The Death of an Alliance, Part 65: Beyond Dependency, Toward Reunification
[Update: In the course of a whiney tirade about how America “betrayed” South Korea, Kim Dae Joong also calls for a national conversation about South Korea becoming more self-sufficient in its own defense. I’d suggest to Mr. Kim that it’s a wee bit early to declare South Korea fully abandoned by America while we still have 29,000 of our people there. Kim also admits that the (elected) South Korean government got the deal it wanted, and in light of its own behavior toward the United States, South Korean cries of betrayal seem uniquely unfounded (ht to the Nomad). Generally, however, I agree that Korea needs to have this conversation, this year.
Original Post: I begin this post with a object lesson in headline deconstruction. Start with this …
… then proceed to this less-than-definitive textual basis for that bold call …
In a press briefing on the results of ministerial bilateral defense talks held on Friday, U.S. Defense Department spokesman Maj. David Smith said that the number of U.S. troops in Korea will be cut from the current 28,000 to 25,000 by 2008 in line with the third phase of reduction plans. But further reductions are not in the foreseeable future, he said.
A Major in the Pentagon is the equivalent of a Specialist at Fort Hood. The term “no plans at this time” is Pentagonese for “I’m a Major and the Secretary of Defense has not authorized me to set deployment schedules on behalf of the next President of the United States.” From there, we end up with a statement that, while speculative, sounds much more candid:
Larry Niksch, a specialist in Asian affairs at the U.S. Congressional Research Service, said recently that it is only a matter of time before the U.S. withdraws all its ground forces from Korea by moving the single remaining brigade to another region. Of two brigades under the second U.S. infantry division, one was already relocated to Iraq, he said. Niksh predicted that the U.S. will considerably strengthen its air forces in Korea and indirectly support Korea’s naval forces from its naval bases in Japan.
Meaning, the truth is most likely to be the exact opposite of the what the headline actually says. Indeed, the Pentagon intends to reduce the level of U.S. ground forces with which it would reinforce the ROK in wartime.
The U.S. military has recently notified South Korean military authorities that it plans to cut back wartime reinforcements specified in a strategic master plan by the two allies, sources said Monday.
Military sources said Korea-U.S. Combined Forces Command and Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff are revising and supplementing the strategy known as OPLAN 5027, and in the process the U.S. told Korea of “plans to reduce the scale” of reinforcements. A South Korean officer declined to say how big the cutbacks will be but added they were “not very big.”
….
Some predict that the U.S. cutbacks will be drastic: the legally binding force of the master plan concerning U.S. reinforcements is weak enough. If the joint command ceases exist, it will be even weaker.
There is mixed news there. Plenty of us had assumed for a long time that 690,000 troops was an unrealistic level. There is also a significant doctrinal change embedded in this reduction: fewer U.S. forces, perhaps none, would be available to invade North Korea and overthrow its regime in the event of war. I admit to some mixed feelings about this. Conventional theory is that a North Korean invasion must mean the end of its regime for maximum deterrent effect. Considering how bloody an invasion of the North could be, however, it’s no longer a given that we’d have the political will to join that fight, or finish it. I believe in getting rid of the North Korean regime, but I don’t believe that invading North Korea is the best way to accomplish that, not even if the North invades first. Invasion is certainly not the only way to deter an invasion, and probably isn’t the best way. In fact, a U.S. invasion could actually rally North Koreans around the banner of nationalism, a sentiment whose appeal in Korea is hard to overstate.
I also believe that any invasion or occupation of North Korea should have, as GI Korea has described it to me, “a Korean face.” South Korea will have to find the manpower for that, which won’t be easy if this RAND study is to be believed. That militates in favor of us doing what we failed to do in Iraq — take full advantage of local support. That begins with a decision to do what the North never quit trying to do in the South: sow dissent, undermine the regime’s control, and prepare the battlefield with psyops, which will not be as effective if we wait for actual hostilities. Next, we should be training, equipping, and organizing a Reuinification Corps of North Korean defectors whose job would be to help reestablish order and basic services during any occupation of the North.
Let’s hope that in time, necessity will force Korea to be all it can be. My hope for Korea is that independent defense planning will lead to self-sufficiency, which will build national self-confidence, break the cycle of unhealthy dependency, and dispense with the luxuries of statecraft without responsibility and emotion as the primary engine of national policy. Let’s hope that instead of complaining about which foreign powers have failed to deliver unification, South Korea will set about planning the most painless way to regain its own undivided nationhood. And with that discussion will come hard questions about just how Korea will find the manpower to protect the South and simultaneously restore order from the chaos of the North.
