CIAO DATE: 04/02

The Korean-American Alliance and the "Rise of China": A Preliminary Assessment of Perceptual Changes and Strategic Choices

"The priority order of Chosun's external strategy should first be to side with China, second to align with Japan, and then to connect with America."

–Huang Zunxian (1880)

"China has moved to cultivate close relations with the government in Seoul–perhaps in anticipation of an eventual United States withdrawal . . . . The United States must make special efforts to sustain its close alliance ties to South Korea."

–Zbigniew Brzezinski et al. (1996)

Does history repeat itself? It appears so for Korea as an unfortunate geopolitical pawn of its stronger neighbors for the last century or so. History does not seem to repeat in quite the same way, however. As Chinese diplomat Huang Zunxian recommended in 1880 that Chosun (Korea's official designation during the Yi Dynasty) "side with the Qing" (qinzhong) while relegating the relative importance of Japan and the United States to the levels of "aligning and connecting" (jieri and lianmei), respectively, Korea remained for the most part the most loyal subsystem of the Sinic world order, thereby missing out on opportunities for self-strength-ening and realignment and eventually becoming a Japanese colony. More than a hundred years later, the Republic of Korea (hereafter Korea) may now be about to confront a similar dilemma, but this time with a reversed order of preferences. That is to say, the rise of China, with which Korea has already accomplished diplomatic normalization, may gradually force the Seoul government to reconfigure its Cold War-based strategic thinking and reassess its half-century alliance relationship with the United States.

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