A government of improvisation in the age of FAFO

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A government of improvisation in the age of FAFO

Published: 20 Jan. 2026, 00:01

Audio report: written by reporters, read by AI

Song Ho-keun

The author is a columnist of the JoongAng Ilbo and a chair professor and director of Doheon Academy, Hallym University.

A phrase that might belong in a gangster film has spilled from the mouth of the leader of the world’s hegemonic power: FAFO — “F__k Around and Find Out.” It means, quite simply, that defiance invites destruction. Across the table, Xi Jinping, heir to a Confucian tradition, chose a more decorous expression, calling it “changes unseen in a century.” He went further, urging — or rather instructing — Korea’s president to “stand on the right side of history.” That remark came shortly after a photograph of Donald Trump bearing the FAFO slogan, reportedly taken at Gimhae Airport, circulated publicly. President Lee Jae Myung responded with a quotation from Confucius, a clever move reminiscent of a well-timed baduk gambit. Yet “find out” has become a fear that 21st-century Korea must confront. Defiance leading to death has, in fact, occurred.

U.S. President Donald Trump holds a press conference as Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and General Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, look on following a U.S. strike on Venezuela where President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were captured, from Trump's Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida on Jan. 3. [REUTERS/YONHAP]

It happened in the late 20th century as well. Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi and Iraq’s Saddam Hussein come to mind. Anti-Americanism and Islamic ideology alone were tolerated. Monopoly control over resources and acts of terror were not. That was when American patience snapped. The turning point came after the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001, when strategic thinking shifted alongside industrial decline. Military power was mobilized to secure industrial advantage, and countries refusing to submit capital and technology were made examples. A carpet bombing of high tariffs flattened resistance worldwide. Emboldened, Trump nullified 66 international agreements and declared himself the law. In the 21st century, international law has acquired a new name: FAFO.

A photo of U.S. President Donald Trump at Gimhae International Airport in Korea's southeastern city of Busan on Oct. 30, 2025, released by The White House [SCREEN CAPTURE]

Why did Venezuela’s leader ignore the warning? Why would he mock Trump from such close range? How could he so recklessly forfeit oil reserves totaling some 300 billion barrels, among the world’s largest? He trusted backing from China and Russia. He was intoxicated by the seductive scent of Latin America’s longstanding populist tradition. Venezuela became a textbook case of what happens to a nation that grows suddenly rich. President Nicolás Maduro showed what befalls a petrostate that mistakes fortune for immunity.

Oil discoveries in the Maracaibo Basin and along the Essequibo River in the 1920s instantly elevated Venezuela into a resource-rich country. Turning oil, the black pearl of the 20th century, into national wealth required avoiding two dangers: domestic rent seeking and intervention by great powers. Latin American leaders, eager to consolidate power, scattered free welfare benefits among populist sectors — the poor, workers and farmers — while deepening corrupt ties with foreign capital. This mechanism of exporting national wealth or dissipating it through giveaways defines populism. Dissatisfaction over development paths and distribution repeatedly triggered military coups. More than 140 coups swept Latin America before the 1959 Cuban Revolution. Venezuela, once committed to democracy, slid into collapse under the populism and habitual anti-Americanism of Hugo Chávez and Maduro. Left-wing populism turned medical resources into poison.

Korea, by contrast, was resource-poor. It was distant, impoverished and largely ignored. The “quiet country” at the edge of East Asia barely merited a visit. In 1816, British naval officer Basil Hall briefly landed on an island off Gunsan while charting coastal waters. Terrified villagers fled, he wrote, “like rabbits to their hutches.” It was today’s Gogunsan Archipelago. Fifty years later, in 1866, a French fleet entered the Yeomha Channel near Ganghwa Island over the execution of Catholic missionaries. What soldiers found in the destitute village was a royal archive. Korea was a knowledge state living on texts. No one then could have foreseen that knowledge and education would become the greatest industrial resources of the 20th century. Empires soon awakened to Korea’s geopolitical value. As Russia moved south, Britain occupied Geomun Island. In imperial eyes, Korea was an entry port to the continent and a dagger aimed at Japan.

Through colonial rule and the Cold War, Korea became rich in human capital and geopolitics. The absence of oil may have been a blessing. The ideological proxy war of the Korean War, however, was unavoidable. Perched on a volatile line of hegemony, how should Korea dance? Maduro’s mocking dance leads to ruin. Is the current government’s claim of “pragmatism,” insisting there are no permanent enemies or allies, the answer? Pragmatism often masks improvisation and the absence of strategy. There is no clear national navigation chart. The Cabinet lacks presence, foreign and economic policy drift and future discourse has vanished. Health care, education and livelihoods are left in near receivership.

President Lee Jae Myung (right) and Chinese President Xi Jinping enter an official welcoming ceremony held on Jan. 5 at the North Hall of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. [JOINT PRESS CORPS]

China’s AI surge has pulled far ahead. Sheltered briefly under MAGA, Korea will face stronger pressure from Beijing. Courtesy visits to Beijing and Tokyo will not reduce risk. Nearly a year into this administration, the public still does not know where the country is headed. Having overturned power so dramatically, the government must present a clear blueprint for global diplomacy and growth. Trump has scrapped a century-old order. FAFO, he says.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.