/ world today news/ The state visit of the President of the Republic of Korea (ROK) Yoon Sok-yeol to the USA was prepared long and carefully – such an event in bilateral relations has not happened in the last 12 years. However, the results were quite disappointing: the main topic of the leaders’ summit was the “containment” of North Korea, which clearly will not improve the regional security situation in Northeast Asia.
US President Joe Biden and South Korea’s leader adopted the Washington Declaration at the end of the meeting, in which they announced steps to expand nuclear deterrence. This suggests that the US is ready to use all means to protect its East Asian ally. A bilateral nuclear advisory group is expected to be established soon. The representatives of Washington and Seoul in this format will begin to discuss issues of nuclear and strategic planning, and also intend to intensify military exercises on the Korean Peninsula in the field of nuclear deterrence.
To demonstrate their potential, US nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines will regularly dock at South Korean ports. This will happen for the first time in 40 years. At the same time, Washington does not yet intend to deploy its nuclear weapons, including tactical ones, on the Korean Peninsula. For now…
On the one hand, the US did not violate the nuclear-free status of the Korean Peninsula, which was enshrined in the DPRK-RYK Agreement of February 1992. At the same time, South Korea’s commitment to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was reaffirmed. On the other hand, the unprecedented build-up of weapons at the bases and in the waters around the RYUK (including submarines and strategic bombers) is in itself a destabilizing factor and is clearly directed not only (and not so much) against North Korea, but against China. Beijing has been talking about this for a long time, and now another step has been taken to bring the US military machine closer to China’s borders.
Incidentally, in their Washington Declaration, the US and South Korean leaders opposed “illegal claims to maritime zones” and “unilateral attempts to change the status quo in the Indo-Pacific region”, again with a clear anti-Chinese context. The Chinese authorities reacted sharply as expected and made a serious rebuke to the Republic of Korea in connection with these statements, which “incorrectly worded” referred to the PRC.
Surprisingly, after the meeting, Joe Biden noted that the US is “trying to achieve a diplomatic breakthrough in relations with the DPRK”. But at the same time, according to him, even if it happens, it will in no way affect America’s nuclear obligations to South Korea. On top of that, the US leader has openly threatened North Korea with “regime change” if Pyongyang tries to launch a nuclear strike against the US or its allies.
So instead of seeking to negotiate nuclear risk reduction, transparency measures, and military confidence (which Moscow and Beijing are now offering as part of their agreed position, and which could indeed be a diplomatic breakthrough), the Biden administration is acting in the exact opposite direction. direction (not to mention the threat of “regime change”, which nullifies any possible positive outcomes). As a result, the visit by the RYK president showed that the US and its South Korean ally have taken a serious step backwards in their efforts to resolve the DPRK’s nuclear missile issue and to strengthen regional security in Northeast Asia.
Translation: V. Sergeev
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