South Korean officials have recently realized that the US is likely to try to forbid them from enriching uranium and expanding their country’s missile range, rather than leave these issues on the diplomatic back burner. Indeed, recent discreet talks, in which the US has disregarded South Korean efforts to supplement the controversial US-South Korea Nuclear Cooperation Agreement — which expires in March 2014 — suggest that there are reasons to be deeply worried about the alliance’s future.
US negotiators — the reluctant midwives of South Korea’s increasing responsibility in the field of atomic energy — remain steadfast in their opposition to South Korea’s drive for improved defensive capabilities and a more advanced energy policy, despite the potential strategic benefits. However, US nonproliferation experts do not anticipate progress on South Korea’s efforts to win support for its preferred policies until the US gains more leverage.
Such a stalemate is not new. Nuclear talks between the two countries have often been characterized by poor communication and a lack of understanding. While South Korean officials rarely say in public what they really think, it is widely believed that US policymakers have little motivation to reconcile with Seoul right now — they would prefer to stifle South Korea’s increasingly loud demands.
In the US-South Korea relationship’s heyday, US politicians considered the country an “extended arm of the US.” Such condescension may have been defensible when South Korea’s military dictatorship needed the US’ political protection and security guarantee, but now the country is a beacon of democracy in East Asia. So, while South Koreans understand the need for compromise and cooperation, they believe that the time is right for a more balanced partnership.
This belief does not imply South Korean cynicism about nonproliferation. Rather, it reflects concern about a nuclear North Korea, compounded by anxiety over the recent US-Japan missile-defense accord. Given that the US and South Korea have the same assessment of the intelligence regarding North Korea’s nuclear progress, not to mention South Korea’s vulnerability, their failure to reach a practical agreement is troubling.
Former South Korean deputy foreign minister Chun Yung-woo warned a US official in 2010 that revising the Nuclear Cooperation Agreement could soon become a “defining issue” in South Korea-US relations, and that it was already attracting “significant amounts of negative press attention.”
Given South Korea’s status as one of the world’s top five nuclear-power producers, the South Korean public would not tolerate the perception that Japan was receiving preferential treatment, Chun said.
Indeed, right-wing leaders like South Korean Representative Chung Mong-joon of the governing Saenuri Party have been vocal in expressing their doubts about South Korea’s current denuclearization policy, suggesting that a nuclear weapons program could prevent a second war on the peninsula. The conservatives seem to believe that US nuclear protection for South Korea is a thing of the past.
Despite their hawkish approach to North Korea’s nuclear threats, South Korean officials know that uranium enrichment and spent-fuel reprocessing remains only a distant possibility. As a result, they are approaching negotiations skeptically, rather than emphasizing the sense of mutual obligation that should characterize the alliance.
However, their pessimism is hardly groundless, given that the United Arab Emirates has already signed a similar agreement with the US declaring that it would not produce nuclear fuel. Indeed, South Korean negotiators appear convinced that they will not be able to make any headway with the US on the issue. (To be sure, this failure may not matter much, given South Korean scientists’ past declaration that they will not contribute to any nuclear program that could be used for military purposes.)
The US-South Korea debate over nuclear weapons should show both sides that their 59-year-old alliance urgently needs to be updated. Together, the allies can improve global prospects for nuclear nonproliferation, but only if they hammer out a grand bargain that accounts for South Korea’s current — and future — security concerns.
Lee Byong-chul was on the national-security planning staff for former South Korean presidents Kim Young-sam and Kim Dae-jung, and is now a senior fellow at the Institute for Peace and Cooperation in Seoul.
Copyright: Project Syndicate
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
In an article published on this page on Tuesday, Kaohsiung-based journalist Julien Oeuillet wrote that “legions of people worldwide would care if a disaster occurred in South Korea or Japan, but the same people would not bat an eyelid if Taiwan disappeared.” That is quite a statement. We are constantly reading about the importance of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC), hailed in Taiwan as the nation’s “silicon shield” protecting it from hostile foreign forces such as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and so crucial to the global supply chain for semiconductors that its loss would cost the global economy US$1
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
Sasha B. Chhabra’s column (“Michelle Yeoh should no longer be welcome,” March 26, page 8) lamented an Instagram post by renowned actress Michelle Yeoh (楊紫瓊) about her recent visit to “Taipei, China.” It is Chhabra’s opinion that, in response to parroting Beijing’s propaganda about the status of Taiwan, Yeoh should be banned from entering this nation and her films cut off from funding by government-backed agencies, as well as disqualified from competing in the Golden Horse Awards. She and other celebrities, he wrote, must be made to understand “that there are consequences for their actions if they become political pawns of