The Origins and Evolution of the Korean–American Alliance: An American Perspective

We cannot give democracy, as we know it, to any people or cram it down their throats.... Money cannot buy it; outside force and presure [sic] cannot nurture it.

Joseph E. Jacobs, political adviser in Korea to George Marshall, 1947 ₁

The people of Asia today fear starvation and poverty more than the oppressive duties thrust upon them by totalitarianism.

Park Chung–hee, 1971 ₂

I’d argue that our investment in Korea far exceeds our strategic interest.

Robert Komer, National Security Council, 1963 ₃

The most striking thing about the relationship between the United States and South Korea has been its persistence in the face of chronic fragility. As analysts in the late 1990s worry about the impact of the Four–Party Talks, the Nuclear Agreed Framework, economic crisis, and reunification upon the ties that bind Seoul and Washington, it behooves them to learn from the lessons of the past: that the linkages have always been weak and that indifference and ignorance have always been a troublesome and threatening reality. The strains of today are simply the frictions of yesterday in a new guise. But the strains of today are more important than before because of the altered international environment.

That this is true follows from the fundamentally different rationales behind alliance in Washington and Seoul. For Washington the alliance occupied a place in a global geostrategic framework where the Cold War was the key and where fear of the Soviet Union and China dictated commitment to South Korea that its intrinsic value would not have mandated. Thus the United States invariably focused its attention elsewhere and minimized its involvement on the peninsula, keeping its support circumscribed and its emotional and cultural bonds weak. At the same time, the South Koreans viewed the alliance as crucial to survival, their total dependence on the power of the American military and the American economy rendering the United States central to their concerns. For Seoul, however, the alliance aimed not at Moscow or Beijing, but at the more immediate menace of Pyongyang. So long as the Cold War prevailed, this divergence could safely be ignored since disparate security requirements merged under the overarching threat. With the Cold War over and the reunification of the peninsula an issue of immediate moment, however, the security imperatives have become fluid and both sides will have to work far harder at sustaining a relationship not firmly anchored in history or culture and too often buffeted by economic competition.

To Build a Strong Korea

Enduring ties between the United States and Korea could not have been imagined by the people of either nation before World War II. To Americans, who rarely focused on foreign affairs and sustained, when they did, an Atlantic orientation, Korea meant little. They had no particular cultural affinity or fascination for Korea. The history of Korean–American relations involved no sustained contact or serious commitment and created no legacy of shared institutions or values. Under virtually any circumstances, Americans would happily have ignored the land and its people. Why, then, did a relationship develop? Two imperatives made it impossible for the government of the United States to do anything else: containing communism and safeguarding Japan. Therefore, Washington sought to devise a policy that would create, as rapidly as possible, a viable Korea able to stand as a bulwark in Northeast Asia. Once accomplished, this would free the Americans to go home. The task turned out to be neither quick nor easy.

Korea did not command much attention as American forces swept toward Japan in the final months of the Pacific War. Although part of the Japanese empire and a pivotal point of Russo–Japanese–Chinese conflict in earlier times, Korea and its future did not appear vital at a moment when the world was in flames. Americans never anticipated fighting Japanese armies on the peninsula and few military or civilian officials knew much about Korean affairs or invested effort planning for the liberation and independence of the territory. Korea remained, as it had been through much of its history, a pawn in the maneuvering among greater powers whose priorities were elsewhere.

Those priorities began rapidly to impinge upon the peninsula during 1945. U.S. military operations overwhelmed Japan through an island assault strategy, followed by massive conventional bombing and, ultimately, two devastating atomic explosions. Japan’s mainland empire, however, did not warrant such a direct application of resources. Washington tried to control Japan’s defeat and surrender in China using the Nationalist forces of Chiang Kai–shek and in Indochina it allowed Chinese Nationalist and British units to push aside the Vietnamese and restore French colonialism. But in Korea, lacking a surrogate, the United States accepted the inevitable occupation of part, if not all, of the area by Soviet troops. This seemed reasonable and practical. Then conflict in Europe intervened. As Washington and Moscow disagreed more and more fervently about political conditions there, concerned officials appealed to the president not to allow Soviet influence to go uncontested in Korea. ₄

As a result, Korea did not emerge from the war a unified state, but rather a divided entity dominated by Moscow and Washington in place of local forces. The line drawn at the 38th parallel to delimit where American and Soviet troops would accept Japanese surrender actually gave United States forces greater scope than conditions on the ground could have been expected to produce. Moscow may have been trying to trade flexibility in Korea for flexibility vis–à–vis occupation policies in Japan. Or it might have believed that generosity would deter the Americans from contesting a Soviet presence in Korea in the future. Washington clearly sought to contain Soviet troops as far north as possible. Not an inadvertent decision made with scarce time and thought as Dean Rusk later insisted, the choice of the 38th parallel accomplished for the Americans important political goals both in gaining territory and testing Soviet intentions. ₅

Initially the Roosevelt administration viewed the division of Korea as a temporary expedient which would be replaced by an international framework designed to lead to eventual independence. Roosevelt believed in tutelage of backward colonial peoples, who must be freed from colonialism, but only after they had been prepared for their new responsibilities under the guidance of a trustee state. Although by the time of Japan’s defeat Harry Truman sat in the White House, the new president turned easily to the idea of a four–power trusteeship for Korea; an idea rejected by both north and south Koreans who had anticipated immediate unity and freedom. American allies Britain and France also opposed such an arrangement for Korea and more broadly trusteeship as a concept, making it clear as early as 1943 that they disliked the transparent American effort, not just to wrest their colonies from them, but to render their peoples dependent upon the United States. Washington ignored such objections, however, and, believing that Stalin had accepted the compromise for Korea at Teheran in 1943 and again in conversation with Harry Hopkins in May 1945, pressed ahead.

Anxiety about overcommitment to an area of marginal importance balanced Washington’s determination to prevent Soviet control over the entire Korean peninsula. Policymakers wanted a formula that would involve other governments and spread responsibilities to other shoulders. Thus the United States struggled to make trusteeship work.

It also plunged into the unfamiliar world of Korean politics to try to find reliable indigenous elements who could create a new government pledged to democracy and reform. In these efforts Washington was neither as selfless as some analysts have asserted nor as benighted as critics would contend. ₆ Policymakers did genuinely hope to install representative institutions and free market capitalism in order to bring the Korean masses political participation and prosperity. But American statesmen and politicians, suffering from a lack of expertise and preoccupied with the occupation of Japan, civil war in China and, above all, the disposition of Germany, did not have a clear Korea policy. The broadest consensus could be found in their deep conviction that they needed to counteract conditions which might lead either to an expansion of communism or an expectation that the United States would remain in Korea indefinitely. Put simply they wanted a Korea that would be stable, subservient, and not act as a drain upon American resources.

Alerted by the departing Japanese that communist agitators intended to disrupt American control, U.S. military officers ironically arrived in Korea suspicious of anti–colonial activists. ₇ Commanding General John R. Hodge, a good field officer lacking political skills and an understanding of Korean affairs, not only possessed intensely conservative inclinations, but came with orders to distance himself from the leftist Korean People’s Republic which had been established just two days before on September 6, 1945. So apprehensive were Hodge and his staff that they briefly tried to use Japanese personnel to rule and then turned to Syngman Rhee, whose conservative credentials seemed more important than his autocratic inclinations. ₈ Continuing efforts to build a centrist coalition ended in the summer of 1947 even though Rhee had already begun to demonstrate the rigidity and repression that would produce purges and riots and challenge the sanctity of the national constitution. By then, the Americans working with him had been thoroughly disillusioned. Rhee took their aid, ignored their advice, and not only criticized the United States for trying to deal with the Soviet Union but also stirred up local anti–American feeling to pressure Washington into abandoning the trusteeship plan. None of this was new, of course, as State Department officials had opposed returning Rhee to Korea after the war precisely because of his intractable nature and had given way only reluctantly to War Department importuning. But, not unlike policy toward Chiang Kai–shek in China, having opted for the man on anti–communist grounds, Washington supported Rhee for head of state, ignoring flaws that would make collaboration exceedingly difficult. ₉

As for reunification, the Americans did not give it a high priority. If Koreans could be brought together under a regime that would hearken to American leadership, then unity should be promoted. Through 1946 and 1947 American negotiators tried to reach a compromise with the Soviet occupiers of the north for free elections and merging of the military zones. But, as in Germany at the same time, maintenance of even a fragmentary pro–American government and elimination of a threat to neighboring countries—in this case Japan—appeared more important than unification or compromise with Moscow. ₁₀ The Soviets, in turn, could not abide a regime that might be anti–Soviet or beyond Moscow’s control and suspected Washington of sabotaging Soviet interests as well as the very idea of trusteeship. ₁₁

Of greater moment was the desire of the United States to liquidate the American presence in Korea, leaving behind a state that would be strong enough to survive in the difficult climate of Northeast Asia. Despite impassioned rhetoric which talked of Korea as an “ideological battleground upon which our entire success in Asia may depend," the military increasingly argued in confidential government forums that Korea had little real significance for American security. ₁₂ In the eventuality of war, U.S. forces there would be vulnerable and the entire peninsula better bypassed. By April 1947, the Joint Strategic Survey Committee had ranked Korea 15th and last on a list of countries whose security was vital to the United States. ₁₃ At the same time, State Department officials had come to understand that they could not build democracy in Korea. Although Rhee strongly opposed departure of American troops, he did not offer to liberalize his regime in order to persuade the United States to stay. American officials also considered themselves “handicapped by the political immaturity of the Korean people" and urged resolution of the situation in such a way as to “enable the U.S. to withdraw from Korea as soon as possible with the minimum of bad effects." Articulation of the Truman Doctrine only served to reinforce the feeling that American resources were needed elsewhere and not so plentiful as to be wasted in Korea. ₁₄

The United States could not, of course, just leave and allow Korea to collapse. A strategy had to be devised to minimize the negative repercussions of the American withdrawal. That strategy dictated two initiatives. On the one hand, the United Nations would be induced to hold elections for a new government that would, ideally, unite the north and south. When terms could not be reached for peninsula–wide balloting, however, Washington insisted that elections go forward in the south, abandoning unity and creating a separate government in August 1948. ₁₅

The second initiative entailed assistance to South Korea of sufficient proportions to create a viable state. Military aid included a 500–man–strong Military Advisory Group to train Korean fighting units and weaponry for an effective defense posture. But Washington did not trust Seoul. The possibility that Rhee would try to march north and entangle the United States in war was too great. The National Security Council cautioned that the United States should “not become so irrevocably involved in the Korean situation that any action taken by any faction in Korea or by any power in Korea could be considered a casus belli for the U.S." ₁₆ In fact, the United States proved slow in delivering the hardware and—loath to equip Rhee with offensive weapons—it sent no tanks, heavy artillery, or combat aircraft. The realities of Truman’s reduced military budgets, moreover, compelled the armed services to accept limits on their ability to respond to secondary challenges like an attack on South Korea. Although in NSC 8/2 (March 23, 1949) the administration asserted the need to equip a Korean force of 100,000, assistance continued to move glacially. Even the $11 million appropriated by Congress for the Korean military in March 1950 had not begun to trickle into Seoul by June 25th.

Economic assistance similarly fell short of expectations. In 1947 an interdepartmental Korea Committee planned for a three–year program costing $600 million to compensate southern Korea for the loss of the industrial and mineral–rich north and the resulting shortfalls in raw materials and power generation capacity. It would also restore Korean agricultural production in order to feed Japan as well as hungry Koreans. But the initial proposal suffered repeated cuts and finally was set aside as congressional distress at rising foreign aid requests made approval unlikely and deliberations among the departments of State, War, and Navy produced a new policy (SWNCC 176/30) which sought to minimize assistance to Korea. ₁₇ Early in 1948 the idea of aid arose again with approval of NSC 8, which called for $185 million in economic assistance, just enough to “forestall economic breakdown." NSC 8/2 took the responsibility more seriously, returning to the idea of a three–year package which the House of Representatives voted down on January 19, 1950. Only after President Truman and Secretary of State Dean Acheson mounted a concerted campaign, reduced the size of the request, and capitulated in broadening the Korean Aid Bill to include moneys for Chiang Kai–shek did it finally become law in February 1950. Congress made clear here, as it would do later, that Korea was expendable and that it would feel no hesitancy in risking the welfare of Korea’s people in the continuing struggle to change the balance between the legislature and the president in the making of American foreign policy.

