Time for aggressive diplomacy with the U.S.

In a shocking development, the share of Americans who support the U.S. forces defending South Korea in the case of North Korea invading the South fell by a sharp margin in a recent survey in the United States. Given the growing possibility of former U.S. President Donald Trump being re-elected in next year’s presidential race, the results of the poll sound loud alarms on our security front. As North Korea recently stipulated the advancement of nuclear weapons in its Constitution, this finding demands aggressive diplomacy from the Yoon Suk Yeol administration toward the ally.

In the survey on 3,242 U.S. citizens by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, only 50 percent of the respondents favored the U.S. forces’ participation in defending the South from North Korea’s aggression. That’s a 13 percent-point drop from the same survey a year earlier. While 57 percent of Democratic voters supported the U.S. defense of South Korea, only 46 percent of Republican voters agreed. That reflects a noticeable dilution of the sense of the military alliance among the conservatives.

The non-partisan research institute analyzed that the results of the survey show a deepening partisan division over the mobilization of U.S. military forces to protect an ally, as suggested in the extreme conflict bordering on a “political civil war” in the Congress.

Our government must not brush off such an alarming change of tide in America. We still have the vivid memories of the former U.S. president pressuring Seoul to share more of the defense costs needed to protect South Korea. Otherwise, Trump said he would pull out the U.S. Forces Korea. It will be a nightmare if the public opinion in the U.S. leans toward opposing U.S. involvement in a war on the Korean Peninsula. Unfortunately, the South Korea-U.S. Mutual Defense Treaty does not mandate an “automatic intervention” in times of crisis.

Considering the gravity of public opinion in the decision-making process in the United States, our government must engage in more aggressive diplomacy with Congress, major think tanks, and the press than ever before, on top of high-level meetings with U.S. officials. Our government must strengthen its networks with pro-Seoul lawmakers and more to effectively rally their support for South Korea. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Korea Foundation and the Korean Culture and Information Service under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism must join forces in the effort.

The Yoon administration must let the U.S. government, Congress and the corporate sector recognize that the sophistication of North Korean nuclear weapons poses a direct security threat to America and that the only way to protect U.S. interests is to confront the threat together with its ally on the frontline of free democracy. At the same time, the government must reinforce its ability to defend itself. Revising the Korea-U.S. Nuclear Energy Agreement — conspicuously disadvantageous to South Korea compared to the Japan-U.S. agreement — can be the start.