[Editorial] Korea-U.S. defense talks

The chief defense officials of Korea and the United States hold their annual security talks in Seoul today with Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin and U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta at the head of each side. Ministers and top generals of the two allies have got together each year without interruption for over four decades to review the security situation on and around the Korean Peninsula and discuss efforts to meet common challenges.

The Korea-U.S. Security Consultative Meeting not only signifies the firmness of the bilateral alliance that originated from the 1950-53 Korean War but proves that military tension along the Demilitarized Zone drawn up at the end of the war has remained so high for so long to require the maintaining of a high-level bi-national strategic forum.

The first defense ministers’ meeting was held at the height of the Cold War as North Korea showed increased aggressiveness with the capture of the U.S. intelligence ship Pueblo and a raid on the presidential mansion in Seoul in January 1968. The United States also started a large-scale joint exercise with South Korean forces, airlifting troops and equipment from the continental U.S. The annual drills have continued largely in the same form though with different codenames.

The world has changed a lot in the intervening years with the demise of the Cold War 20 years ago. In terms of economy, South and North Korea were nearly on a par in the late 1960s; the North has since shrunk to less than one-thirtieth of the South in GDP now. Still Pyongyang’s belligerence has worsened with the sinking of a South Korean navy patrol boat in the West Sea and shelling of a South Korean island last year. It makes verbal threats of a nuclear war toting a few atomic bombs in its possession.

One of the most significant changes in the region is the rise of China in economic and military power. South Korea has recently entered a “strategic cooperative partnership” with China, which is currently focused on economic relations, but Seoul will have to broaden security ties with Beijing as well in the future as it tries to deter North Korean belligerence. This eventuality could put Seoul into a delicate situation as it maintains the triangular alliance with the United States and Japan.

Secretary Panetta revealed his awareness of the importance of maintaining military cooperation with the ASEAN and Northeast Asian allies in his articles in major dailies of Indonesia, Japan and South Korea. He particularly stressed no drawdown in the U.S. military presence in the region despite anticipated budget cuts.

Panetta’s first visit to Seoul as U.S. secretary of defense is brief but it will be valuable if he could catch the growing sensitivity here regarding regional security relations which are complicated by China’s changing status, in addition to the nuclear ambition of North Korea. As he commits himself to elevating relationship to one of “stability, openness and prosperity,” the U.S. defense chief with global responsibilities needs good grasp of regional circumstances and particularities of specific allies.