Roh Learns Bitter Lesson About the Futility of Appeasing Implacable Foes
The president also laid into three aspiring candidates in next year’s presidential election, describing his appointment of the moderate Goh Kun as his first prime minister as “a failure. “I chose Goh in the hope that he would become a bridge bringing me closer to conservatives, but it alienated me and the government from them instead,” Roh said.
His decision to appoint Uri Party hopefuls Kim Geun-tae and Chung Dong-young as health and unification ministers was equally disappointing, he said. Roh compared himself to U.S. president Lincoln, saying his appointment of Kim and Chung to his Cabinet was motivated by “a similar engagement principle. “I did the same as Lincoln. The difference is that I came under fire for doing so. It’s very depressing. I tried to copy Lincoln but it didn’t work. It’s no fun at all.
No word on whether he gets the point as it applies to North Korea, however. Roh’s speech was also noteworthy in that he said something rational:
Roh said the government seeks the handover to prepare for any emergency in North Korea. “Would we have anything to say to China and North Korea when we can’t even control our own troops in wartime and can’t decide whether to bomb a civilian facility in the North and which facility to target?” he asked. “This is diplomatically very important.”
That’s a valid criticism of Korea’s previous defense policies, and it’s legitimate for any nation to seek the independent pursuit of any of the essential trappings of sovereignty, including defense and diplomacy. The problem is not one of objective — where Roh is much more right than his critics — but of execution. Roh has alienated the United States with such inexplicable suddenness and bitterness that his successor will have no choice but to build that independent defense on a timetable that will do to the South Korean economy what French defensive driving did to Princess Di. He may even have timed it for the very moment his country will need to absorb 23 million destitute North Koreans.
I wouldn’t call that a valid criticism.
He is putting politics before national security.
Instead of looking to Lincoln as a model for Roh, we should take a gander at De Gualle. They are very roughly in a similar ballpark.
From day one, before he was even the key leader of the French nation in exile, De Gualle viewed a major point of his mission — sticking his thumb in the eye of the allies.
He clear states in his memoirs that from the first hour, he was looking past the war into the future and that the only way France could avoid becoming a 3rd or 4th rate nothing — due to the “shameful” manner in which they were defeated by the Germans and surrendered so quickly — was to apply a huge amount of arrogance and stubborness when dealing with the leaders of the allied war movement. He had to be rudely nationalistic – even when he did not have a state – inorder to preserve French dignity ———— and the status of France as a great nation.
He kept up the attacks/pressure on allies throughout the war and long afterward.
I think if we examine his kicking NATO (US) troops out of France, we can also see a reason why Roh is so misguided:
When De Gualle stoked French nationalism to kick out the bastard GIs (I knew a librarian who was a teen then with her father in the military, and she is still highly bitter about that time period in French-US realtions and how the base people were treated) —– what security threat did France have?
Yes – we were all wrapped up deeply in the Cold War, but by the time De Gualle made his big move, West Germany was in place (I believe) and the mutual assured destruction doctrine well established on both sides.
Meaning — France had a buffer zone on its border and it had assurance it would be impossible for the Soviet block to go to war with it without the US and others being forced to join in.
South Korea doesn’t have a buffer state, and if US troops leave, the deterent factor plummets, and there are incredibly serious questions about whether the US would throw troops back in or not. I believe they would not fight that way in Korean War II.
But, Roh feels safe in doing all this stuff anyway —–
because he already believes the chance of war is nil. He doesn’t believe North Korea is a threat. He seems to clearly believe that the main threat is NK striking at US troops in Korea – and once those troops are gone, there will be no impediment to friendly relations between the North and South.
Luckily for South Korean society, Roh’s view is in the extreme minority — and he’ll be gone soon.
The only question is whether the US is already determined to get USFK out or not.
I forgot — the reason I wouldn’t call it valid is that nations – even powerful nations – have worked with other powerful nations during times of war using a combined command structure or allowing a more powerful nation to take the lead.
Inotherwords, many times even powerful nations put as top priority the best system to win the war and establish peace – where they can safely play politics without risking more lives than will be lost anyway.
The government’s top priority is to protect the lives and well-being of its citizens, not making sure their sense of national pride is intact – especially if the manner it decides to do so weakens the defense of the nation against a real and present danger.
Roh isn’t mad. He has followed a policy of appeasing China with the goal of securing protection for the ROK. Chinese policy has always been to get USFK to go home and always to diminish Japan in the eyes of Asia. Roh has followed Chinese bidding on both counts. Roh might be taking a long view that for the next few decades, China’s protection will mean more to the ROK than a shrinking USFK. In the meantime he is very much a pawn of both Chinese and American strategies and frequently sacrificed by both.