CIAO DATE: 01/2009
Volume: 7, Issue: 1
Spring/Summer 2003
Complete Issue (PDF)
The U.S. - Korea Alliance: Past, Present and Future (PDF)
Hakjoon Kim
Half a century has passed since the Republic of Korea (ROK) and the United States concluded a mutual defense treaty. Despite occasional disharmonies and even conflicts, cooperation as well as friendship has prevailed in their bilateral relations, and the alliance has proved to be one of the most successful ones in the post World War II period. However, since the advent of the George W. Bush administration in January 2001, the rift between the two allies has become highlighted to the extent that the alliance is seen as being seriously weakened or even irrevocably damaged.
Central to the "troubled alliance" lies the threat perception of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) or North Korea. While the Bush administration regards North Korea as one of three countries comprising "an axis of evil," threatening the peace and security in the Pacific with a nuclear development program, its South Korean counterparts, the Kim Dae-jung administration and the successive Roh Moo-hyun administration, do not necessarily agree. Moreover, some South Korean "progressive" or "leftleaning" activists supporting these two administrations suggest that the South should prefer inter-Korean rapprochement and ultimate unification to an alliance with the United States. In short, the traditional foundation of mutual alliance commitments seems to be eroding with implications that the basic character of the alliance may be changing.
At this critical juncture, what follows is an attempt to review the ROK-U.S. alliance, focusing on their mutual perception of North Korea. First, it reviews the period from October 1953, when the alliance was formally launched, to February 1998, when the Kim Young-sam administration came to an end in South Korea. In these forty-five years, the primacy of the alliance between the two over inter-Korean rapprochement was not questioned. Second, it reviews the period of the Kim Dae-jung administration from February 1998 to February 2003, when the basic assumption underlying the alliance was challenged. It reviews the process leading to serious deterioration in their mutual relations, symbolized in a series of anti-American candlelit vigils in November-December 2002. Third, it examines the present situation unfolding after the election of Roh Moo-hyun to the South Korean presidency in December 2002 with the support of the New Millenium Democratic Party (MDP) which was initiated by Kim Dae-jung and "progressive" activists. Finally, it discusses the future of the alliance.
Chinese-North Korean Relations at a Crossroads (PDF)
Samuel S. Kim
At the locus of the "last glacier of the Cold War," there is a double paradox at work on the Korean peninsula, structured and symbolized by two competing alliances forged during the heyday of the Cold War: North Korea with China (1961) and South Korea with the United States (1954). The peninsula is currently experiencing an unprecedented crisis of alliance maintenance, even survival. For better or worse, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), or North Korea, is the only country with which the People's Republic of China (PRC) "maintains"—whether in name or in practice—its 1961 Cold-War pact. Yet amidst Chinese worries that the U.S.-DPRK nuclear confrontation may spiral out of control, in March 2003 Beijing established a leading Group on the North Korean Crisis (LGNKC), headed by President Hu Jintao. The LGNKC's mission is to improve assessment of the intelligence "black hole" over Pyongyang's nuclear capabilities and intentions and to formulate a cost-effective conflict management strategy.
Russia's Response To The 2002-2003 North Korean Nuclear Crisis (PDF)
Peggy Falkenheim Meyer
Since he became president of Russia, Vladimir Putin has played an active role on the Korean peninsula, pursuing ties with both North and South Korea. Putin's engagement with both Korean states has contributed to a perception by some that Russia could play an influential role in helping to resolve the second North Korean nuclear crisis that began in October 2002 when a North Korean official admitted that his country has been pursuing a secret uranium enrichment program.
What policy has Russia adopted in response to this crisis and how influential has it been? The short answer is that Moscow has proclaimed its strong opposition to North Korea's possession of nuclear weapons. But it has more in common with Seoul, Beijing and to a certain extent with Tokyo, in its analysis of the roots of the problem and the best strategy to deal with it, than it has with the George W. Bush administration in Washington.
