The Republic of Korea (ROK), commonly known as South Korea, has been caught in the middle of the China-US tensions. Seoul seeks to steel its security alliance with Washington over threats from Pyongyang, a historic Beijing ally, and rivalry with Tokyo as well as wants to protect its high economic stakes in China.
Seoul’s exports to Beijing, nearly 26% of its total exports and a trade volume that is larger than the ROK’s trade with Japan and the US combined, is the backbone of the country's economy. The East Asian country therefore can hardly afford to strain ties with China and push its economy in a myriad of woes.
Frictions between Beijing and Seoul, over ROK’s deal with the US to deploy THAAD anti-missile system, flared into an outright diplomatic bickering in February 2016 once former warned the bilateral relation could be “destroyed in an instant” and latter argued the decision was made to counter “North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile threats.”
Under then-new South Korean President Moon Jae-in, largely due to Seoul’s’ dried out exports to Beijing and sinking Chinese tourist arrivals, diplomatic impasse finally broke in October 2017 and the country fostered détente with China in an effort to head off the imminent economic crisis by bringing “exchange and cooperation in all areas back on normal development track.”
Moon’s three noes – no more deployment of THAAD, no integration into a US-led regional missile defense system and no formation of trilateral military alliance with America and Japan – contributed in thawing the China-ROK relationship and helped Asia’s fourth largest economy ship goods to its biggest export market.
Even as Moon had so far refused to support “the Quad” or “the Quad plus alpha” and has been ambivalent promote the US “free and open Indo-Pacific (FOIP)” vision – he acknowledged the importance of the Quad and peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait and agreed to align ROK’s ASEAN-centered New Southern Policy (NSP) with the FOIP including freedom of navigation and overflight in the South China Sea (SCS).
The joint statement is being dubbed in South Korea as a tilt toward the US, backtracking from the country's neutral position in the China-America conflict and throwing weight behind Washington. But the ROK president – who travelled to the US after skipping foreign tours since December 2019 when he visited China to seek Chinese cooperation in several sectors and believed Hong Kong and Xinjiang were China’s internal affairs – still delicately balanced the tone of the shared declaration.
While the joint statement mentioned China not once, Moon didn’t touch the chaffing security aspect of the Quad that Beijing labels an anti-China coalition, talked cautiously on the Taiwan issue in a way not to provoke Beijing and cleverly linked his NSP – which before his arrival at the White House called for substantive cooperation with Washington in seven health, technology and infrastructure areas – with the FOIP through “respective approaches.”
It is also important to note that for three years in a row, South Korea has been cancelling the biannual joint military exercises with the US to prevent stirring tensions with North Korea. On the other hand, former Moon adviser urged the government to pursue a “transcendental foreign policy” as taking side with the US, peace and prosperity would be “hard to guarantee” in the region amid intensifying China-US conflict.
Before the summit, the Biden administration reportedly pressed Moon to act as a decumbent US ally and take up strong language against Beijing. But the ROK president – very well aware of huge political, economic and security implications – had no choice except balancing his stance between the existing and nascent superpowers to safeguard the nation's security alliance with the US and economic interests in Beijing, a popular consensus building in domestic politics.
Unfortunately for the US, it is not just progressives who have been searching for a middle ground between Beijing and Washington; no prominent conservative national security experts think the country should join the Quad, indicating there might not be any changes in the ROK China policy even if conservatives win in the 2022 election.
The US President Joe Biden is willing to meet North Korea’s President Kim Jong-un and diplomatically engage the country for complete denuclearization of the Korean peninsula if he makes serious commitment to discuss dropping his nuclear ambitions. He appointed Obama’s era US ambassador to Seoul, Sung Kim, as his special envoy for Pyongyang.
However following close consultations with Seoul during months-long review of the North Korea policy and staying “deeply concerned” about Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions – the White House, having declined to offer incentives ahead of the summit, didn’t give any specifics of concessions it would extend to bring North Korea back on the table. It was despite Kim’s conciliatory moves not to conduct nuclear tests or firing intercontinental ballistic missiles since 2017.
There are fears in South Korea tipping in the US favor – oblique support for the Quad and FOIP alongside upsetting remarks for China on Taiwan and the SCS – would enrage Beijing, perhaps the only country that can help to reengage Pyongyang for denuclearization and missile launches.
Pew poll is often cited to indicate 83% of the South Koreans lack confidence in Chinese President Xi Jinping about his handling of “world affairs” and 75% of them see Beijing somewhat or very unfavorably. But it is also a historical fact many in the Korean peninsula are closely associated with Chinese civilization and feel proud of being “Sojunghwa” or “little China,” while Beijing is making efforts to further promote cross-country cultural exchanges with Seoul.
Then how could it be discounted that the former ROK President Park Geun-hye, jailed for 20 years over corruption charges, in 2015 visited China to commemorate the end of World War II with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Tiananmen square where she stressed on the importance of strategic cooperation with Beijing.
Washington’s narcissistic strategy, idle talk on denuclearization, unpredictability as a reliable South Korean partner and Trumpization of the US politics, like many countries, have been withering the chances of a clear ROK support for America in the China-US standoff and were the factors that pressed Moon to stick to a neutral position at the White House.
*This is one of my opinion pieces (unedited) that first appeared in "Bangkok Post":