North Korea’s perspective.

“The US has been carrying on with its policies of ‘maximum pressure’ while unconditionally demanding North Korea’s unilateral capitulation, but the more it does that, the more North Korea will view nuclear weapons as necessary for its regime’s security and survival,” he warned.

“At the North Korea-US summit in Hanoi, [US President Donald] Trump asked for visible results first on the denuclearization issue, which [North Korean leader] Kim Jong-un could not do because it would be denying the legitimacy of his own regime,” he explained.

“As a third-generation leader, Kim first wanted economic rewards in order to sustain his political legitimacy through economic development,” he said.

Gause proposed tasks as part of a basic reconfiguration of North Korea policy, concluding that the “US’ North Korea policies seem to have failed over the past 30 years.” His ideas included setting denuclearization as a final goal rather than the starting point for negotiations, adopting a step-by-step approach with denuclearization as part of a larger trust-building process, including denuclearization as part of the peace regime process, guaranteeing the security of the regime and members of Kim’s family, redefining the relationship between North Korea and the US as one of ordinary states rather than antagonists, and loosening sanctions to provide North Korea with the groundwork for economic development.

Junya Nishino, a professor at Keio University in Tokyo, noted, “As North Korea is able to receive economic support from China while its relationship with the US has stagnated, its motivation to denuclearize quickly based on negotiations with the US has been diminishing.”

“China’s cooperation is essential to achieve a peace regime on the Korean peninsula, but we’re seeing a situation now where the establishment of a peace regime is being delayed due to China’s involvement,” he said. “How to overcome this paradox is going to be a task for [South Korean President] Moon Jae-in to resolve.”

Jin Jingyi, a professor at Peking University, said the failure to resolve the North Korean nuclear issue despite considerable efforts over the past three decades was tied to the US’ East Asia strategy.

“The North Korean nuclear issue, which has persisted for 30 years since the collapse of the Cold War order, is closely tied to the establishment of a new international order in Northeast Asia,” he observed.

“The outline for resolving the North Korean nuclear issue and establishing a new order in Northeast Asia that was developed with the September 19 Joint Statement [in 2005] and February 13 agreement [in 2007] from the Six-Party Talks was never implemented, and the talks ended up stopping. This has to do with what was happening around the same time with China passing Japan to become the world’s second biggest economy,” he said. According to Jin’s analysis, the North Korean nuclear issue became less of a priority and a means to keep Beijing in check as the US began perceiving China as a rival and launched a full-scale effort to contain it.

“The reason the North Korean nuclear issue has gone unresolved for 30 years is because it is tied with the East Asia strategies of the major global powers,” he concluded.

“The US may say that North Korea isn’t ready to denuclearize, but I don’t think the US is ready yet to establish a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula,” he said.

Appearing as a discussant, Lee Soo-hyung, a research fellow at the Institute for National Security Strategy (INSS), asked, “Does the US seriously think North Korea’s nuclear weapons threaten US territory and the lives of Americans? Doesn’t it seem like the US’ interest in negotiations with North Korea is waning, and its target is now to maintain the status quo?”

Lee went on to say that Washington’s “chief interest now is not the North Korean nuclear issue, but the South China Sea issue, which is about checking China’s rise.”

“The US’ strategic focus is shifting from the North Korean nuclear issue in Northeast Asia to Southeast Asia,” he observed.

Jin Jingyi predicted that there was no chance of USFK troops being withdrawn in light of the US’ strategy in East Asia.

“The US strategist [Zbigniew] Brzezinski said that a withdrawal of US forces from the Korean Peninsula would symbolize the wavering of the US’ military presence in Japan, while [Henry] Kissinger said that if the US withdrew from the Korean Peninsula, it would raise issues with the military’s standing in Japan,” he noted.

“A lot of experts predicted the US would readily agree to a declaration ending the [Korean] war when the North Korea-US summit was held in Singapore last year, but the US didn’t do that,” he added, explaining that the US’ decision not to declare an end to the war was motivated by concerns that it could lead to a USFK withdrawal.

“The US views the withdrawal of USFK as tantamount to abandoning its East Asia strategy,” Jin said.

“US strategists would like to see the USFK taking part in the strategy to contain China and issues related to the South China Sea and Taiwan rather than limiting its role to the Korean Peninsula,” he added.

Junya Nishino identified three areas where Japan would need to make preparations if progress is achieved with a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula: changes to the USFK, changes to the standing of the UN Command, and changes to the South Korea-US Combined Forces Command (CFC) framework following the return of wartime operational command (OPCON) to South Korea.

“If USFK troop numbers are cut, this will fundamentally mean changes for the military balance in the region,” he said.

“The view in Japan is that we could be facing a larger security burden within the current Northeast Asian military landscape,” he added.

Nishino observed that “South Korea-Japan relations are in such a poor state right now that we aren’t having the kind of strategic communication we need regarding the new security situation.”

“We need to be building a new South Korea-Japan relationship based on the major changes that have taken place in two sides’ domestic political situation and the Northeast Asian security environment,” he suggested.

Kim Jin-ki, a professor at Pukyong National University and another one of the discussants, said, “The signing of the South Korea-Japan General Security of Military Information Agreement [GSOMIA] in November of last year after the decision in July 2016 to deploy THAAD with the USFK was tied to the US’ strategy to delay and contain the rise of China.”

“Both South Korea and Japan have been holding out against US pressure to extend GSOMIA, which ironically shows that the US’ power is not what it once was,” he added.

Won Dong-wook, a professor at Dong-A University, said, “China’s rise has taken place amid a US-led order, but it’s now posing a definite challenge to that order as it increases its own role within that system.”

By Park Min-hee, staff reporter

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