Conventional wisdom holds that voters here are more concerned about the economy than foreign policy. You hear constant complaints about rising prices, the costs of places to live, standards of living and the rising wealth gap between rich and poor.
We've heard such tales of woe for years even as the country has grown into an economic and industrial powerhouse with maybe the world's twelfth-biggest GDP. Estimates vary, but the GDP will probably increase by two percent this year. In an aggressive, competitive society, there's a lot of talk about a severe economic downturn. But you don't get a real sense that it's happening.
Interestingly, however, complaints and criticism of the economic policies of the conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol dominated the campaigns for all 300 seats in the National Assembly to the exclusion of North Korea, the American alliance and Japan. People can feel the vagaries of fluctuating prices in their everyday lives. Impassioned debate on foreign policy is another matter. Despite a rising tide of rhetoric from North Korea along with a record number of missile tests, you don't sense real alarm over what Kim Jong-un will do next. So often has he boasted of newer, more advanced missiles that they're hardly noticed other than in headlines that are easily forgotten.
It's against that background that Yoon has agreed to a series of joint exercises in which U.S. and South Korean forces have perfected their skills more effectively and resolutely than they've done for years. Yoon's foes in the Democratic Party of Korea may not approve of what they see as a potentially dangerous escalation of tension, but they prefer to focus on the economy as the surest way to appeal to popular emotions. North Korea, so close geographically, ethnically and linguistically, seems like an abstract menace, more theoretical than real.
You wonder, though, how long South Korea can exist in what may be a fool's paradise. Kim Jong-un has discovered what looks like a life-saving relationship with Russia. No longer does he have to worry about famine and disease killing hundreds of thousands of his people as during the decade of the "arduous march" of the 1990s. He's got a steady source of income from the sale of armaments and artillery shells to the Russians, who repay him in food and vital equipment, not to mention technological know-how for new and "better" nukes and missiles.
Just as North Korea's exports to Russia fill the needs of the Russian war machine, so Russia's war in Ukraine is the lifesaver Kim needs for regime survival. The war's impact may be felt as much in Asia as in Europe when you consider the strength it's giving Kim to engage in increasingly reckless threats against his enemies. North Koreans may be hungry, but they're no longer on the verge of starvation.
North Korea is gaining strength to the point where Kim can contemplate a surprise blow, maybe not a war but a shock nonetheless, against his enemies. It may be inconceivable that he might deploy a nuclear warhead, which he hasn't tested since 2017, but he could definitely think of a surprise attack of even greater dimensions than the sinking of the ROKS Cheonan or the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island in 2010.
For most people, such talk is all too repetitive. We've heard it all before and don't pay attention. In this atmosphere, we're bound to hear rising criticism of Yoon's hardline emphasis on war games with the Americans and much-improved relations with Japan. For the remaining three years of his term, Yoon's foes will be calling for yet another opening to North Korea while the North goes on demanding the withdrawal of still more American troops, the complete closure of American bases and the end of the Korea-America alliance.
The fact that these issues are not uppermost on the minds of most voters is probably a good thing. Yoon does not have to yield to all these demands even if his popularity descends to new lows and he's unable to convince the fractious National Assembly of his program and policies. We may have to wait until the next presidential election, in 2027, for differences in policy toward North Korea to assume center stage.
Given the record of swings from liberal to conservative in recent Korean history, the only certainty is that nothing is certain. The Americans may talk happily, even optimistically, about much-improved relations with the Yoon government, but the rapport they've built with the Yoon administration over the past two years is far from permanent.
Donald Kirk (www.donaldkirk.com) writes on war and peace mainly from Seoul and Washington.
Shifting sentiments
22
0
11.04.2024
Conventional wisdom holds that voters here are more concerned about the economy than foreign policy. You hear constant complaints about rising prices, the costs of places to live, standards of living and the rising wealth gap between rich and poor.
We've heard such tales of woe for years even as the country has grown into an economic and industrial powerhouse with maybe the world's twelfth-biggest GDP. Estimates vary, but the GDP will probably increase by two percent this year. In an aggressive, competitive society, there's a lot of talk about a severe economic downturn. But you don't get a real sense that it's happening.
Interestingly, however, complaints and criticism of the economic policies of the conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol dominated the campaigns for all 300 seats in the National Assembly to the exclusion of North Korea, the American alliance and Japan. People can feel the vagaries of fluctuating prices in their everyday lives. Impassioned debate on foreign policy is another matter. Despite a rising tide of rhetoric from North Korea along with a record number of missile tests, you don't sense real alarm over what Kim........
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