American second thoughts on Korea

Press, 15 September 1976, Page 21

American second thoughts on Korea

By

MARK FRANKLAND,

of

the “Observer,” London

The Americans and the North Koreans will probably soon agree on new secjrity arrangements at Panmunjom that will lessen the risk of incidents along the demilitarised zone dividing North and South Korea. This, at least, will be one positive result of the killing of two American officers at Panmunjom last month when the North Koreans attacked an American and South Korean team tryin„ to lop some offending branches off a poplar tree. But it would be a pity if that is the only result, for as reactions in Washington to the incident showed, the American military presence in South Korea is not readily accepted by ail Americans. Yet it is arguably the most likely place in the

world for American? to get caught up in a local war.

The fact is that relations with South Korea are something of a burden even for those American officials and politicians who believe that the Korean alliance is essential to American interests. This was illu. rated during the recent crisis.

While American officials quite quickly came round to interpreting North Korea’s message of “regret" about the incident as a virtual apology, and certainly as evidence that North Korea did not want the crisis to get worse, the South Koreans went on calling the message “unsatisfactory and therefore unacceptable.”

A member of the Korean Information Ministry told American journalists

in Seoul that '‘military measures. a surgical strike” were called for. South Korean television, which is controlled by the Government, ran interviews with ordinary Koreans who said: “We know the United States has atomic weapons. Why don’t they use them?”

This South Korean fierceness was also embarrassing because it draws attention to that side of the regime of President Park Chung Hee that officials in Washington would prefer Americans not to think about too much — its repressiveness. A week after the Panmunjom incident, a court in Seoul sent 18 South Koreans to gaol for plotting to overthrow President Park. Kim Dae Jung, who a few years ago almost beat Park in a Presidential

election, got eight years. So did a 79-year-old former President of Korea and a 75-year-old Quaker leader. No one accused them of being Communists, or even being indirectly guided by the Commun-

ists. Simply, it is a crime to criticise Park and to suggest that there be a new government. Senibr South Korean diplomats in Washington and around the world justify their Government’s actions in this way. North Korea still hopes to take over the South, they say, and as a first step it is trying to get the 40,000

American troops out of the South. At the same time, Korean Communists want to encourage dissension and political argument in the South that might weaken the Park Government and perhaps, once the American sol-

diers have gone, lead to armed conflict in which the North could intervene. The quarrel that many Americans, including perhaps a new Democratic administration, might have with this argument is that while they do not doubt North Korea is a troublemaker, they do not see why Americans should take risks for a country

which, by American democratic standards, has scarcely a shred of virtue. South Koreans and selfconsciously tough-nosed American officals sometimes reply that American democracy and morality cannot, be expected to . exist ai! over the world and what counts is hard national interest. This raises two questions. Firstly, it is not clear " that after Vietnam the American people would want to support a war in Asia on behalf of a country with which they are not politically sympathetic. Secondly, what hard national interest does America have in South Korea? The Korean peninsula is of far greater immediate concern to China, Russia, and Japan than to

America. Neither China nor Russia are thought to welcome the idea of a Korea united under the Communists for it would likely be as bothersome to the Communist giants as a united Communist Vietnam. The Koreans, like the Vietnamese, do not kowtow to big neighbours. Japan (and the West) would stand to lose large investments if South Korea fell, but it is not certain that a united Korea would present a military threat to Japan. The two nations might spit at each other sometimes across the sea, but what more? The only indubitably American interest involved is that of not being seen to give way, as in Vietnam, under Communist pressure. But

that was an interest which the American Congress discovered to be uncompelling where Vietnam was concerned.

There does, therefore, seem to be a case for putting America’s relations with South Korea on a better basis. It might, as the Democratic Presidential candidate, Jimmy Carter, has suggested, involve a gradual withdrawal of American troops. It would certainly involve talking to China and Russia.

A more modest commitment should be a more credible one, for it would have a better chance of being properly supported by the American people and the politicians they serid to Congress. (O.F.N.S. Copyright)