Nuclear Issues in U.S.-Korea Relations: An Uncertain Security Future (PDF)
Young Whan Kihl
The security dynamics on the Korean peninsula are changing with the uncertain future associated with the North Korean claim that it now has nuclear weapons and an active program of building a "powerful deterrence force".1 This dramatic reversal of Pyongyang's nuclear stance, which is more than rhetorical but action-driven, followed its announced withdrawal from the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty early in 2003 and its nullification of the 1992 North-South Korean non-nuclear agreement.
Following the six-party Beijing talks in late August, the North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson claimed that his country no longer had "interest or expectations" for future talks on its nuclear program.2 North Korea's rubber-stamp parliament, the Supreme People's Assembly also approved the government's decision to increase its "nuclear deterrence force" in angry reaction to what it called a hostile U.S. Policy.3 The Agreed Framework that provided the basis of U.S.-DPRK relations afterl994 was no longer viable, because Pyongyang was found to pursue a clandestine program of HEU (highly enriched uranium) nuclear weapons development. United States relations with the Republic of Korea (ROK) have also become strained, in large part over basic differences on how to deal with North Korea and its nuclear threat.
This article addresses the varying perceptions and approaches between Seoul and Washington toward North Korea's nuclear brinkmanship and its strategic implications for the future of U.S.-ROK alliance relations. The latest episode of North Korea's nuclear controversy erupted while South Korea's Sixth Republic was undergoing electoral campaigns for the sixteenth presidential election of December 19, 2002. The saga of North Korea's nuclear threat has continued with the launching of the new Roh Moo Hyun administration in February 2003. Therefore, the foreign policy issues like the nuclear controversy and U.S.-Korea alliances are intricately inter-related with the context of a nation's domestic politics in both the U.S. and South Korea.
Brain Drain and Economic Development in the Context of U.S.-Korea Alliance (PDF)
Sunwoong Kim, Ju-Ho Lee
Most people would acknowledge that the military and economic alliance between the U.S. and South Korea (Korea hereafter) has played a very important role in shaping the modern history in Korea. Among other things, many have pointed out that Korea's savings in military spending in order to deal with the North Korean threat since the Korean War is one of the major benefits of the strong alliance, because the savings that should have been diverted to military expense could be invested for improved economic development.1 Also, under this security arrangement, Korea has successfully implemented the strategy of export-as-anengine- for-economic-growth by borrowing heavily from the international financial market. Without the U.S.'s security guarantee, international borrowing would have been much more costly. Another important aspect of the strong alliance is that the U.S. has been the major market for Korean exports for several decades.2
In explaining Korea's successful economic development experience since 1960, economists usually point to several reasons. The rapid expansion of production capacity through heavy investment in capital goods and social infrastructure, stable governments, high domestic savings rates, a disciplined Confucian work ethic, and well-timed government-led economic policies have been often cited as the major determinants of Korea's high growth rates.3 However, the accumulation of Korea's human capital has been mostly ignored in discussions of Korea's successful economic development process. This article, focuses on the role of human resources, particularly highly trained professionals, which will be referred to as "brains" hereafter, in the economic development process from the perspective of the U.S.-Korea alliance.
Jong Won Lee
The Korean economy experienced a dramatic transition from one of an unprecedented rate of economic growth to one under the IMF bail out package program. The recent currency crisis has vitiated in a way the success of rapid economic growth in the past, and brought about hardship and agony to Koreans as well, which they have never experienced in recent decades.
Further, some economists have raised quite skeptical views on the future of the Korean economy, although, Korea has been a symbol of the most successfully developing country. One of the most significant arguments supporting these negative views is that the ability of economic growth of Korea has reached its limit, since Korean economic development has depended excessively on increases of labor and physical capital inputs.2 Some economists even jumped to the conclusion that the Korean miracle was a simple illusion, and thus Korean development experiences can no longer serve as a model for development plans in LDC's.
U.S. Services Trade and Investment In South Korea Under The U.S.-ROK Alliance (PDF)
Martin H. Sours
The Republic of Korea (ROK), hereafter referred to as South Korea or simply Korea, was traumatically introduced to the modern, soon to be globalized, world as a result of the Korean War. One of the lasting effects of this forced modernization was a South Korean national imperative to develop economically as rapidly as possible. This was operationalized by the Park Chung Hee government which signed a peace treaty with Japan in 1965 after Park seized power.
