Korean Peninsula: One Small Step in the Right Direction
“President Donald Trump’s decision to scale back joint military exercises with South Korea,” Matthew Lee and Ben Finley write for the Associated Press, “does not just slight a longtime ally but raises broader concerns about the security interests of the United States in Asia and elsewhere.”
Trump’s reason for supposedly, and in unspecified ways, downsizing the annual “Ulchi Freedom Shield” exercise is that South Korea has been insufficiently supportive of his war against Iran. That doesn’t seem like a very good reason … but there ARE good reasons, and it’s a tiny move in the correct direction of drawing down US military entanglement on the Korean Peninsula.
The history, in brief:
After World War 2, Korea — which had been occupied by the Japanese — was split into two states. In the north, a Soviet/Chinese-backed communist regime under Kim Il Sung held power, while the south was ruled by a US-backed fascist regime under Syngman Rhee. Each side wanted to invade, conquer, annex, and absorb the other’s territory, but the US held Rhee back from doing so and Kim beat him to the punch.
The resulting war technically goes on to this very day, although it’s been in a tense state of ceasefire since 1953. More than 35,000 American troops, hundreds of thousands of South Korean, North Korean, Chinese, and Soviet soldiers, and millions of civilians died to reach that stalemate.
North Korea remains “communist” in name and pageantry while actually embodying absolute , quasi-religious monarchy under the Kim dynasty’s third generation.
South Korea is theoretically a “democracy,” but mostly just a big state capitalist enterprise operating under military protection from, and advantageous trade deals with, the US . The US spends $5-6 billion per year to support 80 military bases and 27,000 deployed US troops, and has now been doing that much or more for 80 years.
Interestingly, the AP story quotes Dan Fried, an official in George W. Bush’s administration, to the effect that “there is no American interest I can see” in reducing US military commitments to South Korea.
But in 2004, Bush himself proposed a much bolder plan than small cuts to joint military exercises. He wanted, he announced, to completely withdraw US forces from the Korean peninsula over the course of ten years.
Granted, Bush made that proposal under duress after rushing to New Mexico when his campaign learned that Libertarian Michael Badnarik was polling at 5% in the state, that Democrat John Kerry had scheduled a speech of his own there, and that New Mexico’s electoral votes might hang in the balance. He needed an olive branch to the growing anti-war movement, and quickly dropped the plan once he was re-elected.
But it was a good idea then, and it’s a great idea now.
American taxpayers have been throwing blood and treasure at South Korea for most of a century even as it has become an economic powerhouse that competes with US producers, and that commitment also feeds into US entanglement in every regional argument involving not just the Koreas, but China, Taiwan, Japan, the Philippines, etc. It’s a raw deal for America.
South Korea possesses abundant means to provide for its own defense , especially since Kim Jong-Un certainly understands that even success at military conquest of a population twice the size of the one he already rules would eventually bring his own regime down.
I hope that President Trump will continue on, and accelerate ambitiously along, this course. The US armed forces should stand down in South Korea. Whether the South Korean regime stands up in their place, and if so in what ways, isn’t a matter for the US regime to decide. Bring the troops home.
Another Trump-Kim Carnival?
A Trump-Kim summit would be a spectacle like no other. A carnival extravaganza with the Korean Peninsula holding center stage, and every handshake, expression, seating arrangement, and stray remark dissected by troupes of North Korea pundits across the world’s news networks. But like any great traveling carnival, a few days later ticket holders will be left with an uncomfortable queasiness and a sense that they’ve somehow been cheated. Spectacle, not strategy.
As the media fawned over the prospect of another Trump-Kim carnival, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi arrived in Seoul for two days of talks with South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun. Strategy, not spectacle.
Washington is lost in spectacle, Beijing is focused and strategic. The differing approaches will transform the region.
Iran as a warning
The decision to attack Iran demonstrated that U.S. decision-making was driven less by strategic or operational considerations than by personal motivations. The conflict was poorly planned, employing the wrong military tools at the wrong time. Earlier operations had already exposed these limitations: the United States struggled to achieve its objectives against Houthi positions in Yemen between March and May 2025, and again against Iranian targets during the Twelve-Day War in June 2025. These warnings went unheeded. The resulting conflict exposed a deeper problem: an inability to match military means to strategic ends.