As it happened, Moscow too sought a rapid exit from Korea. After setting up a government in Pyongyang in September 1948, Moscow pulled its troops out, not even waiting for the Americans to comply with its call for mutual withdrawal. Aid, on the other hand, did not stop and the large number of weapons left behind for Kim Il Sung’s army in December was but a part of continuing material and technical assistance. The Soviets, like their American counterparts, could not risk the loss of prestige inherent in allowing a Korean ally to fall, but no more than the Americans did they want to find themselves at war on the peninsula.

Nevertheless, war quickly ensued. In north and south Korea the passion for reunification did not diminish over time despite difficulties in persuading foreign supporters to countenance military operations. Washington, recognizing the dangers inherent in arming Syngman Rhee, limited supplies and discouraged thoughts of marching north. In January 1950, Secretary of State Acheson repeated at the National Press Club what had long been said by military officials, publicly and privately, that Korea, along with Taiwan, was outside the American defensive perimeter. Thus the attack from Pyongyang, when it came, should have been ignored by the United States government.

Clearly neither Kim Il Sung, Joseph Stalin, nor Mao Zedong anticipated the massive American and United Nations response that the north Korean invasion triggered. As recently released documents from Soviet and Chinese archives make clear, the impetus for the war came from Kim, who was a puppet of neither the Soviets nor the Chinese. Stalin agreed reluctantly to the idea in order to retain Moscow’s leadership of the communist movement and only when convinced both that the United States would not intervene, threatening Soviet security, and that Mao had committed himself to the enterprise. All three may have gained confidence for the operation from Acheson’s Press Club speech, just as the right wing in America contended, believing that the affair could be carried to success rapidly against a less well–trained and armed foe lacking external assistance. The Chinese probably would have preferred that Kim not attack until after their liberation of Taiwan, but Mao could not publicize his concerns regarding American intervention lest Stalin then oppose action against Chiang Kai–shek. ₁₈

Although Washington had been eager to withdraw from Korea, the outbreak of war radically changed perceptions among American officials. Surprised by the attack, which intelligence sources had not predicted, the administration reacted reflexively, determined not to allow Korea to become another Manchuria or Munich. The invasion swept away restraints posed by the peripheral status of Korea, hopes that a Sino–Soviet rift might develop, and public disinterest in Asia. Policymakers had to defend American credibility, preserve the sanctity of the United Nations, and punish aggression. ₁₉

Fighting in Korea had profound effects upon the future of both the peninsula and the Cold War. The two Koreas sustained devastating losses in people and infrastructure. Division was consolidated and dependency upon allies escalated. More broadly, the Cold War everywhere became hotter and more militarized as defense budgets rose and armies expanded. Washington’s willingness to declare Korea a peripheral area and let it fend for itself, so obvious in the days before the conflict erupted, disappeared. Indeed, British diplomats meeting with the Americans on July 12, 1950, feared nothing more than that the United States would waste its might in the East instead of focusing on Europe and perhaps even provoke World War III. ₂₀ Korea, in the minds of Washington policymakers, had become a necessary showcase of American power and its survival crucial to American prestige.

The Rhee Era: The Ties That Bind

Nevertheless, the US–ROK Mutual Defense Treaty, which crystallized Washington’s commitment to Seoul, was not the product of American designs. Much like the US–ROC Mutual Defense Treaty signed in 1954, the alliance with Rhee resulted from the maneuverings of a dependent head of state who understood how to manipulate reluctant U.S. officials despite their preference for flexibility over treaty obligations. ₂₁ Although prolongation of the war meant greater destruction in Korea, urgency to end the war was felt more by American than Korean officials. The United States government worried about the high American casualty rate and the domestic political costs of an endless conflict. Indeed, Eisenhower had garnered considerable popularity at home by pledging during the presidential election campaign in 1952 that his visit to Korea would eventuate in an armistice agreement.

For Rhee, on the other hand, an end to the fighting without reunification of the country entailed few political or personal advantages. He resisted all argument and his desperation suggested that he might try to continue the war on his own. ₂₂ In fact, Rhee unexpectedly released 25,000 North Korean prisoners of war in a vain attempt to derail negotiations. To secure Rhee’s adherence to an armistice, Dwight D. Eisenhower had little choice but to pledge a security pact, long–term economic aid, military assistance, and careful consultation over details of the armistice accord. ₂₃ Frustrated officials had briefly contemplated staging a military coup to eliminate the recalcitrant president but shrank from such drastic action. ₂₄ So Rhee got his treaty minus only the provision mimicking NATO guarantees of automatic response that he had desired.

Ties did not stop with the treaty. After the Korean War ended, the United Nations commander, always a U.S. general, retained operational control of Korean forces and with that the responsibility for national defense. This bolstered the most attractive feature of the alliance: the powerful restraint upon Rhee’s opportunities to instigate military clashes with the north. In the diplomatic sphere, Washington protected South Korea’s interests in international organizations. The United States also carried out the recommendations of NSC 157/1 on “Strengthening the Korean Economy" and poured assistance into Rhee’s regime. Economic and military aid totaled $12.6 billion between 1946 and 1976, more than twice what Taiwan amassed. Korea alone received almost as much in economic grants and loans as all of Africa between 1946 and 1978. During the 1950s aid funds amounted to 100 percent of the government’s budget. ₂₅ As Eisenhower observed in a 1956 NSC meeting, “South Korea was getting to be a pretty expensive plaything." ₂₆

The U.S.–Korean alliance did not, however, flourish unencumbered. Frictions between Rhee and those Americans who tried to bring advice along with money mounted. Rhee’s resistance to reform and tight control over the economy antagonized officials responsible for making the South Korean state thrive. ₂₇ Ellis O. Briggs, the American ambassador, complained that “instead of helping row the boat, Rhee persists in throwing out anchors. Instead of collaborating in strengthening the dike, Rhee keeps boring holes in it." ₂₈ When Rhee did attend to economic growth issues he emphasized import substitution and the development of an industrial sector both to reduce dependence on Japan and to become another Japan. At the same time he stubbornly disregarded budgetary and planning problems as well as the country’s inadequate infrastructure. ₂₉ By the mid–1950s many Americans officials had given up, concluding that “there appears no prospect for Korean economic viability." ₃₀

Furthermore, Rhee demonstrated an absolute unwillingness to cut defense spending, and pressed relentlessly for expansion of his forces beyond what the Joint Chiefs of Staff thought necessary or viable. ₃₁ U.S. officials resented having to bribe Rhee to act in his own best interests. To secure his agreement to attend the 1954 Geneva conference on Korea and Vietnam, for instance, Rhee wanted promises that the United States would assist with reunification or supply aid significantly to expand ground, air, and seagoing units. Instead, an irate Dulles delayed final action on the Mutual Defense Treaty and the administration balked on force levels. ₃₂ Nevertheless, Eisenhower, although equally exasperated, pledged some assistance since it would not do to “throw a wet fish in his face." Washington should let Rhee know “we still love you, you s.o.b." ₃₃

Yet Rhee could not be satisfied and American officials grew increasingly disenchanted. By 1956 Eisenhower’s complaints regarding the burden of subsidizing Korea were plaintive and his anger at “penny ante dictators" tempted him to “tell Rhee off." Secretary of the Treasury George Humphrey contended forcefully that the United States could not afford the $1 billion it spent annually for overseas forces. And Secretary of Defense Charles Wilson, noting South Korean lack of cooperation, asserted that even large expenditures would not prevent collapse. ₃₄ Americans wanted Rhee to relax behind a relatively low–cost and low–maintenance U.S. nuclear shield and focus on modernizing and strengthening the nation’s economy. In 1958 they placed 280–mm nuclear cannons and Honest John missiles in the South and the following year added Matadors whose range reached as far as China and the Soviet Union. Suggestions from Rhee that he and Chiang Kai–shek hoped to join together to attack Asian communists seemed an irrational and diabolical plot to plunge the United States into the midst of a new world war in pursuit of their selfish interests. ₃₅

Much of the difference in attitude between Washington and Seoul followed from the differences in historical experience. Washington had to deal with global balances of power and found Rhee’s concentration on past injustices and the narrow goal of unification frustrating. Plans to depose him resurfaced periodically as his single–minded determination to march north threatened stability in Northeast Asia. ₃₆ Assistant Secretary of State Walter Robertson, generally a friend to Asian conservatives, reminded Rhee that even Britain and France had been cut off by the United States when they tried to force Washington into a war with Egypt at Suez. ₃₇ Indeed, though Rhee never succeeded in unifying his country, he managed to unify American officials from various agencies against him. On the other hand, Rhee had decided complaints about the Americans himself. He made obvious his concern that they were invariably too soft on communism and too willing to negotiate with the Soviets. Above all he feared that they would one day tire of the effort to deter North Korea and go home.

Adding to mutual frustration was the struggle over Japan. The United States government did not sympathize with Rhee’s unrelenting hostility toward the Japanese, which worked against its plans for complementary economic rehabilitation. Rhee did not understand, or did not want to understand, that Japan was of far greater significance to Washington than Korea. Indeed, Washington’s very commitment to Korea grew out of its conviction that future United States involvement in Asia depended upon Japan’s security and economic development. If Korea endangered or impeded Japan’s prosperity, Korea must be disciplined. Korea, in the end, was expendable, not Japan. Thus when Rhee chided Eisenhower and Dulles for forcing his government to buy from Japan and defer domestic industrialization to provide a market for Japanese products, they did not show compassion for his outrage. An agitated Rhee forlornly warned Eisenhower that some Koreans thought unification with the communists might be the only way to protect the south from renewed Japanese domination. ₃₈

As time passed Rhee became less popular among South Koreans as well. They objected to widespread corruption, slow economic growth, and police brutality. ₃₉ Various military leaders periodically confided in American advisors their desire to oust Rhee, but none took action. It remained for a popular rising led by student protesters to force Rhee to resign from the presidency in 1960. ₄₀

A further key to the success of the public campaign to oust Rhee proved to be the shift in strategy by the United States. American dismay with Rhee’s presidency had always been subsumed by larger Cold War concerns, creating tolerance for his excesses and obstructionism. His defenders excused Rhee’s authoritarianism as the necessary quid pro quo for a loyal ally in a sensitive location between communist powers and Japan. In 1960, however, mounting violence throughout the south led Americans to insist that Rhee undertake long–overdue reform. The American ambassador Walter McConaughy, not unaware that such pressures had been largely ignored in the past, warned that “ROKs tend to feel that State Department positions and pronouncements are not necessarily those of US Government as a whole, and ROKs have developed elaborate and not ineffective means for circumventing Department and of playing one US branch or agency against another." This, he cautioned, made it vital that the United States “speak with one voice." A constructive American role was, he believed, especially important because “we bear heavy responsibility for what Korea is today and same will be true of what Korea is tomorrow." ₄₁ That this was interference in Korea’s internal affairs did not escape the attention of Eisenhower or Dulles, but they quickly set that constraint aside. Later they would also dismiss the idea that the Korean people could hold Washington accountable for the new government. ₄₂

Minimizing Commitment

Thus American officials welcomed the new order which replaced Rhee with enthusiasm and hopes for an effective administration that would be democratic and cooperative. Indeed, Chang Myon, the new prime minister, had long been an American favorite in Korean politics and once in office he consulted the American Embassy and the CIA station chief often. ₄₃ But the successor regime did not survive. Unable to resolve problems of factionalism, corruption, unemployment, and food shortages, civilian officials were pushed aside in a military coup in May 1961. ₄₄ American officials on the scene tried to rally support for the existing government although its popular appeal had declined appreciably. Once again there was an awareness that this constituted interference in internal realms that ought to have been beyond the American reach, but Chester Bowles, the under secretary of state, argued that Koreans had grown accustomed to looking “to the United States for guidance in hours of crisis." ₄₅ Nevertheless, the United States did not actively intervene and the generals prevailed.

In fact, after Washington became convinced that the new leader, Park Chung–hee, was not a communist long secreted in the army, the coup regime began to look more appealing. ₄₆ Repressive it surely was, but Park appeared determined to carry out policies long desired by the United States for the modernization and development of South Korea. ₄₇ No less dedicated to reunification than Rhee, Park sought to build a model economy that would demonstrate southern superiority and win the contest without the necessity of war. Since the primary American goal remained a strong, stable state which could stop the expansion of communism in Northeast Asia while it reduced the need for an American presence on the peninsula, this seemed a government with which Washington could work. Within six months of the coup, Kennedy met with Park in the White House. ₄₈

At the same time, since U.S. aid comprised some fifty percent of the national budget and more than seventy percent of all defense expenditures, the new leadership understood the need to placate its foreign benefactor despite some bitterness and suspicion stemming from American efforts to protect the Chang government. As a result Park temporarily took on the trappings of constitutional rule even as he retained power in his own grasp. ₄₉ When Park tried to back away from his democratic facade, the United States threatened to discontinue financial support, forcing him to go ahead with elections. ₅₀

For Washington the issue remained what it had long been. Kennedy like Eisenhower felt he had to protect South Korea from communists who threatened to repress its people, pillage its economy, and create a platform for intimidating, and possibly attacking, Japan. But neither president could generate much enthusiasm for Korea politically, economically, or culturally. The images Americans had of the country reflected the frozen landscapes, brainwashed and brutalized prisoners, and destitute civilians of wartime. They considered aid for such a distant, godforsaken, and unremarkable place a waste of resources which ought to be fueling domestic growth. The White House, therefore, found itself caught between military demands for more funds to keep Korea safe and political demands from Congress and domestic agencies to cut appropriations to exotic peoples.

