President Lee Drags South Korea Toward Its Destiny (Updated)

If there is such a thing as cautious enthusiasm — particularly for something that’s implausible on its face — that describes my reaction to President Lee’s proposal for phased unification with North Korea:

Lee’s plan, similar to proposals from previous South Korean leaders, calls for North Korea’s denuclearization. If North Korea meets that demand — and years of international persuasion have not succeeded — Lee’s plan calls for a “peace community,” improved economic cooperation and then the establishment of a “national community.”

“Inter-Korean relations demand a new paradigm,” Lee said, according to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency. “It is imperative that the two sides choose co-existence instead of confrontation, progress instead of stagnation. The two of us need to overcome the current state of division and proceed with the goal of peaceful reunification.” [WaPo]

Perhaps it’s not completely implausible. Lee must know that the demise of Kim Jong Il is going to destabilize the North Korean leadership, and that if relatively open and moderate thinkers are lying latent in Pyongyang, a proposal like this one could have some appeal for them. There is some chance that this could come to pass if there’s a coup or some other kind of dramatic shift in control, but not without one.

It seems to me that Lee’s proposal does three things he badly needed to do. First, he steals “unification” from the lexicon of those for whom it really means sustaining North Korea (and hence, the division of Korea). I mean, the last thing the average unnamed Hankyoreh “analyst” or Democratic Party assemblyman wants is for the archives of the Peoples’ Reconnaissance Bureau to fall suddenly into the hands of the Chosun Ilbo. But don’t take my word for it:

“Overall, I see a major contradiction in his proposal, proposing a unification tax while having burnt all the bridges with North Korea,” said Moon Chung-in, a professor of political science at Yonsei University.

Personally, I think “torpedoed” would have been the perfect metaphor.

Second, he offers a financial and security incentive for the emergence of legitimate North Korean moderates, as opposed to those who inhabit Selig Harrison’s fantasyland. Third, by levying new taxes to pay for it, he makes a difficult and necessary decision to begin offsetting the cost of reconstruction (and this is also reason for American taxpayers to celebrate). Being a low tax / small government sort myself, I ordinarily recoil at big, expensive projects, but who can really call this discretionary spending? It seems to me that if big changes are inevitable for North Korea, the South is probably money ahead by getting serious about planning for it and having the equipment and logistical machinery in place now. And to the extent there are fiscal objections to this, I’m willing to entertain those from anyone except the same crowd that dumped billions of Sunshine dollars into Mount Paektu and haven’t a thing to show for it.

Fourth, it certainly beats another water project.

Update:

In the Wall Street Journal, Evan Ramstad has some more good quotes from Lee:

“Reunification will happen,” Mr. Lee said. “It is therefore our duty to start thinking about real and substantive ways to prepare for reunification, such as the adoption of a unification tax. I ask that these and other issues related to this be discussed widely and thoroughly by all the members of our society.”

North Korea’s state media carried no immediate reaction to Mr. Lee’s speech. [….]

Mr. Lee’s idea rests on the premise that North Korea’s authoritarian regime will either collapse or be pressured into reaching out for help, and that the more prosperous South will take the lead in picking up the pieces. [….]

Mr. Lee began [his speech] by including “our brethren in the North” in the list of people he was addressing. He opened the section on North Korea by saying “My 70 million compatriots,” a reference to the combined population of the two Koreas.

Powerfully provocative words that I hope many North Koreans will hear. Ramstad compares Lee’s concept to Germany’s the “unification” or “solidarity” tax.

Yonhap notes the absence of detail in Lee’s proposal, suggesting that the tax might be levied in the form of a VAT, a bond issue, or even lottery tickets. This made me snicker …

“President Lee doesn’t call for the immediate imposition of a unification tax. Such a tax, if imposed, will be visible only in the next administration,” Rep. Na Seong-lin of the ruling Grand National Party (GNP) said in a radio interview.

What we have here is a bold vision without any specific plans, at least not that Lee’s people are willing to talk about yet:

“Amid speculation about Kim Jong-il’s health problems and the North’s worsening economic crisis, the need for us to raise unification expenses has grown bigger and bigger. We should assume greater responsibility for North Korea if we don’t want to lose it to China in the aftermath of its possible collapse.”

Related Cabinet ministries declined to speculate on how preparations for unification will be funded. An official at the unification ministry said discussions for Lee’s idea of unification tax “will only now enter the early stage of planning” adding, “There could be different ways to secure finances, but it’s something that requires national consensus.”

The big losers here? Kim Jong Il, for one. With this speech, Lee effectively began to write his obituary. Another must be Han Song Ryol, whose cross-DMZ media spectacle was more or less forgotten amid the debate Lee has provoked about better ideas. That debate shows us again that the last thing South Korea’s left really wants is unification:

The main opposition Democratic Party countered that Lee’s words could actually lead North Korea to believe Seoul is trying to “absorb” Pyongyang and that the government would do well to first consider how to first improve inter-Korean ties.

They’ve delayed the inevitable, but in the end, they can’t prevent it — by which I mean the reading of the Reconnaissance Bureau’s archives.