The Coming Change in the U.S.-Korea Alliance

April 9, 2003
By Victor D. Cha

Even if the differences in perspectives on North Korea between Washington and Seoul could be closed, the inevitable fate of the Roh Moo-hyun presidency may be that the most critical foreign policy issue it will have to contemplate before its departure in 2008 will not be North Korea but the alliance with the United States.   

This is because a historically unique constellation of forces indicates that change to the U.S. military presence in Korea is inevitable, if not imminent.  The presence of American ground troops has been successful in deterring and defending against North Korean aggression, yet its finely tailored  forces (designed to repel a massive land assault) have grown less useful to overall American strategy in East Asia.   At the same time, the ROK military has grown more robust and capable, a far cry from the feeble force trained by the United States fifty years ago.   

Civil-military tensions over the U.S. military footprint in Korea have grown immeasurably in past months, showcasing a younger generation of Koreans who see the United States less favorably than did their elders.  The sunshine policy also had the unintended consequence of worsening perceptions of U.S. troops in the body politic.  On the one hand, the exaggerated success of the policy caused the public to be less welcoming of the U.S. presence.  On the other, the failure of the policy led to the search for scapegoats, for which the U.S. presence was a ready target.   

Larger trends in U.S. security thinking also presage change.  The Pentagon’s 100,000 personnel benchmark in Asia is viewed as obsolete among experts.  The revolution in military affairs, moreover, with its emphasis on long-range, precision-strike capabilities foreshadow alterations in the face of the American forward presence around the world.  

I do not view changes in the structure and number of U.S. Forces in Korea (USFK) as a tool for tension-reduction on the peninsula.  Doves argue that the main rationale for restructuring USFK (or withdrawing it) should be for the purpose of achieving peace on the peninsula. Although there is an intuitive appeal to this view on the South Korean side (especially if one posits a ROK military capable of standing on its own), it is less appealing from the American perspective.  Such a view assumes that North Korea has implicit veto power over the disposition of U.S. forces in Korea.  It underestimates the deterrent value provided by the U.S. presence (i.e., willingness to negotiate away USFK may give the mistaken impression that U.S. security commitments are not sound).  Moreover, it undercuts the notion that the future of USFK derives from the future of the alliance.  Changes in USFK should not be the sacrificial lamb for peace on the peninsula, but should be integrated with a larger U.S.-ROK joint vision.    

At the same time, though, I disagree with the hawkish argument that contemplation of any change in USFK must await a stable peace on the peninsula (defined as elimination of the northern threat).   This view is too inflexible; moreover, it focuses on the easily answerable questions at the expense of the most challenging ones.  USFK is composed of three components: the UNC (United Nations Command), Combined Forces Command (CFC) structure, and the 37,000 men troop and base presence.  If a peace treaty emerged on the peninsula, then this would obviate the need for the UNC (primarily tasked after 1978 with armistice related issues).  Hawks accept that changes in the forward presence and the command structure would likely follow such a peace.  The more interesting and challenging question is whether one can contemplate incremental change in the CFC and USFK presence given continued threats from the North.  Such a plan of action would maintain traditional deterrence against the North, sustain America’s allied defense commitment to Seoul, but also resonate with the gradual cultivation of a new vision for the alliance that looks beyond the DPRK.  In the end, this plan for USFK would be least specious in that it would hold across a spectrum of potential outcomes on the peninsula (i.e., from continued stalemate to peace treaty to unification).  

Those Koreans who believe that the U.S. is too comfortably self-interested with its position on the peninsula to contemplate serious change are dead wrong.  The images beamed back to the United States of “Yankee go home” demonstrations, burned American flags, accosted GIs, and young Korean assertions that George Bush is more threatening than Kim Jong-il have had a real effect in Washington.  There is anger, expressed in Congress and in the op-ed pages of major newspapers about South Korean ungratefulness for the alliance.  With no imperial aspirations, the United States indeed would withdraw its forces in the face of an unwelcoming host nation.   

Secretary Rumsfeld’s recent remarks about possible modification of U.S. forces in Korea offers a glimpse, in my view, of a deeper, serious, and longer-term study underway in Washington on revising the alliance.  The anti-American tenor of the election campaign in Korea and the subsequent “peace” demonstrations have created a momentum in Washington that proponents of alliance revision can ride.  The ostensible goal of such plans is to have the same alliance but with a smaller and different (i.e. less ground, more air/navy) footprint, but if the vicious circle of anti- Americanism in Seoul and consequent anti-Korean backlashes in the US continues unabated, then the outcome could also entail a downgrading of the alliance in U.S. eyes.   

Already, some South Koreans are concerned about the apparent seriousness of Bush’s plans.  In the ultimate historical irony, Seoulites who once claimed that the United States would forever keep their military footprint in the center of the metropolis because it suited American geostrategic interests, are now calling for the U.S. military to remain because it is in South Korean interests that they do so.  President Roh Moo-hyun does not want to go down in South Korean history as the leader who “lost” the alliance.   His entreaties to NGO groups to dampen down the anti-American rhetoric, his meeting with USFK, and his remarks about how “precious” Korea finds the U.S. military presence were all well-advised steps in this regard.  But he needs to do much more.  As is underway in the United States, President Roh and his foreign policy team need to undertake a bottom-up review of the alliance.  They need to assess Korea’s long-term interests in the alliance.  And they need to come up with a longer-term vision of what the alliance stands for, rather than what it stands against.   

This vision must showcase the new U.S.-Korea alliance as the embodiment of values including democracy, open markets, nonproliferation, counter-terrorism, human rights, rule of law, civilian control of the military, and freedom of worship in a region of the world that does not yet readily accept these values.   

At its military core, the alliance’s regional stability function would require a force presence that meets three criteria.  The revamped presence must be militarily potent, but flexible enough to react swiftly to a broad range of regional tasks (deployable).  The presence, however downsized and changed, must still preserve America’s traditional defense commitment to South Korea (credible).  Finally, as critical as being a potent, credible, and deployable, the revised presence must not be seen as overbearing by South Koreans (unobtrusive).   On the ground, this new presence would most likely entail the removal of Yongsan headquarters in central Seoul and the upsizing of basing at Osan as a replacement.  Ground troop presence would be drawn down and moved south of Seoul.  Air capabilities (at Osan and Kunsan) would remain constant and enhanced with a larger naval presence on the peninsula, possibly with a port or access rights on the southern end of the peninsula. 

However this presence is reconfigured, it must be done in a careful, deliberative fashion and not in a knee-jerk, reactive one.  There are undeniable military rationales for changing the US military footprint on the peninsula.  The value-added of such changes, however, would be even greater if they could be accomplished to military satisfaction, and without the negative political externalities.  Such negative consequences include a North Korean regime snatching victory from the jaws of defeat by claiming “success” for having pushed the Americans out, or acute abandonment fears on the part of Tokyo and Seoul that compel them to self-help security alternatives.  Both outcomes would occur at the expense of losing traditional American political influence and stature in the region. 

The long-term scope of such a study should not belie its urgency.  Coming up now with a mutually agreeable vision and military rationale for the alliance ensures that future revisions to the force presence take place in the right political context and are not misinterpreted.  Otherwise, the U.S.-ROK alliance runs the risk of entering its middle ages as a brittle cold war relic, prone to being overtaken and outpaced by events.   

Victor D. Cha holds the Song Chair in Government and Asian Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.