Pressures to reduce involvement in Korea, moreover, resonated with the foreign aid thrust of the 1960s. The action intellectuals who came to office with John F. Kennedy believed in the potential of Third World nations to reach self–sufficiency through mobilization of local resources behind a manufacturing industry that, with a little bit of external aid, could push such countries to the “take off" stage of growth. Although Walt Rostow had not thought of South Korea in particular in articulating this theory, the possibility of rapid development which would relieve the United States of heavy burdens there, as much as half a billion annually, could not have been more welcome. ₅₁ Awareness of North Korea’s superior performance also spurred interest in accelerating growth. Robert Komer of the NSC staff argued that American assistance had been proportioned foolishly since 1953 since it had been weighted so heavily toward military defense when, he contended, the communists had no intention of attacking South Korea. Aid reallocated, alongside better use of internal resources, would transform Korea’s economy and get Korea “off our backs." ₅₂ Both the State Department’s Korean Task Force and an interagency steering group on aid programs reached similar conclusions and an American adviser detailed to Park Chung–hee’s government was to help Seoul move in this direction. ₅₃

This reapportionment of funds and related reductions in force levels did not please either the Korean military or elements of the U.S. military. ₅₄ The Joint Chiefs of Staff insisted that “it cannot be emphasized too strongly" that the existing force structure must be maintained since “the ROK is an essential element of our forward defense strategy in Northeast Asia." If Korean forces declined in number then there would be an escalation of military risks as American influence fell and the communists gained assurance. In fact, the situation would be so destabilized that the chances of nuclear war would grow. Similarly, a study conducted under the office of Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs Paul Nitze argued that any significant changes in force levels would be too dangerous at a time when Korea remained weak economically and politically. ₅₅ Maxwell Taylor, Kennedy’s personal military representative, concurred, adding that “it is essential to be able to defend the ROK economy before building it into a lucrative, vulnerable target for Communist military aggression." ₅₆

Such conclusions angered but did not deter Komer, who felt the military was exceeding its purview by reaching political conclusions using scare tactics. ₅₇ He and others on the NSC staff persuaded Kennedy to differentiate between an attack by North Korea, which South Korea ought to be able to handle, and an attack with Chinese communist participation, which would escalate the conflict dramatically and inevitably involve the United States and nuclear weapons. ₅₈ A far more pressing concern, they asserted, was the congressional assault on aid, which would require the administration to take funds from countries like Korea where “our investment...far exceeds our strategic interest" to keep other programs afloat. ₅₉ NSC concerns were echoed in the State Department, where Averell Harriman, assistant secretary of state for Far Eastern affairs, also drafted a plan for American troop withdrawal. ₆₀ In the end, Secretary of Defense McNamara decided to reduce force levels quietly, hoping to avoid further provocation at home and abroad. ₆₁

Commitment to a policy of force reduction carried with it broad security and economic implications. To resolve the potential crisis of sharply diminished military assistance funding, the Kennedy White House and the Johnson administration, which came to office shortly after McNamara’s initiative, escalated efforts to broker reconciliation between Korea and Japan. American policymakers had long desired resolution of this continuing rift since in their minds the fate of these two countries seemed inextricably linked. They hoped that Tokyo could assume some of the costs of economic development in Korea and wanted to eliminate a source of instability in the region that could force new American military engagement. Kennedy’s Department of State labored to try to overcome Korean nationalism and Japanese suspicions that Washington would foist too heavy a burden upon them. ₆₂

Korean intransigence matched by Japanese hostility had stymied all attempts at reconciliation under Rhee, and diplomats initially fared little better with Park Chung–hee. ₆₃ Park, however, had been raised under Japanese imperial control, had attended a military academy in Japan, and spoke Japanese. Others in his government shared cultural and personal links with Japan and many agreed that South Korea could benefit by following the Japanese model of growth and modernization. ₆₄ The issue suddenly became pressing when the Park government’s first five–year development plan failed to accelerate growth and its second five–year plan required an infusion of considerable foreign moneys that the United States would not supply. ₆₅ Fortuitously, Japanese businessmen had begun to pressure their government to facilitate investment opportunities in Korea and growing frictions with Red China ignited concerns that an economically fragile South Korea could fall to communist blandishments or sabotage. ₆₆

Washington similarly believed that the stakes for reconciliation had risen. Earlier fear that opponents of rapprochement would blame the United States and attack their local governments for being puppets of Washington did not diminish, but during the Johnson years security concerns overwhelmed all other considerations. Johnson wanted to be assured of peace among allies in Northeast Asia while the administration lavished its attention upon war in Vietnam. Thus the State Department insisted in arduous negotiations, despite street protests leading to martial law in South Korea, that a treaty be signed in 1965. Johnson proved willing to grant the Koreans loan guarantees and other economic concessions to conclude the deal. After all, the State Department estimated that the treaty would save Washington $1 billion between 1965 and 1975. ₆₇

Seoul also extracted substantial American assistance as compensation for its participation in the U.S. war effort in Indochina. Offers, including the dispatch of troops, began as early as 1961, with Korean leaders anxious to demonstrate their utility as allies, to establish the need for maintenance of existing force levels, and to underline the importance of fighting communism in the region. ₆₈ Under Kennedy and in the first years of the Johnson presidency such proposals received scant attention. ₆₉ But Lyndon Johnson needed to muster greater popular support for the war effort at home and hoped to do so by demonstrating active international involvement. His vehicle, however—the “many flags campaign"—shifted the leverage surrounding the contributions of countries like South Korea. Seoul, along with Taipei and others, now became a dispenser of favors rather than a supplicant, able to force Washington to supply massive amounts of assistance. Koreans also parlayed their loyalty into procurement contracts and investment opportunities in Vietnam. By 1969 South Koreans made up more than half the foreign civilian employees in South Vietnam, and roughly twenty percent of the country’s foreign currency earnings were derived from Vietnam–related enterprises. Over the eight years of direct involvement South Korea earned some $1 billion, providing a critical impetus to the development of its export industries. ₇₀

More importantly, Seoul utilized Johnson’s anxieties to shore up the American defense commitment to South Korea. Aware of Washington’s desire to reduce its obligations on the peninsula and tentative plans to transfer some of those units to Vietnam service, Park’s government insisted that the Johnson administration station as many soldiers along the Korean frontier as Seoul dispatched to Vietnam. In the so–called Brown Memorandum of 1966, which crystallized Washington’s concessions, the United States also agreed to suspend efforts to have South Korea assume more of the costs of its military program. Further, Johnson was forced to renew American pledges to Park in communiqués signed in 1965, 1966, and 1968. ₇₁

But North Korean terrorists were not thwarted by the continuing American presence. From 1966 to 1967 the number of serious incidents rose elevenfold. ₇₂ The traumatic year of 1968 began with a raid against the presidential residence in Seoul by commandos who intended to assassinate President Park. Two days later, North Korea seized the USS Pueblo during a routine intelligence–gathering mission off the Korean coast. American analysts concluded that Pyongyang not only hoped to disrupt American intelligence gathering, but also distract the United States from its concentration on Vietnam and discourage Seoul’s involvement there. ₇₃ In fact, the Tet Offensive, which came just days later, had a far greater impact on the American campaign in Vietnam and Korean soldiers remained on the ground there despite heightened tensions on the Korean peninsula.

What Pyongyang did accomplish instead was the aggravation of strains in the Korean–American relationship. Seoul found the responses by the United States to the so–called Blue House raid and the Pueblo crisis inadequate, suggesting that the Americans could not be trusted to put sufficient emphasis on the lives of Koreans or the security of the Korean government. This seemed especially alarming in light of the significant military expansion under way in North Korea. ₇₄ Washington refused to allow the outraged southerners to retaliate. Rusk saw Park as “increasingly obsessed" with plans to strike northward and believed his government had leaked information to the press to churn up emotional pressures. ₇₅ Seoul, on the other hand, feeling more assertive as a result of its participation in the Vietnam theater and imagining that its service to Washington had earned it a greater voice in policy deliberations, found the American position unconscionable. ₇₆ To calm growing anger and frustration in Seoul, Johnson ultimately dispatched Cyrus Vance as a special emissary with promises of new funding for defense modernization, including counterinsurgency and counter–infiltration units, and annual military consultations. ₇₇

Nevertheless, Johnson would not allow Park to use these events, however ominous, to reshape the U.S.–Korean alliance. As passionately as the South Koreans argued the case, Vance rebuffed demands that Seoul be given the inflexible guarantees that previous administrations had been unwilling to make. No overt or covert automatic retaliatory pledge followed. ₇₈

In fact, even the increased defense commitments made by the Johnson administration did not long survive the new presidential term of Richard M. Nixon. Koreans discovered to their chagrin that the changing nature of the American political scene would once again have a direct and undesirable impact on their fortunes. Although Nixon himself had a history as a rabid Cold Warrior, he brought a different reality to the White House. Shrinking budgets paralleled the diminishing fashionability of being an outspoken anti–communist and acting upon those convictions. The new world order that South Korea confronted involved cooperation with communists, not the confrontations of the past. Loyal allies on the periphery did not have the same significance, indispensability, or leverage. Indeed, the central dynamic of Nixon’s foreign policy became détente and in Asia his initiatives reflected the injunctions of his 1967 Foreign Affairs article which called for less American and more Japanese responsibility for Asian affairs as well as better relations with China. ₇₉

Thus Nixon moved to retrench. He ordered a review of overseas military obligations which reduced readiness expectations, shifting as it did from scenarios in which Beijing would fight alongside Moscow to others in which the Chinese would not participate. He initiated rapprochement with China, removing the central threat to security in East Asia. He announced the Guam/Nixon Doctrine, calling upon vulnerable nations to see to their own defense first. And he began Vietnamization of the war in Indochina. Among the results of these new policies was the reduction of forces in Korea by 20,000 even though both Secretary of State William Rogers and Nixon himself had reassured the Koreans that their contributions in Vietnam would exempt them from such action. ₈₀ The leadership in Seoul was astounded both by the decision and Washington’s refusal to consider that they ought to have any say in the matter. Efforts to make up for the change through a new military modernization program fell behind schedule due to disinterest in Congress, which failed to vote adequate appropriations. Congress also responded to growing Korean prosperity by cutting economic support, moving from grants to loans and decreasing levels overall. ₈₁ Coupled with Vice President Spiro Agnew’s declaration that all American troops would be out of Korea within five years and Nixon’s failure to take forceful action when North Korea shot down an EC–121 reconnaissance aircraft, the image of the United States in South Korea became one of weakness and unreliability. ₈₂

Seoul feared further diminution of Washington’s ties to Korea as a result of its relations with Japan. Among the most compelling issues at the beginning of the Nixon administration was the fate of Okinawa, which the Japanese insisted be returned to their control. Reversion had become a symbol of Japan’s emergence from postwar United States domination in the early 1960s, and, although elements in the American military establishment dreaded the loss of Okinawa and its bases, the White House understood the necessity of prompt action on the matter. For South Korea the change in control and usage of the island bases symbolized a lessening of American involvement in the area. Worse yet, it had the potential of jeopardizing the U.S. military’s ability to defend Korea’s security, particularly if Washington needed Tokyo’s permission to mount operations from and station nuclear weapons in Okinawa. Seoul sought to modify negative repercussions by improving its relations with Tokyo and reminding the United States of South Korea’s vulnerability. ₈₃

The Nixon–Sato Communiqué of September 1969 provided a partial answer. Confirming that the retrocession would occur, it made formal the linkage Americans had always assumed by including a “Korea clause" asserting that the security of Korea was “essential" to the security of Japan. The communiqué also promised the continued use of bases to meet American defense obligations in Asia. To American officials in Japan this seemed virtually a “blank check" to cover Washington’s protection of Korea, constituting a major modification of the U.S.–Japan security alliance. ₈₄ It also significantly altered the U.S.–Korean mutual defense treaty commitment, as it gave Japan a role in Korea’s future not imagined in 1954.

