The Marmot’s Hole

Diplobabble, courtesy Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon and the staff of the Korea Times:

South Korea is not opposed to American forces playing a greater role in Northeast Asia unless it means a weakening of the combined defense posture to keep peace and stability on the Korean peninsula, Seoul?????s top diplomat said Monday.

“Nobody (in the South Korean government) has opposed that,” Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Ban Ki-moon told The Korea Times, in an interview on the occasion of its 54th anniversary.

“I admit the necessity of what the Americans call ’strategic flexibility’,” Ban stated, citing the changed global security situation over the past 50 years.

“The United States has been going through a transformation period since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks,” he continued. “As an ally, South Korea should also understand the U.S. position that its overseas troops should play a greater role with more flexibility in this transformational stage.”

Ban’s remarks are seen as a further step over the controversy about the future status and role of the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK), stationed here for more than half a century to deter any aggression from North Korea after the 1950-53 Korean War.

Washington has often expressed an intention to expand the USFK?????s role into mobile forces to cope with any contingencies in the Northeast Asian region, although Seoul has maintained a cautious attitude toward the idea.

I guess this is good, with the foreign minister seeming to agree that if the U.S. is going to base troops on the Korean Peninsula on a permanent basis, they shouldn’t be a complete waste of increasingly valuable U.S. military resources. That being said, I’m kind of curious as to what kind of “greater role in Northeast Asia” the DoD and MoD had in mind. From what I’ve read about USFK transformation plans, it seems like the general idea is to create a lighter, highly mobile force that probably seems to some disturbingly similar to a rapid deployment force. Thing is, perhaps I’m a bit shortsighted, but I don’t see possibly contingencies in Northeast Asia where such a force might come in handy that don’t involve China, and Seoul has been extremely hesitant to permit itself to get involved in what it perceives as U.S. moves to contain Beijing, something I expressed concerns about back in May. Perhaps Ban’s comments in the KT are a sign that the Korean progressive honeymoon with China has ended, but I don’t think they are. They may be nothing more than the diplomatic art of saying nothing.