By Kim Bo-geun, Special content Manager

I hope that the Cheonan Report will come out today. But today, too, I must wait. The Defense Ministry had previously announced it would distribute the report by the end of August, the publishing of which had been delayed several times. However, it is now September and the report has yet to come out. There is talk that it will come out soon, but nobody knows when, exactly, that will happen.

The biggest reason why we await this report is because of the regret for the twisted situation on the Korean Peninsula. South and North have both turned their backs to one another and are facing their respective allies, the United States and China. It appears South Korea got hung up on America first. When sanctions on North Korea issued through the UN Security Council failed, South Korea reportedly urged the United States to enact independent sanctions. It seems the Lee Myung-bak administration thought that it could lose its place amongst its conservative base if it were to be abandoned by the United States after the UN. The price we have to pay to the United States, however, has been great. Cars and beef, the Afghanistan deployment, sanctions on Iran... what we have to give, one thing after another, is a lot.

The same is true for North Korea. North Korean leader Kim Jong-il’s recent visit to Changchun and Harbin indicates that North Korea intends to actively cooperate with China’s strategy to promote development in the Chinese Northeast. For this strategy, which began full-scale in 2002, to work properly, it is very important for China to turn North Korea into a “low-ranking partner” supplying raw materials and labor. Until now, North Korea did not seem very active. This is because a “strong and prosperous country,” as North Korea wishes to become, cannot be a “low-ranking partner” of China’s Northeastern Provinces.

Up until just a few years ago, North Korea had several cards to play, including economic exchanges with the South, normalization of ties with the United States and compensation money that would have accompanied diplomatic ties with Japan. With the appearance of the Lee Myung-bak administration in the South, the utility of these cards decreased greatly, and with the sinking of the Cheonan, they have become useless. Both North and South are being quickly sucked into the magnetic fields of the two Great Powers, and not only is the “current peace” being lost, but so is the “future vision of the nation.”

At the core is the Cheonan. Prior to the sinking, even while the two Koreas experienced tensions between each other, they were not uncommunicative. The sinking of the Cheonan has greatly reduced the possibility of improving inter-Korean relations, represented by a summit. South Korea claims the Cheonan was sunk by a North Korean torpedo, while North Korea has criticized this as a fabrication. One of the two is lying, and as long as they are both calling each other liar, a summit is impossible. Many talk of an exit strategy, but in this situation, an exit does not exist. If we rush to a summit as an exit strategy, it will just seem like a deception in the eyes of the people. The only exit from this blind path is to “confirm the truth.”

The Cheonan Report is an important clue in starting down the road to truth. The Ministry of Defense has been saying it plans to include the scientific evidence related to the investigation team’s announcement of its findings. The goal is to make you understand a bit more clearly the truth that the Cheonan was sunk by a North Korean torpedo. The Defense Ministry, however, continues to delay this very important report, which has deepened the division in public opinion. It makes no sense.

It took just a little more than just one and a half months from the formation of the joint investigation team on March 30 to the announcement of its findings. In contrast, another three and a half months passed from that announcement to now. They have only themselves to blame for the criticism that they made an important judgment in haste but are excessively delaying the publishing of the report that contains the logic behind their judgement.

The government must publish the report quickly. Moreover, the report must receive the thorough verification of the people. It is difficult to tell whether this report will survive the screening process ahead or sink amidst all sorts of suspicions, like Prime Minister-designate Kim Tae-ho.

The only way to salve the hurt of public division is to confirm the truth, however, I await the Cheonan Report again today, with the desire to find an exit for a frozen Korean Peninsula.

The views presented in this column are the writer’s own, and do not necessarily reflect those of The Hankyoreh.