Changing relations among the states in Asia, of course, included the reemergence of China from years of semi–isolation imposed both by the United States and Chinese domestic politics. Sino–American reconciliation had potential benefits for Korea in reducing tensions in the region. But Seoul did not trust Chinese purposes and feared the Americans were deceitful as well as being entirely too naive and romantic. Rather than feel confidence in the alliance with Washington, Park believed that Nixon would not hesitate to discuss Korean affairs in Beijing without prior consultation just as he had failed to warn Seoul of his impending China initiative. In a letter addressed to Nixon in the summer of 1971 Park appealed for a summit meeting before the president’s trip to China. As journalist and author Don Oberdorfer notes, Park’s “concern was such a low priority question in Washington that it took three months for the State Department and Nixon’s National Security Council staff to frame and present a presidential reply. When it finally came, it was a ritual declaration from Nixon that during his Beijing trip he would not seek accommodation with China at the expense of South Korea’s national interest." The idea of a meeting between Park and Nixon was dismissed. ₈₅

For Seoul the problem was that better relations with China, even if possible, had only an indirect connection with South Korea’s immediate and perilous communist problem. Indeed, China’s military and diplomatic support for North Korea increased as a result of its new status and access to the international community. ₈₆ Park Chung–hee worried that Washington might be tempted to bargain away its troop presence on the peninsula for guarantees of North Korean good behavior that would not be dependable. His own attempt at improving relations with the North ended in stalemate after two years of fruitless and often acrimonious debate between 1971 and 1973 and was followed in 1974 by a new attempt on his life as well as discovery of infiltration tunnels constructed beneath the demilitarized zone. ₈₇

Confusion, frustration, opportunism, and a broad authoritarian streak led Park to react to these destabilizing developments by embarking upon political initiatives of his own. At home, in 1972, he moved decisively against the constitutional democracy he had never wanted by carrying out the equivalent of a coup d’état, declaring a state of emergency and inaugurating a new, restrictive state constitution effectively permitting him to remain president for life. Park claimed that these moves were necessary because of Sino–American normalization and rumors regarding total American troop withdrawal. As historian Bruce Cumings observes, “he now justified his draconian measures as `Korean–style democracy’...an early elaboration of Singapore’s theme that `Western–style democracy’ is alien to capitalist Asia." ₈₈ Unable to stop Park but unwilling to be associated with his actions, Washington decided publicly to distance itself. Ambassador Philip Habib cautioned Washington,

In following such a course we would be accepting the fact that the U.S. cannot and should no longer try to determine the course of internal political development in Korea. We have already begun a process of progressively lower levels of U.S. engagement with Korea. The process of disengagement should be accellerated [sic]. The policy we propose would be consistent with the disengagement trend, and Park’s actions will contribute to the process. ₈₉

The human rights abuses that followed, however, galvanized regime opponents at home and abroad. Attacks emanated especially from the student population and the fledgling union movement in Korea. They also led to hearings in the U.S. Congress and a notable increase in sentiment favoring disengagement from Korea. When Korea’s Central Intelligence Agency kidnapped former presidential candidate Kim Dae–jung from Japan to silence his denunciations of the so–called Yushin reforms, Park’s audacity and malevolence reinforced the worsening image of South Korea in the United States. ₉₀ Edwin O. Reischauer, Harvard professor and former ambassador to Japan, wrote in anger and dismay in the New York Times that Korea under Park did not warrant American interest. Even as a buffer for Japan it seemed overrated, the addition to Japan’s security being largely psychological and the strait, in fact, providing a better barrier to attack. Washington should, he counseled, not set Korea entirely adrift, but cut aid enough to promote a military coup that would eventually oust Park. ₉₁

Equally as destructive, Park launched an illicit lobbying effort in Washington, subsequently known as Koreagate, which jeopardized the entire alliance relationship. Beginning in 1970, Park targeted campaign contributions and gifts to Democratic Party leaders in Congress and key members of the committees on the armed services, appropriations, and foreign relations to blunt criticism of his domestic political maneuvering, to prevent further troop withdrawals, and to speed approval of funding for military modernization in Korea. These Korean operations reached all the way to the Speaker of the House and seem to have been willfully ignored by the Departments of State and Justice for years after evidence surfaced that foreign agents were corrupting American lawmakers.

When word of a secret grand jury probe finally broke in the press in 1976, officials in Seoul not only denied all accusations but also threatened to take retaliatory action and attempted to block further investigation. Seoul insisted that gift giving was culturally sanctioned in Asia and should not be taken so seriously by critics of Korea who seemed too eager to sensationalize the story. Korean officials appeared astonished, believing it “inconceivable that the U.S. government would permit a minor scandal to embarrass its faithful ally in Asia." ₉₂ There had to be, Park believed, an official guiding hand behind the obloquy since, as he understood the relationship between newspapers and government, the press would not dare to attack a foreign leader without authorization. Diplomats at the South Korean Embassy speculated that the scandal grew out of Gerald Ford’s efforts to hold on to the presidency by countering Watergate with Koreagate. Although South Koreans had learned enough about the American political system to appreciate the importance of cultivating Congress, many political leaders seemed to be less attuned to the emphasis that the system placed on freedom of expression and the rule of law. As scholar and diplomat Han Sung–joo has noted, “South Korea often showed a remarkable inability to understand the intricate workings of the American political and policymaking process, often because it projected its own internal dynamics on the U.S. scene." ₉₃ Conversely, revelations that the U.S. CIA had been bugging the presidential mansion in Seoul outraged Koreans, provoking popular demonstrations against the United States.

Finally, Park also undertook a secret program to develop an indigenous atomic capability, fearful that the American nuclear umbrella might be withdrawn as part of Nixon’s reduction of the American commitment to Asian allies. Launched surreptitiously in 1971, the effort finally attracted American attention in 1975 after the explosion of an Indian nuclear test in 1974 alerted Washington that it had been too complacent regarding nuclear proliferation. An incredulous Henry Kissinger moved quickly to shut the project down, threatening to terminate the defense alliance with Seoul if Park persisted and applying pressure to European suppliers of nuclear technology to abandon their cooperation. ₉₄

Carter and Crisis

Throughout all this disarray, as the Korean–American alliance appeared to be fracturing and human rights violations accelerated, Jimmy Carter’s views of Korea took shape. Although it remains unclear when or why Carter first conceived of the idea of withdrawing all American forces from South Korea, it is likely that he turned in this direction as a reaction to reduced resources in America, dictatorship in Korea, and the fall of Vietnam. Public disenchantment with foreign commitments, particularly in Asia, also played a part. In April 1975 a Lou Harris public opinion poll showed that only fourteen percent of Americans favored United States involvement if North Korea attacked the South and sixty–five percent opposed it. ₉₅ Carter’s views would have been gaining momentum at the same time as President Gerald Ford, Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger, and Ambassador to Korea Richard Sneider were trying to reassure Park that the Paris Peace Accords and the subsequent collapse of South Vietnam did not mean a parallel abandonment of Korea. But as early as January 1975, candidate Carter began to call for withdrawal from South Korea.

Upon assuming the presidency Carter authorized, in Presidential Review Memorandum 13, a study of how, not whether, to get the troops out. Moreover, he dispatched Walter Mondale to tell the Japanese of his intentions but did not send the vice president on to Korea to discuss them with Park. ₉₆ Thereafter he moved ahead with implementation despite strong objections from virtually all of his senior advisors except Zbigniew Brzezinski, including his Joint Chiefs of Staff, the CIA, the head of the Office of Korean Affairs at the State Department, leading Republicans and conservative Democrats in Congress, and the Koreans, who were shocked at the lack of consultation before Carter went public on the issue. ₉₇ When the chief of staff of American troops in Korea, Major General John K. Singlaub, openly decried the decision in May 1977, insisting that it would lead to war, Carter relieved him of his post. Otherwise, the president remained unmoved. As he had told the Foreign Policy Association in June 1976, he believed that “it should be made clear to the South Korean Government that its internal repression is repugnant to our people and undermines the support for our commitment there." ₉₈

The firestorm of protest against the withdrawal, however, began quickly to take its toll on the president’s plans. Although administration spokesmen asserted that South Korea should practice self–reliance since its economic development qualified it to support its own military establishment albeit with continued American aid, opponents argued that the very departure of American forces would undermine growth. Not only would Seoul have to waste scarce money on military expansion, there would be a tremendous psychological toll in the whole of Asia as well as in Korea. Some in Korea argued that removal of American ground forces would also free Park to heighten repression. Moreover, if the American objective included saving money such savings would not be realized since stationing the same units in the United States would cost far more than feeding and housing them in Korea.

Japan’s outraged response probably carried even more weight. A Japanese cabinet minister denounced the policy as racist. Why, he wondered, did Carter’s retrenchment make no changes in West Germany and shift Korea–based manpower into a NATO support group. Suggestions that South Korea no longer possessed the same strategic salience and no longer required an American tripwire similarly dismayed Japan’s government. Taking an uncharacteristically forceful position, Tokyo complained not only about the disregard of its opinions and security requirements, but also about the increased burden the move would impose upon its military as Washington continued to flee its Asian obligations. ₉₉

Carter’s desire to move with alacrity became the first casualty. At the 10th Annual Security Consultative Meeting in Seoul in July 1977 the Carter administration agreed to several compensatory requests from Park. These included a slower, more gradual departure, improvements in air, naval, and intelligence capabilities, and transfers of equipment to South Korean forces. ₁₀₀

The debate over troop withdrawal revealed at bottom the fundamental duality in sentiment toward Korea. On the one hand there was little affection and considerable suspicion of South Korea. Policymakers of varying types believed that Seoul would happily plunge Washington into a war on the peninsula and, at the very least, gouge Washington for whatever funds might be extracted. Its abysmal human rights record and repeated elevation of unfit leaders to power, despite American efforts at tutelage, reflected a deep–seated flaw in the society. Furthermore, Seoul’s efforts at bribing American officials indicated a lack of respect for U.S. institutions and values. To these critics, Korea had lost its strategic edge and should be allowed to go its own way. Proponents of South Korea, to the contrary, asserted that it remained a bulwark against the red menace to the north which threatened Japan as well as Seoul. Rather than congeries of politicos attempting to deceive Washington, the government in Seoul was a staunch ally struggling toward a democratic system with a free market economy. These two views, however, were not mutually exclusive. Sometimes those most protective of the alliance also harbored reservations about the relationship.

This certainly appeared true of the general American public, which did not support withdrawing all troops from South Korea but remained highly critical of Seoul. A public opinion survey early in 1978 showed that some 50 percent of respondents did not want the United States to rescue a South Korea under attack and 45 percent thought that assistance to the Korean government should be used to extract greater compliance with American policy. ₁₀₁ Polls also revealed striking ignorance about South Korea, with some 24 percent in 1978 unsure where it was located and half of those convinced that Korea was an island. ₁₀₂ Even in Congress, where some of the most vicious attacks upon Carter occurred, members voted unanimously in November 1977 to withhold $800 million in arms transfers to South Korea and threatened to end military support entirely because Seoul would not cooperate in its Koreagate investigations. In mid–1978 Congress also reduced food assistance by some $56 million. ₁₀₃

Within the administration opponents of the president’s plans grasped Congress’ refusal to vote for compensatory aid to South Korea as a way to persuade Carter to delay withdrawal. At an April 11, 1978, White House meeting Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke warned that proceeding without military assistance for Seoul could undermine recognition of China, as the United States would be seen as abandoning East Asia. Morton Abramowitz from the Defense Department feared that the U.S. Military Commander in Korea, General John Vessey, might actually resign over the issue, which could provoke the Joint Chiefs to back away from the president’s policies. Based on these discussions, Brzezinski convinced Carter to reduce his initial troop extraction substantially. ₁₀₄

In the end, the most devastating and decisive assault upon Carter’s policy grew out of intelligence estimates that indicated a far stronger North Korean military force existed than had been estimated previously. By then Carter had also been confronted with the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia at the end of 1977 and a new Soviet–Vietnamese Treaty late in 1978. As the security picture in Southeast Asia changed, analysts alerted the president to an even more inauspicious alteration in the security climate on the Korean peninsula. New methodology had yielded data indicating North Korean men under arms numbered some 50 percent higher than believed earlier and that these units, based closer to the DMZ than previously realized, could launch an attack with virtually no warning. ₁₀₅ Carter, angry and feeling manipulated, nonetheless recognized that he could not win under such circumstances. Concerned that he might also sacrifice the SALT II treaty then before the Congress, and just beginning his descent into the Iranian morass, he capitulated in July 1979, suspending further troop withdrawals. ₁₀₆ Carter’s loss illustrated poignantly the ability of Congress and the bureaucracy to circumscribe presidential power.