The continuation of the conflict appears to be shaped by political, financial, and reputational incentives as much as a coherent assessment of strategic costs and benefits. The distinction between the national interest and personal interests is increasingly difficult to discern. The problem therefore extends beyond poor strategy or operational failure: the machinery of war itself has become a vehicle for presidential profit.
The failure to come to terms has demonstrated that the U.S. is “agreement incapable”. The weakening of the State Department and the reliance on poorly qualified presidential envoys has hollowed out the institutional capacity needed to negotiate, conclude, and sustain credible agreements.
Then there’s the treatment of allies, such as South Korea. Start with removal of the Patriot and THAAD platforms, their effective failure in high-intensity conflict, the departure of the last U.S. carrier group from East Asia, and unilateral changes to long-planned military exercises, and the value of the U.S. alliance begins to look very different. Add the ever-present demand that South Korea play a larger role in containing China, and the alliance itself begins to look like a risk.
Awaiting Washington’s move?
Unarguably, South Korea currently needs the U.S. – and Donald Trump in particular. Securing an end to the Korean War would replace a temporary armistice with a permanent peace regime, reduce the risk of renewed conflict, and open space for a more stable relationship with North Korea. Achieving this requires U.S. participation and presidential authority, as well as the narcissism and recklessness to break with decades of established policy.
An end to the Korean War would also fit nearly two decades of South Korean preparation to survive a weakening of the U.S. alliance or its end.
South Korea regained peacetime OPCON in 1994, while the formal process for transferring wartime OPCON began in 2006, when Roh Moo-hyun and George W. Bush agreed on the basic principles of the transfer. Twenty years later, the process remains incomplete, but its direction has not changed: greater South Korean responsibility for its own defense and less dependence on U.S. command.
The growth of South Korea’s arms industry points in the same direction. Once dependent on U.S. weapons, South Korea now produces and exports tanks, artillery, aircraft, warships, missiles, and air-defense systems. More than an export success, this is building the industrial capacity for greater strategic independence.
The nuclear “wish list” points further in the same direction. South Korea currently moving toward a domestically produced nuclear submarine, with the first planned for the mid-2030s. At the same time, public support for an independent nuclear deterrent remains strong, even though the government currently formally rejects the development of nuclear weapons.
All three point in the same direction: greater autonomy, military-industrial independence, and ultimately independent deterrence. South Korea still needs the alliance, but it is preparing for a future in which it may no longer have one.
However, the current South Korean push for Trump to play a role on the Korean Peninsula is more about cognitive and institutional reflex than strategic foresight – and this reflex is rapidly weakening. South Korea is increasingly aware that this is Beijing’s region.
The future lies in Beijing?
America’s greatest supporters in Seoul are aware that that the Iran conflict suggests the U.S. no longer has the capacity to decisively shape events on the Korean Peninsula. The deeper strategic logic is difficult to ignore: the long-term dynamics of East Asia increasingly point toward U.S. departure.
The regional balance is shifting from maritime toward continental power, while technological change is making forward bases, surface fleets, and extended supply lines increasingly vulnerable. At the same time, the military and political costs of maintaining regional primacy are rising faster than the benefits it provides. Withdrawal will not be immediate, but the strategic trajectory is clear.
Across the West, it’s assumed that middle powers seek to balance nearby great powers by securing the support of more distant great powers. South Korea’s alliance with the U.S. fits this logic. But East Asian history shows that accepting and even profiting from a nearby great power sometimes makes more sense. Much of Southeast Asia’s more acquiescent approach to China fits this logic.
For South Korea, coming to terms with this is politically and socially difficult. Yet, in strategic terms, it makes sense to “negotiate” the departure of the U.S. with Beijing before, rather than after. Waiting until the U.S. leaves of its own accord, or is pushed out in a region-changing diplomatic failure, will not improve South Korea’s position. Time is not on Seoul’s side.
Another Trump-Kim carnival may take place. If it soothes and engenders favor with President Trump, then it serves a purpose. If it supports immediate objectives, such as securing greater military independence or an end to the Korean War, then it serves a purpose. But beyond the immediate spectacle, the future of the Korean Peninsula will not be decided on Trump’s social media, but by talks at the Zhongnanhai.
Jeffrey Robertson previously worked for the Australian government in the fields of foreign policy and diplomacy with a focus on East Asia. He now writes from the other side of the line as an academic at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. His updates can be found at https://junotane.com.
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