[Editorial] Seoul‘s Fifth Columnists

South Korea requested the United States to delete an article on Washington’s provision of a nuclear umbrella for Seoul in a joint statement during last year’s defense ministers’ talks, the 37th Security Consultative Meeting (SCM). However, the U.S. strongly opposed Seoul’s proposal, saying that it would then not issue a joint statement. This is indeed terrifying news.

In this regard, the Korean government claims that the proposal was made as part of efforts to persuade the North to return to the negotiating table. However, how could senior security policy officials have come up with such an absurd idea or action unless they are insane. I cannot understand their intention unless it was to lay the entire South Korea at the foot of the communist regime. The proposal was certainly far more extreme than the “sunshine policy” or the “engagement policy,” and it was highly suspicious of collaboration or collusion with North Korea. It appears as if fifth columnists or secret agents have become South Korea’s top government officials and seek polices that would threaten national security and peace. If not, the top officials must be so ignorant that they don’t even know the definition of security or peace.

A nuclear umbrella is not for invasion but to protect ourselves. This is not for retaliation but prevention. A nuclear umbrella serves as a deterrent against potential invasion from North Korea by implying that South Korea is under the U.S. nuclear protection against the North. Hence, it is only effective when it is announced clearly towards North Korea. In order to do that, South Korea and the U.S. have put a nuclear umbrella agreement in a statutory form since 1978. The role of a nuclear umbrella has become even more crucial after all the tactical nuclear weapons of the American forces deployed in South Korea were withdrawn in accordance with the South-North Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula in 1991.

However, the National Security Council (NSC) has been claiming to remove the article about a nuclear umbrella or change the term nuclear umbrella since the launch of the Roh administration in 2003. Such change in the national security policy has been, in fact, made since incumbent Unification Minister Lee Jong-seok served as the deputy head of the NSC. The claims that the change should be made in order to bring North Korea back to the dialogue table can be only made out of either sham or ignorance. “If (the senior officials really) thought giving up the nuclear umbrella would induce a nuclear-free Korean peninsula, they are wrong. They do not seem to know the real intentions or truth of the North Korean regime.”

North Korea relentlessly requested South Korea to remove nuclear weapons, abolish its national security law, and send the U.S. troops back. The Stalinist regime believes they are the main hurdles in unifying the two Koreas by force. Nuclear weapons were long ago withdrawn from the Korean peninsula, and the National Security Law is also about to be abolished. U.S. Forces Korea will also reduce its number of troops by 12,500 by 2008. The Roh administration’s self-reliant policy will be accelerated with the retrieval of wartime command control and the dismantlement of the ROK-U.S. Combined Forces Command in 2009. Minister Lee also reviewed the adjusting the current Northern Limit Line (NLL) over which North Korea has been grunting.

Moreover, pro-North Korean leftists have been repeating the claims of the North Korean regime as if their own while waging demonstrations all across the country. Still, the Roh government does not show any response against it. The National Human Rights Commission of Korea, which is speechless when it comes to the human rights problems of North Korea, submitted recommendations in January this year which demanded the abolishment of the National Security Law.

Meanwhile, the regulations of the North`s ruling Workers` Party still remains unchanged, stipulating far more severe penalties than the South’s National Security Law. The North has also continued to develop nuclear weapons despite the joint denuclearization treaty and the Geneva agreement with the U.S. in 1994 and eventually carried out a nuclear test.

Even though the current security situation is in such a mess, the government requested the U.S. not to include an article concerning a nuclear umbrella. What would be the government’s intention if not to be under the nuclear umbrella of the North and risk the lives of the people? If their intention is to disarm themselves first and expect grace from the North in return, they are indeed wrong and unqualified to handle national security. “If the government’s policy is wrong, all the military strategies become futile. The current situation between South Korea and North Korea reminds me of the time just before losing the Vietnam War,” said Chae Myung-shin, former commander of the Republic of Korea Forces in Vietnam.

President Roh Moo-hyun, the commander-in-chief and guardian of the Constitution, praised Minister Lee at a Cabinet meeting in July just after North Korea launched their missiles, saying, “Minister Lee is the most trustworthy route in contacting North Korea.” Now it appears to be that South Korean people should prepare and worry about their own safety by themselves. It may have become a time to find and drive out the enemies within the Roh Administration.