Thereafter Carter’s approach to South Korea changed. Neither the coup d’état that brought Chun Doo Hwan to power nor his human rights abuses led the president to condemn Korean leaders as he once might have done. Between the hostage crisis in Iran and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Carter saw himself as besieged and had revived an atmosphere of Cold War militancy in his administration that made human rights a less central principle for American foreign policy. ₁₀₇ Thus when civil unrest in South Korea grew violent enough in 1980 to spark a declaration of martial law, the Americans did not object to use of the army to reinforce police authority. Even the bloody crushing of protest in Kwangju did not deter Washington from agreeing to extend $600 million in U.S. Export–Import Bank credits. Assistant Secretary Holbrooke and Ambassador to Korea William Gleysteen saw the central question as stabilization of the situation before North Korea could take advantage of chaos in the South. This, rather than human rights and democracy, had to be the principal determinant of policy. ₁₀₈

Thus Carter’s administration traveled a considerable distance. It had begun with a commitment to minimizing the influence of East–West tensions on the broad sweep of American foreign policy and to introducing a humanitarian test to cover allies as well as adversaries. Adversity had redirected it, however. The president returned to a policy framework that placed domestic conflicts, like that in Korea, back into a Cold War context even if doing so meant bolstering a brutal authoritarian regime. The desire to reduce involvement in Korea sharply similarly changed as the front–line nature of the Korean regime again assumed overriding importance.

The Reagan Revival

Ronald Reagan, in contrast to Carter, came to the White House with a belligerently Cold War outlook in place and a determination to restore absolute faith in United States alliances, including that with South Korea. Reagan enlisted human rights principles in the East–West struggle in what ethicist J. Bryan Hehir has called a “systemic vision" that largely exempted allies from critical scrutiny. ₁₀₉ Reagan did use the lure of a summit meeting to save Kim Dae–jung from a death sentence imposed by a military court in 1980 for alleged sedition. But the repressive nature of Chun Doo Hwan’s regime otherwise presented no barrier to his welcome in Washington or to Reagan’s affirmation that American troops would stay on the peninsula indefinitely. ₁₁₀ The administration also upgraded joint military exercises (Team Spirit) and sold the Korean military advanced weaponry including early–warning radar equipment and F–16 fighter aircraft. Reagan, moreover, conveyed to South Korean leaders that to him Korea represented more than simply a bulwark against communism designed to protect Japan. For the first time an American president appeared to think South Korea was important for its own sake. ₁₁₁

Reagan’s largely uncritical embrace of Korea’s leadership remained quite different from the more jaundiced assessments of the American people. Public opinion polls continued to reveal animosity for Korea among the general public. In July 1980, respondents overwhelmingly considered it a drain on the U.S. economy (81 percent) and rated it more negatively than China, even while admitting (57 percent) to knowing little about the country. ₁₁₂

Ironically, the contrast in views of Korea stemmed in part from the economic prosperity that had come to characterize the South in the late 1970s and 1980s. As Park Chung–hee’s plans for industrialization materialized, South Korean steel and automobiles and chemicals raised the profile of Korean business globally and produced high domestic growth rates reaching 12 percent per year from 1986 to 1988. Whereas in 1985 South Korea ranked as the fourth largest debtor nation in the world, by 1990 it had become a net creditor. ₁₁₃ Although this constituted extraordinary good fortune for Koreans, it radically diminished the willingness of Americans to provide the kind of generous support that the United States had given in harder times.

Meanwhile in South Korea, Chun imposed a harsh military dictatorship which appeared to many Koreans to have an American seal of approval. Anti–American acts, such as the burning of the Kwangju city United States Information Service office, spread and multiplied. Anger at supposed American complicity in Chun’s crimes sprang not just from immediate political tensions but also from long–held resentment toward the ways in which the alliance relationship facilitated American cultural imperialism. Koreans may have slavishly followed American fashions and yearned for American imports, but they also insisted on preserving a Korean identity in the face of overwhelming foreign pressures. ₁₁₄ The resulting contradictions aggravated the despair and frustration bred of a political system beyond their control. Thus resistance to the regime became increasingly violent and, as Chun sought to put in place as his successor yet another general, a revolt looked possible.

At this juncture, in June 1987, press coverage of the worsening crisis in Korea aroused Americans. Congress had already begun its probe of the Iran–Contra scandal, putting the Reagan administration in an awkward position when it came to unruly client states. Reagan’s very public praise of Chun’s government implicated the president at home as well as among Koreans in the abuses that Chun had perpetrated. Thus in contrast to 1980, the United States decided to act to prevent the use of the military to suppress dissent. American Ambassador James Lilley delivered a cautionary letter from Reagan and intensified the effect with a stern verbal warning that the alliance would be jeopardized if Chun acted. Whether for this reason or the simple fact that chaos was objectionable to all concerned, Roh Tae Woo, the successor presumptive, chose to call for direct presidential elections instead. ₁₁₅ Instantly dampening the crisis atmosphere, Roh had only to watch as the democratic opposition failed to unify, split the popular vote, and allowed Roh to win the presidency after all. Those Americans who had long sought liberalization of Korean politics felt great satisfaction in the momentous turn toward democracy. Not only did it have tremendous significance for the quality of life in Korea, but it had the potential to eliminate one of the central points of friction that had often handicapped the Korean–American alliance.

After the Cold War

Other changes soon followed which equally impinged upon the treaty relationship. A popularly elected and self–confident Roh felt able to pursue with vigor the policy of bettering relations not just with North Korea, but with the North’s allies and benefactors in China and the Soviet Union begun hesitantly in the early 1980s. Through intensive diplomacy, often wholly economic in nature, South Korea wooed Moscow and Beijing. Seoul could offer markets, access to technology, and investment at a time when North Korea had nothing but ideology with which to maintain its alliance ties. Not surprisingly South Korea won, opening diplomatic relations with Moscow in 1990 and Beijing in 1992.

Meanwhile, recognizing that stripping Pyongyang of its allies was only half a policy and potentially a dangerous one, Roh sought to improve contacts with the North and asked for American help to involve Pyongyang in international affairs, breach its isolation, and render it a more reasonable interlocutor. Previously Seoul had urged Washington to minimize contacts with Pyongyang, fearing that the sometimes unreliable Americans might make deals undermining South Korea’s interests. Americans had shunned early North Korean approaches both in deference to their ally and because of the nature of the northern regime. Now Roh’s change of direction and Washington’s decision that dialogue could yield benefits allowed a modest breakthrough.

Into this fluid situation, however, a harsher reality intervened. Evidence drawn from aerial intelligence gathering demonstrated that North Korea had by 1989 made significant advances toward development of an indigenous nuclear weapons production capability. Pyongyang’s adherence to the Nuclear Non–proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1985 had not deterred these efforts. When, in the wake of the 1991 Persian Gulf War and discovery of Iraq’s secret defiance of its NPT commitments, the International Atomic Energy Agency announced a regime of more rigorous inspections, North Korea made it plain that it would not comply. The result was a crisis that dominated U.S.–Korean relations during much of the 1990s.

Under such circumstances, the need for and nature of the U.S.–Korea mutual defense treaty were dramatically transformed. For Washington that treaty had always been about threats and challenges far larger than the Korean peninsula. South Korea’s significance had rested upon its role in constraining the Soviets and Chinese in a region where the United States needed proxies to act as a first line of defense. In the 1990s, however, that dynamic no longer governed. The Cold War had ended. Neither China nor Russia could, at least for the moment, be considered dangerous adversaries, neither encouraged Pyongyang’s belligerence toward the south, and neither sought to menace Japan.

But the possibility of a preventive war to strip North Korea of its provocative nuclear installations focused Washington and Seoul’s attention on the single issue—deterring North Korea—that Seoul had always considered the primary purpose of the alliance. North Korea, independent and unstable, looked even more frightening than when thought to be a puppet of the communist bloc. Pyongyang had little to lose, having been virtually abandoned militarily, politically, and economically by Moscow and Beijing, as well as facing recurrent natural disasters. In the spring of 1994 Kim Il Sung threatened to turn Seoul into a “sea of fire." ₁₁₆ One pessimistic assessment of war on the peninsula made early in 1991 suggested that the North actually might win, but even more optimistic scenarios projected a four–month struggle involving tens of thousands of American casualties and many more South Koreans killed and wounded, not to mention a cost estimate of $1 trillion. ₁₁₇ The possibility that North Korea would turn to a nuclear solution of its many problems made the Korean–American alliance appear more necessary than at virtually any other moment in its history.

But at the same time, efforts to resolve the North Korean nuclear challenge severely strained the U.S.–South Korean alliance. Seoul could not bring itself fully to trust American diplomats to represent its interests and feared that compromises would be made that would jeopardize southern security. Gradually some government officials began to think of American interaction with Pyongyang as appeasement. ₁₁₈ Simply the notion of bilateral exchanges between the Americans and North Koreans accorded too much legitimacy to the adversary. And, even were negotiations adequately to provide for Seoul’s concerns, South Korean officials resented disenfranchisement in a process that centrally affected them. Seoul’s encouragement to the United States to become involved had never meant to encourage Washington to follow an autonomous course. As a result frustration and suspicion grew.

Bitterness increased further as Seoul and Washington continued to respond to problems differently. First came the Agreed Framework solution to the nuclear crisis which emerged in October 1994 at talks from which Seoul had been excluded. South Korea accepted the settlement, but it had reservations about the huge financial burden imposed on Seoul, not to mention Pyongyang’s retention of bomb–making ingredients until well into the future. ₁₁₉ As during the Cold War, priorities clashed. Washington focused on the global ramifications of proliferation. Seoul worried little about arming rogue states, remaining preoccupied with the intimate, local terror that Pyongyang might already possess one or two atomic bombs. Moreover, as Washington seemed mesmerized by nuclear weaponry, Seoul emphasized the persistence of a conventional threat from the North. Dismay also characterized Seoul’s response to the relative lack of concern displayed by Washington as the years have passed without Pyongyang engaging the South on implementation of the 1991 “Agreement on Reconciliation, Nonaggression, and Exchange and Cooperation" or the “Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula." ₁₂₀ Although Seoul officially welcomed the 1996–97 U.S.–Japan Defense Guidelines review, moreover, many South Korean analysts expressed unease with any surrender of responsibility to Japan for overall Korean security. ₁₂₁

Unhappiness accelerated when North Korea’s desperate need for food led to international assistance. Seoul alternated between favoring aid to avert catastrophe and blaming the United States and other donors for propping up a doomed regime whose demise would finally produce unification under southern control. Then, the Americans failed to share Seoul’s outrage when in September 1996 a North Korean submarine infiltrated southern waters, calling instead, in the words of Secretary of State Warren Christopher, upon “all parties" to avoid provocative actions.

