'Unnecessary': military alliance with US and Japan will deepen regional tensions, South Korea opposition chief says

South Korea's top opposition leader has said a three-way military alliance with the United States and Japan is "unnecessary" as it would only deepen the mounting rivalry between two opposing power blocs.

Lee Jae-myung also called for "pragmatic diplomacy" by Seoul, asserting that its alliance with Washington and its "strategic cooperative partnership" with Beijing were "not incompatible" given their mutual interests and robust trade ties.

South Korea has the world's sixth-largest conventional military force and the US is firmly committed to offering an "extended nuclear deterrence" to cope with nuclear-armed North Korea, he said.

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"Under these circumstances, a new war on the Korean peninsula would mean the extermination of all lives," Lee said. "A trilateral military alliance that goes beyond the current military cooperation with the US and Japan is not necessary as it would only spark an equivalent alliance including the North, China and Russia."

The leader of the liberal Democratic Party of Korea, who narrowly lost to Yoon Suk-yeol from the conservative People Power Party in last year's presidential election, has consistently been polling as the presidential favourite for the 2027 race.

Lee's popularity has not suffered even though pro-Yoon prosecutors have accused him of corruption and abuse of power during his tenure as a provincial administrator.

The remarks by Lee come ahead of Yoon's visit to Washington later this month for a summit with US President Joe Biden. They are expected to discuss cooperation in defence and extended deterrence, challenges in technology and trade, and international issues, according to Yoon's presidential office.

Kim Joon-hyung, former head of the Korea National Diplomatic Academy, said the US would seek to renew efforts to bolster three-way cooperation with its top Asian allies to the level of a military alliance, to curb China and Russia.

"At this time, neither the US nor South Korea is expected to utter the sensitive word - military alliance - during Yoon's visit. But the three countries are likely to enhance their military cooperation to the level of a de facto alliance," Kim told This Week in Asia.

When the US, South Korea and Japan carried out an anti-submarine naval exercise in September 2022 near the disputed Dokdo or Takeshima islands in the Sea of Japan, or East Sea, the simulated enemy submarines were as large as 7,500 tonnes.

"The North has midget submarines and it's only now building a 3,000-tonne submarine to launch missiles from underwater. This means the exercise was simulating an engagement with Chinese or Russian submarines," Kim said.

In addition, Japan had made it clear it will build up its missile capabilities, Kim said, including by developing hypersonic weapons, doubling its defence expenditure over the next four years and extending its military operational area beyond its own territory.

"As South Korea brings in Japan to help handle North Korea, the Yoon government is now turning China and Russia into two formidable enemies," he said.

Lee, the opposition chief, also said that growing confrontation between the region's opposing blocs - North Korea, China and Russia on one side and South Korea, the US and Japan on the other - was posing "fatal threats" to the South's export-driven economy.

The World Bank warned in its semi-annual economic report last month that the US and China's growing rivalry now posed "the most immediate challenge" in the Asia-Pacific region.

"As South Korea heavily relies on trade with China, its ballooning trade deficit with China is a deepening crisis for South Korea's economy," Lee said, urging Seoul to adopt "a flexible, pragmatic diplomacy" that prioritised its national interest.

South Korea's bilateral trade surplus with China had hit a high of US$55.6 billion in 2018. Since then, that figure has been declining, hitting a low of US$1.2 billion last year as a result of China's pandemic-triggered lockdowns and price increases for raw materials and intermediate products that South Korea imports for manufacturing, data from the Korea International Trade Association showed.

However, in the first two months of this year, South Korea's accumulated trade deficit with China surged to more than US$5 billion, followed by Australia at US$4.85 billion and Japan at US$3.53 billion, according to the official figures.

"Aside from the global economic slowdown, it can't be denied that the deepening confrontation between South Korea, the US and Japan in one bloc and North Korea, China and Russia in the other bloc is damaging the country's economy," Lee said.

Under these circumstances, it was "highly important" for South Korea to employ "multipronged diplomacy" by striking a balance between the two superpowers and expanding its ties with China, Russia, the European Union and Asean, he said.

This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (SCMP).

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