Prior to 1965, the business legacy in South Korea was mixed at best. Korean business during Japanese colonial rule was one of small, local firms or economic organizations harnessed to Japanese wartime production. There did not exist the kind of international trade and business services which characterized the international/global trading system developed over several hundred years by the British and American venture capitalists. This international economic/business system was not equal, but it was global, and it rested on a series of business norms which became increasingly universal. World War II in Asia was fought in large part to insure the permanent establishment of these commercial/economic norms and prevent Japan from instituting an alternative form of modernization through an exclusive tribute system under the "co-prosperity sphere."
North Korea's Unofficial Market Economy and its Implications (PDF)
Sungwoo Kim
Amidst the rigid command economy of North Korea, there exists an unofficial yet flourishing market economy, currently operated through Jung Ma Dung, or literally a market place. Of course, a market place is a common feature of even the poorest country in the world and does not require special scrutiny. Yet to North Koreans who have been hitherto completely accustomed to government rationing for all their economic necessities, an economic activity for personal profit is a completely new and almost revolutionary concept. More importantly, the market place in the north has been gradually developed, with strenuous public oppression at the beginning, by a dire need for physical survival of its ordinary people. Without precedence and knowledge, they established, purely through trial and error, every aspect of the market place best suited for the existing peculiarities and constraints of its economy. Now the market place is so widely and firmly established, with the participation of practically everybody in North Korea, ranging from high government officials to common soldiers, that no power, including the leadership itself, can completely shut it down without causing a major revolt, especially by starving and desperate soldiers with weapons to wield, reminiscent of the October Revolution in czarist Russia.
Currently, the market place is the only force which prevents total collapse of the North Korean economy, and it will continue to grow of its own momentum despite occasional feeble suppression by the government. Due to the complete lack of an official economic policy, the growth of the market place by its people will definitely set the future direction of North Korea's economy. Therefore, it is very important for us to monitor its progress, and if possible, render appropriate assistance for its acceleration. The existence of a reasonably well-functioning market economy in North Korea will greatly facilitate reunification of the two Koreas without an enormous cost, which is estimated to range between $200 billion and $1 trillion, as well as a serious delay experienced in the German reunification.1 With objectives in mind, this article attempts to analyze the current operation of the market place and the optimum external economic assistance necessary to expedite North Korea's progress toward a complete market economy.
Perspectives on the Economic Role of Korea and Korean-Americans in U.S.-Korea Relations (PDF)
Yoon-Shik Park
Since the end of World War II, the United States and Korea have enjoyed a very close relationship in many important areas. Such a relationship started with the liberation of Korea in 1945 by U.S. troops from the Japanese occupation of almost four decades and also included the shedding of blood by Americans for the defense of South Korea from the North Korean and Chinese invasion during the bitter Korean War of 1950-53. Most Koreans, especially those older Koreans who personally experienced the tumultuous years of the Japanese occupation and the Korean War, still harbor such goodwill and sense of gratitude towards America and Americans that perhaps no other country has earned nearly as much in Korea's long history. Even now, the United States is maintaining a significant military presence, including its ground troops, in order to assist the Korean government in repelling any potential military threats from the heavily-militarized North Korea.
Over the past several decades, however, the close relationship has extended from the military and political arenas of earlier years to the economic areas such as trade and investments. The U.S. economy is the largest in the world, with its GDP of $10.45 trillion or about one third of the world economy. In comparison, the Korean economy with its GDP of $477 billion in 2002 is less than one-twentieth of the U.S. economy. Due to the sharp depreciation of the Korean won in the aftermath of the 1997 financial crisis, the Korean per capita income had actually shrunk from $11,380 in 1996 to only $6,723 in 1998 and $8,551 in 1999 and just about $10,000 in 2002, compared to over $36,000 for the United States in 2002. The United States is also the biggest market for Korean exports, accounting for 21% of the total Korean exports in 2001 and 2002. With the total bilateral trading volume of $58.4 billion in 2002, Korea was the United States' 6t h largest export market, 4th largest export market for agricultural products and 7th largest trading partner.