Public opinion surveys in Korea showed growing dissatisfaction with the United States. Polls in the winter of 1997 indicated that “most of the public does not trust Washington to protect the country’s interests in talks with the North." ₁₂₂ Although Clinton had tried to reassure President Kim Young Sam at their 1996 summit, to many South Koreans it appeared that the Americans had abandoned a long–established consensus that “the only way to deal with the North is through hard–line containment." ₁₂₃

Perennial American pressure to open the Korean economy to American trade seemed irksome and unreasonable given the trade deficit that it alone in Northeast Asia carries with the United States. ₁₂₄ Expectations that a prosperous and democratic South Korea would be treated increasingly like a partner rather than a dependent state were not being met. ₁₂₅ When the Korean economy plunged into crisis in the autumn of 1997 and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) demanded reform in exchange for assistance, many Koreans held Washington responsible, complaining that “everybody knows it’s run by the U.S. and the U.S. is using it for its own interests." ₁₂₆

Indeed, burgeoning nationalism and the prospect of reunification have released long–suppressed cultural, political, and economic antagonism toward the United States, particularly among younger Koreans in their twenties and thirties. A review of contemporary Korean literature reflected the disenchantment, suggesting that “most Koreans no longer feel that Korea owes an everlasting debt of gratitude for what the U.S. did for them; they now feel that the U.S. owes them apologies and compensation for the harm they [sic] did to Korea in the course of pursuing their imperialistic objectives." ₁₂₇ As David Steinberg, then representing the Asia Foundation in Seoul, observed in the summer of 1997, “if we...simply assume that a little tinkering around the edges—a high–level visit here, kind words there, reassurances on all sides—will resuscitate matters, then this descending relationship will likely continue to drop and the bilateral friendship atrophy." ₁₂₈

On the American side irritation and astonishment similarly characterized reactions to developments in Korea. American officials could not understand South Korean wariness and anger at an ally whose loyalty to Seoul had been proven repeatedly and whose generosity had been exceptional. “At times it...[actually] seemed that United States relations with South Korea were worse than with North Korea." ₁₂₉ Furthermore, Americans worried that Seoul’s belligerence, fueled by the very democratic domestic politics which Americans otherwise celebrated, might lead to retaliation against Pyongyang. Thus reports in the Joong–ang Ilbo in October 1996 that twelve possible targets in the North had been selected by defense officials seriously alarmed Americans. Not only did this have the potential of embroiling the United States in war on the peninsula, but it demonstrated the erosion of military cooperation, as it challenged American command authority over Republic of Korea forces. Similarly, Korea’s interest in reviving an independent ballistic missile development program and its negotiations to purchase Russian air defense systems to supplement, but remain separate from, the American defensive umbrella each posed a proliferation dilemma for Washington. ₁₃₀ Not surprisingly, American officials came to “feel that their biggest headache on the peninsula is the government in the South, not the North." ₁₃₁

Fundamentally, of course, American policymakers have considered the alliance with Korea important to maintain in the confused environment of a Northeast Asia in flux and a world system not yet clearly defined. Despite the difficulties and annoyances, cooperation with Seoul promises concrete payoffs in stabilizing the area, integrating a pariah state into the world community, and securing economic advancement for all concerned. Washington also worries about protecting the credibility of its other Asian security agreements in the region. Given the dire results imaginable from failure to cooperate on issues such as North Korean collapse, no real alternatives to a healthy alliance would appear to exist. ₁₃₂ Yet, paradoxically, this understanding has not generated the “sustained, week–to–week high–level attention necessary to manage the Korean Peninsula at a level commensurate with" American interests. ₁₃₃

And American public opinion certainly is not going to force policymakers to pay more attention. Early in 1994, at the same moment that Washington deployed Patriot missiles to the peninsula, public opinion polls suggested that Americans did not see the South Koreans as close allies or significant trading partners. ₁₃₄ After several subsequent months of crisis in which Korea–related stories appeared regularly in the press, some 66 percent of Americans remained disturbingly indifferent to the South Koreans. ₁₃₅ Furthermore, when queried periodically between 1993 and 1997 about their willingness to send military forces to fight alongside South Koreans against a North Korean attack, Americans opposed the effort, relenting solely if it would be multilateral and under United Nations auspices. ₁₃₆

The history of the Korean–American alliance, then, could only be described as difficult; a relationship lurching from crisis to crisis without a firm foundation. Since the two parties entered into the attachment for different reasons and with many conflicting goals, its longevity has seemed puzzling. Indeed, Koreans have been more aware than most of their Asian neighbors that Americans tend to pay little attention to the East. They have had to labor assiduously to prod, beguile, and manipulate Washington into meeting their needs and protecting their security. In those endeavors their greatest allies, ironically, have been Japan and the communist world. Although the Japanese threat and the threat to Japan are both gone now, the growing menace of a North Korea nearing collapse and poised to attack promotes for the moment continuing commitment even as different strategies for dealing with Pyongyang produce friction. ₁₃₇

Nevertheless, Americans remain largely ignorant about Korea’s history, politics, and culture. ₁₃₈ Despite the slow multiplication of Korean restaurants in American cities and a growing number of Korean immigrants and Korean–American citizens, the societal bonds that can overcome lethargy and strife remain very weak between the United States and Korea. Even strong trade and investment ties did not persuade the United States to make firm promises of financial assistance when the Korean won came under speculative attack late in 1997. ₁₃₉ Betting on the future of the alliance under such conditions would be risky indeed.

Endnotes

Note 1: 740.00119Control(Korea)/9–1947 #361 Jacobs, Seoul, U.S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1947, vol. 6: The Far East (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1972), 806 (hereafter FRUS). Back.

Note 2: Park Chung–hee. Our Nation’s Path (Seoul: Hollym Publications, 1971), 39–40, as quoted in Stephen Haggard, Pathways from the Periphery (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990), 62. Back.

Note 3: Komer to JFK, May 31, 1963, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22 : Northeast Asia (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1996), 647. Back.

Note 4: John Lewis Gaddis, “Korea in American Politics, Strategy, and Diplomacy, 1945–50," in Yonosuke Nagai and Akira Iriye (ed.), The Origins of the Cold War in Asia (New York: Columbia University Press, 1977), 278. Back.

Note 5: Dean Rusk. As I Saw It (New York: Penguin, 1990), 124; Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, vol. I: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945–1947 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1981), 120–21; 740.00117Control(Korea)/7–1250 Dean Rusk, assistant secretary, Far Eastern affairs, to G. Bernard Noble, chief, Division of Historical Policy Research, FRUS 1945, vol. 6: The British Commonwealth, The Far East (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1969), 1039. Back.

Note 6: Gregory Henderson, Korea: The Politics of the Vortex (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968), 120–21; Joyce and Gabriel Kolko, The Limits of Power (New York: Harper & Row, 1972), 277 and 299. Back.

Note 7: Carter J. Eckert, et al., Korea Old and New (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990), 337. Back.

Note 8: On the use of the Japanese see Cumings, Origins, vol. 1, 138–39. He notes that the State Department immediately disavowed Hodge’s decision but that much of the damage had already been done in the minds of Koreans, who saw the Americans collaborating with the Japanese. As for American attitudes, Cumings suggests that “the Japanese were viewed as cooperative, orderly, and docile, while the Koreans were seen as headstrong, unruly, and obstreperous." Back.

Note 9: 740.00119Control(Korea)/5–1847 #109 Langdon, Seoul, FRUS 1947, vol. 6, 645; ibid., /5–2147 #115 Langdon, Seoul, 646–47; ibid./5–2147 #92 Marshall to Hodge, Seoul, 647; ibid./5–2647 #Zgeg705 Hodge, Seoul, 653; 895.00/7–247 #C53768 MacArthur, Tokyo, 682–84; 740.00119Control (Korea)/7–2147 #219 Jacobs, Seoul, 710–11; 611.95B/9–2655 Memcon Minister Han Pyo Wook, Korean Embassy, with William Sebald, DAS/FE, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23: Korea, pt. 2 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1993), 163; Okonogi Masao, “The Domestic Roots of the Korean War," in Nagai and Iriye (eds.), The Origins, 301–02; Henderson, Vortex, 127–28. Back.

Note 10: See Carolyn W. Eisenberg, Drawing the Line: The American Decision to Divide Germany, 1944–1949 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996). Back.

Note 11: Gaddis places the larger part of the blame upon Moscow. Gaddis, “Korea in American Politics," 279–80. Soviet sources indicate that Moscow fundamentally distrusted the American negotiators. Sergei N. Goncharov, John W. Lewis, and Xue Litai, Uncertain Partners (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993), 132. Back.

Note 12: Original quote in 740.00119PW/7–346 Edwin W. Pauley to Truman, June 22, 1946, FRUS 1946, vol. 8: The Far East (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1971), 706, and then quoted by Truman back to Pauley with his observation that he is in total agreement, July 16, 1946, ibid., 713–14; William W. Stueck, Jr., The Road to Confrontation (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1981), 154–55. Back.

Note 13: SANACC 176/38 includes a statement regarding lack of strategic interest and fear that troops on the peninsula would be a military liability by JCS quoted in NSC 8 “Position of the United States with Respect to Korea," April 2, 1948, FRUS 1948, vol. 6: The Far East & Australia (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1974), 1164–69. Cumings sees the ranking as indicating an “unprecedented" degree of concern for Korea. Bruce Cumings, “The Course of Korean–American Relations, 1943–1953," in Bruce Cumings (ed.), Child of Conflict (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1983), 20. Back.

Note 14: NSC 8, FRUS 1948, vol. 6, 1166, 1168; Norman D. Levin and Richard L. Sneider, “Korea in Postwar U.S. Security Policy," in Gerald L. Curtis and Han Sung–joo (eds.), The U.S.–South Korean Alliance (Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath, 1983), 34. Back.

Note 15: James Matray argues that the UN–supervised elections were not designed to permit the United States to withdraw but rather to persuade Congress to appropriate aid for Korea. James I. Matray, “Korea: Test Case of Containment in Asia," in Cumings (ed.), Child of Conflict, 177. Back.

Note 16: NSC 8, FRUS 1948, vol. 6, 1169. Back.

Note 17: SWNCC 176/30 “United States Policy in Korea," August 4, 1947, FRUS 1947, vol. 6, 738–41; Stueck, Road to Confrontation, 79–80; NSC 8/2, March 23, 1949, FRUS 1949, vol. 7: The Far East & Australia (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1976), pt. 2, 969–78; Woo Jung–en, Race to the Swift (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991), 44–45; Ronald McGlothlen, Controlling the Waves (New York: Norton, 1993), 53–59. Back.

Note 18: For the new literature on the Korean War see Kathryn Weathersby, “The Soviet Role in the Early Phase of the Korean War: New Documentary Evidence," Journal of American–East Asian Relations 2 (Winter 1993), 425–58; Chen Jian, China’s Road to the Korean War (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994); Goncharov, Lewis, and Xue, Uncertain Partners, 136–52.

There have been several historical controversies surrounding the outbreak of the Korean War. First there was the contention, most clearly articulated by I.F. Stone in The Hidden History of the Korean War, that the fighting actually began because of provocation by the south of the north. Bruce Cumings, although not going quite as far as Stone, also put great weight in his writings upon the element of provocation. For years the entire issue of who began the war could not be discussed in the People’s Republic of China because the government mandated that the North Korean position on southern guilt be accepted. Most of the literature on the war, however, did not take this idea seriously. A second major controversy has surrounded the issue of whether the war was a civil conflict or an international contest. Rooted in the proposition that the Soviets were pulling the strings of their puppets in Korea, conventional wisdom generally ignored local causes for the war. Again the most outspoken and articulate exponent of the idea that the war was largely of an indigenous nature has been Bruce Cumings. More recently William Stueck has recycled the debate in his The Korean War: An International History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995). Finally, there has been a debate on the related issue of the degree of involvement of the Soviets and the Chinese in the decision–making regarding the war. The release of new documents has begun to narrow and sharpen the focus of these questions but conclusive answers to all aspects of the inquiry remain elusive. For an excellent review of the literature which is, unfortunately, somewhat dated, see Rosemary Foot, “Making Known the Unknown War: Policy Analysis of the Korean Conflict in the Last Decade," Diplomatic History 15 (Summer 1991), 411–31. Back.

Note 19: President’s remark as recorded by the notetaker at the NSC meeting. Gaddis, “Korea in American Politics," 286–90. Back.

Note 20: Thomas J. Christensen, Useful Adversaries (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), 181. Back.

Note 21: For the struggle over the U.S.–ROC Mutual Defense Treaty see Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, Taiwan, Hong Kong and the United States, 1945–1992: Uncertain Friendships (New York: Twayne/Macmillan, 1994), 38–40. Korean Foreign Minister Y.T. Pyun first proposed the treaty in April 1953, implying it would be the quid pro quo for an armistice. After Rhee and the Korean ambassador added their entreaties, Eisenhower made known his own negative assessment on May 22. John Kotch, “The Origins of the American Security Commitment to Korea," in Cumings (ed.), Child of Conflict, 241–44. Han Sung–joo has asserted that the treaty was not a concession but was made to look that way to bind Rhee. He believes the United States wanted to sign it in any case. Han Sung–joo, “South Korea and the United States: Past, Present, and Future," in Curtis and Han (ed.), The U.S.–Korean Alliance, 205–6. He bases his conclusion, in part, on the memoir of Mark Clark, From the Danube to the Yalu (New York: Harper & Row, 1954), 273, but Clark says he approached Rhee only in May. Back.

Note 22: Fears of what action Rhee might take in response to the signing of the armistice are clear in the exchange of cables in FRUS 1952–54, vol. 15: Korea (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1984) pt. 1, 938–43. Back.

Note 23: DA 940241 Chief of Staff, US Army, Collins, to the Commander in Chief, Far East, Clark, May 30, 1953, FRUS 1952–54, vol. 15, pt. 1, 1122–23; Letter from Eisenhower to Rhee, June 7, 1953, Public Papers of the President: Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1954), 377–80. Back.

Note 24: Paper by Taylor, Commanding General, 8th Army, May 4, 1953, FRUS 1952–54, vol. 15, pt. 1, 965–68; DA 940238 Collins to Clark, May 29, 1953, ibid., 1119–20, and reply 1120–21; DA 940242 Chief of Staff, US Army to the Commander in Chief, Far East, May 30, 1953, ibid., 1123–24; Kotch, “The Origins of the American Security Commitment," 244–47. Clark nevertheless took it as part of his instructions that “in the event that the present ROK govt cannot be forced to acpt the armistice terms, an amenable ROK govt...can be established." C 62910 Clark to JCS, June 8, 1953, FRUS 1952–54, vol. 15, pt. 2, 1153. Back.