That is where the rebuilding of the alliance can begin.
Kim Dae jung’s whinefest underscores to me that South Korea will not be much easier to deal with when/if conservatives take power. Remember all the fun under Kim Yong-sam….
I blogged about both of these today – though not Kim’s editorial.
I guess I overreacted to the “no future troop cuts.”
But, I’ll stick with my gut feeling about Korean War II.
I don’t think it will be long or hard fighting. I believe it will be a TREMEDOUS bloodletting in the first hours to perhaps days, but the main fighting would be over quickly, then the difficult task of keeping the nation together and introducing it to the real world would begin and take a very long time —- with perhaps a prolonged period of terrorist type activity.
And there is no way in Hades the US should put soldiers on the ground for that.
And if South Korea is unwilling to put the money and manpower and planning behind getting ready for doing such work — it will only have itself to blame if the Chinese move in to do it for them….
….and given what is likely to happen after the regime falls, China might not need to create much of a cover story for moving in – because it South Korea won’t put itself on the line to try to bring the northern half of the peninsula back under control, and the US (correctly) decides not to pump GIs into a society that has been brainwashed for generations to hate America with a passion that seems like bad fiction —– and NK is floundering bloodily as it probably will post-collapse —- many will believe at least China is willing to do something…
That is my guess…
I’m also with slim.
People who think the GNP victory will mean lasting changes in anti-US culture might be corrrect, but they need to take a look at nationalists like Kim Dae Joong.
Here is one of my favorites from him:
http://www.usinkorea.org/issues/911/ci.html
Here is my rebuttal the paper didn’t choose to print:
http://www.usinkorea.org/issues/911/mrii.html
I think a GNP win will improve things — having relatively rational people who don’t viscerally hate you has that effect — but I agree that plenty of Koreans and Americans alike expect too much from that. I think we especially underestimate the degree to which the Korean left and the American media will manage to demonize a GNP administration and drive a wedge between it and (especially) Democrats in the USG. It could even be a photonegative of what we’ve seen for the last 8 years.
I think the best thing we can really do for the US-Korean relationship is to evolve from smothering mother hen to ally.
My feeling on it is that it took decades of prepping to get to the point that a Roh was elected in the first place and Uri rose up. It turned out to be a little premature, but that was the clear direction we’ve been heading in for a long time.
You can’t reverse that that easily – without something like a huge outside threat – and the South just doesn’t picture the North as such a threat – or the Japanese or Chinese or anybody.
Left, right, center. It really doesn’t matter. Korea and the US are headed for divorce court and a GNP victory this year won’t change that.
The GNP differs from Uri and other parties in degree, not in kind.
Past GNP-ers have never had a problem with letting the weekly flag burnings continue uninterrupted so long as such events took the focus off their own corruption. From blame for Kwangju to thousands of CCCP logo red t-shirt wearing Korean fans at the 88 Olympics to the sacking of US Cultural Centers to whatever, wherever. The GNP has never been concernced about protecting US relations [or educating its people about why those relations might be worth fostering] except insofar as it had to in order to continue extracting money from the pockets of US taxpayers. It has certainly turned a blind eye whenever it thought its own image might get a black eye from standing up for the alliance.
And in a time of heightened proud Hanryu Korean nationalism, the GNP simply can’t afford to come across to voters this year as anything resembling a “lapdog” as Roh so eloquently put it in 2002.
Which ultimately means, while a GNP administration might try to cozy up somewhat to USFK in order to keep the money rolling in [like a nightmare version of a PBS telethon fundraiser] it will always have to deal with the domestic issue of keeping itself electable by a young populace that increasingly sees the US as an obstacle to Korean reunification.
Even the front runner former Seoul Mayor Yi never had a problem with falsely accusing and demanding money from USFK for polluting his subways based on non-existent evidence several years ago. The US is merely a means to an end, not an ally in a MUTUAL Defense Treaty, and that end is usually money.
The GNP–should it get itself elected, will do nothing radical, but rather will likely stay on the straight and narrow path of Roh and Kim nationalism.
Like Bill & Ted quizzing each other in front of a magical phone booth, Korean leaders will always say that their favorite number is “690,000, dude!” whether or not they have any realistic possibilities of obtaining it.
On a grand national level, it’s very comforting to know that you can kick the dog [and feel like a man] and that the dog will still protect you if someone breaks into your house.