That was a diplomatic way of putting it. Based on what I said at the beginning of this thread, I’d have to say “I’m quite sure Roh’s spin on things is not helping matters.”

For decades, South Korea was one of the most staunchly Anticommunist countries on earth. I think many South Koreans are just ready to try a new solution to an old problem.

And nobody is completely unaware of the threat from up north: nationwide air raid drills are still held once a month, and are serious business indeed. I was in the middle of one. Even in the middle of busy cities, traffic just stops. Nobody moves. It’s eerie. There is a veneer of “nonchalance” (as someone called it on another thread), but everyone is keenly aware of what’s involved.

That said, I have no better idea what to make of the “balancer policy” than anyone else, and I’m not sure Roh’s spin on things is really helping things.

If all you had was sewage water to drink for the past 50 years and someone offers you urine to drink, you might jump up at the chance too.

So it would appear the hard-line approach isn’t solving anything. Let’s try something different. Let’s be the bigger man and smother them with kindness.

But smothering is not instantaneous, and the victim tends to kick and twitch, and this is where we are right now.
And nobody is completely unaware of the threat from up north: nationwide air raid drills are still held once a month, and are serious business indeed. I was in the middle of one. Even in the middle of busy cities, traffic just stops. Nobody moves. It?€™s eerie. There is a veneer of ?€œnonchalance?€? (as someone called it on another thread), but everyone is keenly aware of what?€™s involved.
Hey, that’s me again!

I remember when the 1994 crisis occurred, reporters were here from all over, practically expecting war to break out at any minute. One talked about how tensions were so high that the ROK decided to start doing air raid drills.

Started?! No, they had never stopped.

Again, I say, the situation for many South Korean citizens: threat fatigue.

But, and this is important, if a threat really does raise itself, people will be all over it.
That said, I have no better idea what to make of the ?€œbalancer policy?€? than anyone else, and I?€™m not sure Roh?€™s spin on things is really helping things.
I think he just wants to be a mediator. He made clear he doesn’t want to break off the US military alliance. He just wants Korea’s contribution to being a host at cocktail parties between rivaling sides where a grand and wonderful compromise can be reached. He wants the kind of Nobel Prize T.R. got in 1905.

20,000 or so PRC troops along the DMZ would serve equally well (if not better) as a deterrent to war between the North and the South, vs. the US presence. The North could hardly object openly to such “assistance” by its fraternal brothers in “protecting” it against the South could it?

Particularly if the Chinese were lightly armed and if the current Security Council could be persuaded the resurrect the “UN” mission originally voted in 1950 (now just a facade maintained by the US and ROK if I’m not mistaken, as the UN itself stopped budgeting for this decades ago (?)).

It’s not like the mainland is short of troops or anything. And ROK could offer to foot the bill for the troops on “generous” terms, making it a possible profit center for the PRC! The danger of war on the peninsula would be reduced immensely; seems like a “win-win” all around, especially for Americans like me who are infinitely weary of our “allies” and their carping and posturing.

I’m just not into “master-slave”, “client states”, “maintaining a foothold in Asia to threaten the heart of China”, or whatever other geopolitical/ poly sci class balderdash gets propagated here periodically. And neither is the rest of the American public, taken as a whole.

No US troops will ever move into North Korea in any meaningful amount, no matter what happens there in the future (short of some catastrophic nuclear war scenario). In that respect the Chinese Communist counterattack of Nov-Dec 1950 was a turning point in history.

On the other hand it’s highly likely that the Chinese will have to intervene in NorK someday, so why not implicitly acknowledge this by all concerned (except of course DPRK) and begin preparation for it now? An eventual (and inevitable) NorK collapse scenario would be a lot safer for the US and Japan if the US were physically gone from the peninsula (or so it seems to me).