Note 25: Woo, Race to the Swift, 44–45; Bruce Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun (New York: Norton, 1997), 306. Back.

Note 26: 276th Meeting, NSC, February 9, 1956, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 217. Back.

Note 27: Haggard, Pathways, 55–59. Back.

Note 28: 795B.5–MSP/3–3055 Briggs, Seoul to Robertson, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 62. Back.

Note 29: Haggard, Pathways, 64–67; Eckert, Korea Old and New, 360; Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun, 305. Back.

Note 30: 795.5–MSP/6–856 William G. Ockey, officer in charge of economic affairs, NEA to Howard Jones, DAS/FE, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 281–82. Back.

Note 31: Charles Wilson, secretary of defense, to James S. Lay, executive secretary, NSC, April 2, 1954, FRUS 1952–54, 15, pt. 2, 1778–85. As the Americans began to discuss reductions in Korean troop levels they recognized the explosive potential of such a proposal. 795B.5/5–3055 #1307 Lacy, Seoul, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 104–06. At the same time they understood that high rates of inflation damaging to economic development arose from the huge American military subsidies. 269th Meeting, NSC, December 8, 1955, ibid., 194. Back.

Note 32: NSC 170/1 Progress Report, March 26, and Appendix B, March 23, 1954, FRUS 1952–54, 15, pt. 2, 1773 and 1775. Back.

Note 33: 193rd Meeting, NSC, April 13, 1954, FRUS 1952–54, 15, pt. 2, 1186–87. Back.

Note 34: 297th Meeting, NSC, September 20, 1956, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 309–13; 304th Meeting, NSC, November 15, 1956, ibid., 348. Back.

Note 35: 684A.86/11–1456 #466 Dowling, Seoul, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 347. Back.

Note 36: 795.00/1–1255 Robertson to Dulles, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 5–6; NSC 5514, “U.S. Objectives and Courses of Action in Korea," February 25, 1955, ibid., 45. Back.

Note 37: 795.00/12–1856 Memcon Rhee with Robertson, FRUS 1955–57, vol. 23, pt. 2, 369–70. Back.

Note 38: Rhee to Eisenhower, December 29, 1954, FRUS 1952–54, 15, pt. 2, 1938–40. See also Rhee to Eisenhower, February 4, 1954, ibid., 1745–47, which Robertson refused to accept from the Korean counselor because of its insulting and hysterical character. On antagonism of Korean officials for the Japanese, see Victor D. Cha, “Alignment Despite Antagonism: Japan and Korea as Quasi–Allies," Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University, 1994, 14; Victory D. Cha, “Bridging the Gap: The Strategic Context of the 1965 Korea–Japan Normalization Treaty," Korean Studies 20 (1996), 126. Back.

Note 39: Henderson, Vortex, 59–60. Back.

Note 40: Eckert, Korea Old and New, 353–55; Memcon Korean ambassador with secretary of state, March 16, 1960, FRUS 1958–60, 18: Japan; Korea (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1994), 606–8; 795B.00/3–1750 #742 Green, Seoul, ibid., 608–10; 795B.00/4–2660 #969 McConaughy, Seoul, ibid., 638; Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun, 344–45. In contrast to the Chinese troops at Tiananmen Square in 1989, Rhee troops would not fire on the student demonstrators. Back.

Note 41: 795B.00/4–260 #794 McConaughy, Seoul, FRUS 1958–60, 18, 611: 795B.00/4–1960 #890 McConaughy, Seoul, ibid., 620–22; 795B.00/4–1860 #848 Herter to Seoul, ibid., 624–26; 795B.00/4–2160 #878 Herter to Seoul, ibid., 634–37. Back.

Note 42: Memcon Dulles with Eisenhower, April 19, 1960, FRUS 1958–60, 18, 623; 442nd Meeting, NSC, April 28, 1960, ibid., 651. Back.

Note 43: 611.95B/4–2760 #897 Loy Henderson, deputy under secretary, to Seoul, FRUS 1958–60, 18, 645; Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun, 346. Back.

Note 44: SNIE 42–61 “Short–Range Outlook in the Republic of Korea," March 21, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 430–35; 795B.00/4–161 #1123 Rusk to McConaughy, ibid., 436–38. On development of the coup refer to ibid., 449, and see Han Sung–joo, The Failure of Democracy in South Korea (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974), and John Kie–chang Oh, Korea: Democracy on Trial (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1968). Back.

Note 45: 795B.00/5–1861 Bowles to Kennedy, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 463. Back.

Note 46: SNIE 42–2–61 “Short–Term Prospects in South Korea," May 31, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 468–69; Robert H. Johnson, NSC to Rostow, deputy special assistant for national security affairs, June 28, 1961, ibid., 491–92; SNIE 42–3–61, “The Current Regime in the Republic of Korea," July 18, 1961, ibid., 501. Back.

Note 47: Kennedy allegedly considered Korea’s military usurper someone to be encouraged. Theodore Sorensen, Kennedy (New York: Harper & Row, 1965), 535; 795B.5–MSP/10–2861 #640 Berger, Seoul, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 522–26. Back.

Note 48: Memcon JFK with Park, November 14, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 535–39. For a positive assessment from the American ambassador see 795B.00/12–1561 Berger to Rusk, ibid., 54248. Back.

Note 49: Eckert, Korea Old and New, 361–62; SNIE 42–3–61 “The Current Regime in the Republic of Korea," July 18, 1961, op cit., 502. Back.

Note 50: Warren I. Cohen. Dean Rusk (Totowa, NJ: Cooper Square, 1980), 205–06. Rusk described Park as the “only figure in sight who seems to possess sufficient intelligence, vision, breadth of contact, forcefulness, personal reputation and access to power (especially over military)...." 611.95B/7–2762 #109 Rusk to Seoul, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 591–94. Re pressure on Park by U.S. see #547 Rusk to Seoul, March 16, 1963, ibid., 630–31; #838 Berger, Seoul to Hilsman and Bell, April 29, 1963, ibid., 643–45. Back.

Note 51: W.W. Rostow, The Stages of Economic Growth: A Non–Communist Manifesto (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1960). George Ball, who served as under secretary for economic affairs, disparaged development economics and the professors who “tendentiously" advocated the building of “new Jerusalems" and looked down on the “unenlightened bureaucrats of the State Department who were not zealous converts to the new theology." George Ball, The Past Has Another Pattern (New York: Norton, 1982), 182–84. Back.

Note 52: Komer to Bundy, special assistant for national security affairs, June 12, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 474–75; Komer to Kennedy, May 31, 1963, ibid., 647. These ideas reflected conclusions reached in a task–force report written by George Ball for president–elect Kennedy. William O. Walker, “Mixing the Sweet with the Sour: Kennedy, Johnson, and Latin America," in Diane Kunz (ed.), The Diplomacy of the Crucial Decade (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 48. Back.

Note 53: 795B.5–MSP/8–161 Rusk to Berger, Seoul, ibid., 505–7; “Revised Progress Report on Follow Up Actions Responsive to Recommendations of Korean Task Force Report," August 24, 1961, ibid., 516. Back.

Note 54: Komer to Bundy, December 20, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 548–49. Park’s government threatened a reduction in Korean force levels if American military aid fell. Komer welcomed the possibility but it was strongly opposed by the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, the assistant chief of staff for intelligence, Department of the Army, and the assistant chief of naval operations. SNIE 42–62 “Outlook for South Korea," April 4, 1962, ibid., 553n3. Back.

Note 55: JCSM–265–62 L.L.Lemnitzer, Chm JCS to McNamara, April 10, 1962, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 554–555; McNamara to Hamilton, AID administrator, April 27, 1962, ibid., 562. Back.

Note 56: "Impressions of Korea," by Maxwell Taylor, September 20, 1962, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 601–2. Back.

Note 57: Memorandum for the Record, Komer, May 4, 1962, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 562–4. Back.

Note 58: Komer to Kaysen, September 26, 1962, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 606–7. Back.

Note 59: Komer to Kennedy, May 31, 1963, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 647. Back.

Note 60: Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun, 365. Back.

Note 61: Colonel Lawrence J. Legere, White House staff, to Taylor, Chm, JCS, June 11, 1963, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 648–49. Back.

Note 62: Record of NSC Action No. 2430, June 13, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 485; Memcon JFK with Ikeda Hayato, June 20, 1961, ibid., 489–90; Memcon Rusk with Park, November 5, 1961, ibid., 527–28; Memcon Rusk with Park, November 14, 1961, ibid., 534; Rusk to Kennedy, May 17, 1962, ibid., 565–66; “Korean–Japanese Relations," State Department Paper, May 17, 1962, ibid., 567–71; 694.95B/7–1362 #90 Rusk to Seoul, ibid., 579–81. Back.

Note 63: "The Task Force Report on Korea," Memo Robert H. Johnson, NSC, June 13, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 477. Back.

Note 64: Cha, “The 1965 Normalization Treaty," 128. Back.

Note 65: Komer to Kennedy, April 23, 1962, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 555–56. U.S. economic and military aid fell from $529 million in 1960 to $309 million in 1965. Cha, “The 1965 Normalization Treaty," 148n24. Back.

Note 66: Cha, “The 1965 Normalization Treaty," 129–30. Back.

Note 67: "ROK Economic Development and Foreign Economic Assistance Programs," Briefing Paper, May 17–19, 1965, National Security File (hereafter NSF) Country File, Korea, vol. I, Box 254, Lyndon Johnson Library (hereafter LBJL); Memo James Thomson to LBJ, January 11, 1965, NSF Country File, Japan, Box 253, f: Sato Visit Briefing Book, January 1965, LBJL. Back.

Note 68: Memcon JFK with Park, November 14, 1961, FRUS 1961–63, vol. 22, 536–38. Back.

Note 69: #1128 Berger, Seoul, March 7, 1964, NSF Country File, Korea, Vol. I, Box 254, LBJL; #12 Rusk, July 3, 1964, ibid., Vol. II, LBJL. Back.

Note 70: Han makes the case that the South Koreans did not intervene to help the Vietnamese, who were reluctant beneficiaries, but rather as a result of the alliance relationship with the United States. The South Koreans supplied soldiers over a period of eight years from 1965 to 1973 with peak strength reaching 50,000. Han Sung–joo, “South Korea’s Participation in the Vietnam Conflict: An Analysis of the U.S.–Korean Alliance," Orbis (Winter 1978), 893, 896–89; George McT. Kahin, Intervention (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1987), 335; Eckert, Korea Old and New, 397–99. Back.

Note 71: Lee Yur–bok and Wayne Patterson (ed.), One Hundred Years of Korean–American Relations, 1882–1982 (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1986), 109; McNamara to LBJ, November 15, 1963, NSF Country File, Korea, Boxes 256–57, f: filed by LBJ library, LBJL; #953 Berger, Seoul, January 21, 1964, NSF Country File, Korea, Vol. I, Box 254, LBJL; Han, “South Korea and the United States," 209; Eckert, Korea Old and New, 398; Han, “South Korea in Vietnam," 902–05, 907. Back.

Note 72: #120315 Rusk, February 24, 1968, NSF Country File, Japan, Vol. 7, Box 252, LBJL. Back.

Note 73: #8517 Porter, Seoul, January 24, 1968, NSF Country File, Korea, Pueblo Incident, Vol. I, pt. A, Box 257, LBJL. Other possible motives include a desire to embarrass the Soviets and Chinese, who were beginning to court the United States; fear of Japanese remilitarization; opposition to the improvement of Japanese–South Korean relations following the 1965 treaty; and a probe of Washington’s determination to protect South Korea. Peter Hayes, Pacific Powderkeg: American Nuclear Dilemmas in Korea (Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath, 1991), 127. Back.

Note 74: Levin and Sneider, 45; #120315 Rusk, February 24, 1968, NSF Country File, Japan, Vol. 7, Box 252, LBJL. Ultimately this expansion contributed to a weakening of North Korea because of the budget strain that accompanied it. Ralph Clough, East Asia and U.S. Security (Washington, D.C.: Brookings, 1975), 164. Back.

Note 75: Han, “South Korea and the United States," 211; #120315 Rusk, February 24, 1968, NSF Country File, Japan, Vol. 7, Box 252, LBJL. Back.

Note 76: Han Sung–joo argues that the Vietnam experience altered the nature of the alliance relationship. Han, “South Korea in Vietnam," 908–12. Back.

