The Biden Administration and Peace on the Korean Peninsula

 

Joe Biden was elected the 46^th president of the United States on November, 3, 2020, and the new Biden administration was subsequently launched on January 20, 2021. The Biden administration, which is expected to implement domestic and foreign policies that would be substantially different from the former Trump administration, is also expected to take a policy significantly distinct in relation to the Korean Peninsula issues.

In doing so, we look forward to establishing a more proactive Korean Peninsula peace policy from the Biden administration, both taking over the achievements and overcoming limitations of Trump’s “maximum pressure and engagement” policy and Obama’s “strategic patience” policy.

As a candidate, President Biden said, “With North Korea, I will empower our negotiators and jump-start a sustained, coordinated campaign with our allies and others, including China, to advance our shared objective of a denuclearized North Korea.”

In order to achieve the denuclearization and establish a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula, the most urgent task for stability and prosperity in Northeast Asia and for world peace, it is necessary for the Biden administration to closely cooperate with the South Korean government, a partner of the US-ROK alliance and the most concerned party to the Korean Peninsula issues.

It is also imperative that in order to achieve the denuclearization and a permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula, two most important diplomatic goals in the region, the two principles should always be kept: a diplomatic way through negotiations with Pyongyang, and a step-by-step, reciprocal solution based on action for action. In addition, the “denuclearization first” policy or CVID policy only based on sanctions and pressure, which the former administrations have tried in vain, should not be repeated.

The Biden administration has appointed key positions to deal with North Korea. Some of them argue that the denuclearization of North Korea is impossible or that the North Korean government is not a reliable negotiating partner, neither of which is far from the truth. If the nuclear negotiation process between the US and North Korea since the Clinton administration is closely examined, we can see that North Korea has been seriously engaged in negotiations with the US. In dealing with North Korea, President Biden with expertise in the field of diplomacy should keep this in mind.

In order to negotiate with North Korea, furthermore, it seems desirable to attempt a combined approach from above and from below as necessary. While the Trump administration's top-down approach had a lot of limitations, the bottom-up approach expected from the Biden administration may also have limitations in the initiatives and timing of resolving the North Korean nuclear issue. The two approaches are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

At the Eighth Congress of the Workers' Party of Korea held in January this year, North Korea insisted that in order to establish new US-North Korea relations, the US withdraw its hostile policy against North Korea, and said that it would face the US with the tit-for-tat strategy. In fact, North Korea's argument is not new and still expresses a willingness to talk with the United States.

North Korea's nuclear weapons were developed not to preemptively attack the US, but as a deterrent to alleviate the security anxiety of the North Korean regime after the end of the Cold War. With the end of the Cold War, the Soviet Union collapsed, and China established diplomatic relations with South Korea. On the other hand, the United States became the world's only superpower, and the gap in economic and military power between South Korea and North Korea began to widen enormously.

Time is not on our side. Even at this moment, North Korea's nuclear capabilities are increasing and becoming the most unstable factor in peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula and in Northeast Asia. The Biden administration should no longer waste time in the wishful thinking of the collapse of the North Korean regime in the foreseeable future. Instead, it should take as a starting point the principles and spirit of the Singapore Joint Statement agreed by President Trump and Chairman Kim Jong-un in 2018, where the two countries agreed on the establishment of new US-North Korea relations, a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula, and the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. The Biden administration should keep in mind that these three tasks are closely intwined and that the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and the establishment of a peace regime are two sides of the coin.

To facilitate peace on the Korean Peninsula, the Biden administration, in close consultation with the South Korean government, should suspend the US-ROK annual joint military exercises as a concrete step to create a peaceful atmosphere and build mutual trust on the Korean Peninsula, return wartime operational command to the government of the Republic of Korea, declare an end to the Korean War, and hold a summit meeting between the U.S. and North Korea as soon as possible.

President Biden will probably be very busy even now overcoming the COVID-19 pandemic and dealing with urgent domestic and foreign problems. However, the establishment of a peace regime on the Korean Peninsula is also an urgent task that cannot be postponed any longer. We hope that President Biden will show a new leadership for peace on the Korean Peninsula to the world.

P.S. This article was published in The Road to Unification by the Orange County San Diego Chapter of the National Unification Advisory Council of the Republic of Korea.