Note 77: #4229 Rusk, February 14, 1968, NSF Country File, Korea, Pueblo Incident, Seoul Cables, vol. II, Box 262, LBJL. Back.

Note 78: #120315 Rusk, February 24, 1968, NSF Country File, Japan, vol. 7, Box 252, LBJL. North Korea’s security treaties with the Soviets and with the People’s Republic of China signed in July 1961 included automatic response guarantees. Nam Joo–hong, America’s Commitment to South Korea (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 147. Back.

Note 79: Richard M. Nixon, “Asia After Viet Nam," Foreign Affairs 46 (October 1967). Back.

Note 80: Cha, “Alignment Despite Antagonism," 104–14. Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird approved a plan to cut the remaining troops down to a single brigade but Alexander Haig and Henry Kissinger prevented implementation of the plan. Don Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas (Reading, MA: Addison Wesley Longman, 1997), 86. Back.

Note 81: Levin and Sneider, 47–50. Back.

Note 82: Nam, America’s Commitment to South Korea, 78. Henry Kissinger claims that he favored retaliation but that Nixon had no stomach for it. Kissinger, The White House Years (Boston: Little Brown, 1979), 315–21. Nixon himself contends that he worried about starting a war. Richard M. Nixon, RN (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1978), 384. Seymour Hersh believes they both wanted to take action, recalling Nixon’s indictment of LBJ over the Pueblo crisis: “I say to you tonight that when respect for the United States falls so low that a fourth–rate military power like Korea will seize an American naval vessel on the high seas, it’s time for new leadership." Seymour Hersh, The Price of Power (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983), 69. Back.

Note 83: Lee Chong–sik, Japan and Korea (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1985), 70. Back.

Note 84: Cha, “Alignment Despite Antagonism," 155. Clearly the Japanese were not comfortable with the broad commitment and shortly thereafter sought to cancel the clause. Lee, Japan and Korea, 75–76. Back.

Note 85: Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 14. Back.

Note 86: Cha, “Alignment Despite Antagonism," 260–61. Back.

Note 87: According to Oberdorfer, discussion at the meeting in the spring 1972 between KCIA director Lee Hu Rak and Kim Il Sung “is remarkable for a shared antipathy to the major powers." Lee observed to Kim that “the big powers only provide lip service to our hope for unification." Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 23–24. Back.

Note 88: Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun, 358–59. Back.

Note 89: Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 40–41. Back.

Note 90: Kim had received 47 percent of the vote in the election even with Park’s efforts to prevent the opposition from voting. Edwin O. Reischauer, “The Korean Connection," New York Times Magazine, September 22, 1974, 60. Oberdorfer suggests that quick action by Habib probably prevented the KCIA from throwing Kim into the sea. Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 43. In 1974 the U.S. Congress voted to make $20 million in aid contingent upon a better human rights record, although it also approved $145 million in military support outright. According to Han Sung–joo, Seoul was “insulted." Han, “South Korea and the United States," 217, 233n43. Back.

Note 91: Reischauer, “The Korean Connection," 15, 60–69. Back.

Note 92: Lee Chae–jin and Sato Hideo, U.S. Policy toward Japan and Korea (New York: Praeger, 1982), 73–89 (quote 80). Back.

Note 93: Han, “South Korea and the United States," 218. Back.

Note 94: Hayes, Pacific Powderkeg, 204–05. Hayes goes on to demonstrate that South Korea’s flirtation with nuclear weapons technology did not stop at this time. Ibid., 205–06. Back.

Note 95: Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 85 and 87. Oberdorfer corresponded with Carter and interviewed top figures from the administration, none of whom knew the source of the idea. Jody Powell told him that Carter had been aware of Laird’s withdrawal plans. Carter himself noted only that he had been generally inclined to bring American troops home from overseas. Oberdorfer, 86–87. Back.

Note 96: Lee and Sato, U.S. Policy toward Japan and Korea, 106–8. Back.

Note 97: Cyrus Vance, Hard Choices (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983), 128–29. Back.

Note 98: Gaddis Smith, Morality, Reason and Power (New York: Hill & Wang, 1986), 104; Nam, America’s Commitment to South Korea, 150. Back.

Note 99: Lee and Sato, U.S. Policy toward Japan and Korea, 113 and 115; Cha, “Alignment Despite Antagonism," 384–85; Nam, America’s Commitment to South Korea, 151; Han, “South Korea and the United States," 213–14. Back.

Note 100: Lee and Sato, U.S. Policy toward Japan and Korea, 114. Back.

Note 101: Nam, America’s Commitment to South Korea, 156. Back.

Note 102: William Watts, “The United States and Korea: Perception versus Reality," in Curtis and Han, The U.S.–South Korean Alliance, 67. Back.

Note 103: Levin and Sneider, “Korea in Postwar U.S. Security Policy," 52. Back.

Note 104: Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 93. Back.

Note 105: Vance, Hard Choices, 129; Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 101–03. Back.

Note 106: Smith, Morality, 104–5. According to Oberdorfer’s account, Carter felt that the Defense Intelligence Agency had doctored the figures on the North Korean troop strength. Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 103. Back.

Note 107: Smith, Morality, 105. Back.

Note 108: Tim Shorrock, “Debacle in Kwangju," The Nation, December 9, 1996, 19–22; Tim Shorrock, “The U.S. Role in Korea in 1979 and 1980," Internet, Korea Web Weekly (www.kimsoft.com/korea/kwangju3.htm), 1997. Back.

Note 109: J. Bryan Hehir, “The United States and Human Rights: Policy for the 1990s in the Light of the Past," in Kenneth A. Oye, Robert J. Lieber, and Donald Rothchild (eds.), Eagle in a New World (New York: HarperCollins, 1992), 240–42. Back.

Note 110: In a generally unflattering portrayal of his rival, Carter reports that, during pre–inauguration meetings between the two men, Reagan expressed envy for Chun’s absolute authority in repressing campus unrest. Jimmy Carter, Keeping Faith (New York: Bantam Books, 1982), 578. Back.

Note 111: Cha, “Alignment Despite Antagonism," 417–20; Han, “South Korea and the United States," 222–25. Back.

Note 112: Watts, “The United States and Korea," 76–79. Back.

Note 113: Cumings, Korea’s Place in the Sun, 322–26; Bertrand Reynaud, “The Structure of United States–Korea Economic Relations: Getting to Yes in a New Era," in Ilpyong Kim (ed.), Korean Challenges and American Policy (New York: Paragon, 1991), 250–51. Back.

Note 114: Eckert, Korea Old and New, 414–16. Back.

Note 115: Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 163–72. Back.

Note 116: Steve Coll and David B. Ottaway, “New Threats Create Doubt in U.S. Policy," Washington Post, April 13, 1995, A1, A26. In May 1994 Secretary of Defense William Perry reviewed contingency plans for a preemptive attack on the North Korean nuclear reactor as well as broader studies of war on the peninsula. Back.

Note 117: The grim assessment was by Air Force Colonel Robert Gaskin, “Net Assessment on Military Balance," March 1991, and reported by Barton Gellman, “Trepidation at Root of U.S. Korea Policy," Washington Post, December 12, 1993, A1, A49. The price tag of $1 trillion came from General Gary Luck, commander in chief of U.S. forces, Korea, on May 19, 1994, and included economic losses to the region as well as battlefield expenses. Coll and Ottaway, “New Threats," A26. Back.

Note 118: Daryl Plunk, “No Way to Deal with North Korea," Washington Post, September 29, 1996, C2. Back.

Note 119: The United States focused on the proliferation problem, but South Korea believed the possibility that the North already possessed one or two bombs ought to get at least equal attention. Lee Song Hee, “The North Korean Nuclear Issue between Washington and Seoul: Differences in Perceptions and Policy Priorities," The Journal of East Asian Affairs 11 (Summer/Fall 1997), 334–37. Back.

Note 120: Larry A. Niksch, “North Korea’s Campaign to Isolate South Korea," Korea and World Affairs 19 (Spring 1995), 29, 31. Back.

Note 121: Ralph A. Cossa, The Major Powers in Northeast Asian Security (Washington, D.C.: McNair Paper 51, National Defense University, 1996), 30–32. A related concern is the shift in American strategy away from fixed commitments to fight large–scale conflicts toward more mobile forces. For Korea this could mean the end of a long–term security guarantee, the “unmovable" U.S. forward–deployed deterrent. Moreover, if American forces in Korea are to serve larger regional purposes then, to some Koreans, their continued presence on the peninsula is not worth the costs. Kim Hyun–dong, “Future Developments on the Korean Peninsula: Implications for the United States and Korea," in Jonathan Pollack and Kim Hyun–dong (ed.), East Asia’s Potential for Instability and Crisis (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1995), 172 and 178. Back.

Note 122: R. Jeffrey Smith, “Korean Talks Jeopardized by New Tensions," Washington Post, February 17, 1997, A1, A20. Back.

Note 123: Victor Cha, “Realism, Liberalism, and the Durability of the U.S.–South Korean Alliance," Asian Survey 37 (July 1997), 619. Back.

Note 124: Robert A. Scalapino, “Foreign Policy for a New Administration," in Asian Update: The 1997 Korean Presidential Elections, November 1997, 18. China, Japan and Taiwan all enjoy surpluses with the United States. Back.

Note 125: Kim, “Future Developments on the Korean Peninsula," 174. Back.

Note 126: Nicholas D. Kristof, “Many Proud South Koreans Resent Bailout from Abroad," New York Times, December 11, 1997, D4. Back.

Note 127: Quote taken from Suh Ji–moon, “America and Americans as Depicted in Korean Fiction," Journal of American Studies (Seoul), 28 (Winter 1996), 388, as cited by David I. Steinberg, “Tensions in the South Korean–U.S. Relationship," Asia Foundation Working Paper #2, 1997, 11. Back.

Note 128: David I. Steinberg, “Reconstructing the Bridge—Rethinking Korean–American Relations," Pacific Bridge 6 (Spring/Summer 1997), 9. Back.

Note 129: Andrew Pollack, “U.S.–Korea Friction," New York Times, February 18, 1997, A6. Back.

Note 130: Bates Gill, “Proliferation and the U.S. Alliances in Northeast Asia," America’s Alliances with Japan and Korea in a Changing Northeast Asia, Asia/Pacific Research Center, Stanford University, 1997, 6–9. Back.

Note 131: Oberdorfer, The Two Koreas, 390–91, with quote from Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times, 391; Smith, “Korean Talks Jeopardized," A20. Back.

Note 132: The scenarios for war on the peninsula are varied; see for examples Richard L. Armitage, “New Discourses on a Peace Regime in Northeast Asia and Korea: Contending Views and New Alternatives," International Forum Proceedings, Research Institute for International Affairs, Seoul, Korea, November 1996, 10–13. Back.

Note 133: Robert A. Manning, “The United States and the Endgame in Korea," Asian Survey 37 (July 1997), 608. Back.

Note 134: USA Today/Sankei Shimbun/Gallup Poll, February 1–3, 1994, ranked South Korea as comparable to China in the closeness of its ties with the United States and equivalent to Russia (and well below China, Taiwan, or Hong Kong) in its business and trade significance to Americans. Public Opinion Online, Lexus/Nexus. Back.

Note 135: Chicago Council on Foreign Relations/Gallup Poll, October 7–25, 1994, ibid. Back.

Note 136: Poll data on the question of the use of troops:

	yes	no
November1993	31%	63%
From CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll, Public Opinion Online, Lexus/Nexus.
February 1994	39%	55%
March 1994	45%	46%
From Gallup Poll (Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 1995), 213.
November 1995	31%	64%
October 1997	35%	58%

From Program on International Policy Attitudes, 1995, and Princeton Survey Research Associates, 1997, Public Opinion Online, Lexus/Nexus.

The exception came when respondents were asked their view of intervention if carried out with other countries and under the UN. Then the figures were 68% in favor and 29% opposed. From Program on International Policy Attitudes, 1995. Back.

Note 137: Various scenarios for tension between Washington and Seoul can be imagined. Victor Cha has suggested two: (1) the establishment of U.S.–North Korean liaison offices in the absence of better North–South relations, and (2) American acceptance of uncertainty regarding Pyongyang’s actual possession of a nuclear bomb in its effort to prevent proliferation. Cha, “Realism, Liberalism," 621. Back.

Note 138: At the end of the 1980s a report on American universities remarked upon the “relative marginality of Korean studies, compared to the more developed China and Japan fields." “Report on Korean Studies in the United States," Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C., 1992, ix. Back.

Note 139: The United States’ unwillingness to provide direct aid provoked resentment in Korea. David E. Sanger, “The Bank of America," New York Times, December 10, 1997, A1. Back.