Is this Korea’s grand strategy?
Park Jung-won
What was displayed was bizarre. What was hidden was unsettling. That is the simplest way to sum up the recent Korea-U.S. summit. It was billed as the South Korean president’s first big stage in Washington, but when it was over, no joint statement or communique was issued, nor was there a joint press conference. What the public actually saw was a brief exchange in the Oval Office. And in that short time, the name repeated most often was neither Korea nor America — but Kim Jong-un.
President Donald Trump, in his usual fashion, dominated the conversation with long answers to reporter questions, with topics ranging from Ukraine to China to domestic politics. South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, by contrast, spoke little. The one moment that stood out was his request to President Trump: “Please meet Kim Jong-un.” Before a global audience, why did the South Korean president repeat the North Korean leader’s name so often? Is Kim Jong-un really the most pressing issue right now?
This was not a mere diplomatic slip. It created the impression that the South Korean president was speaking on Pyongyang’s behalf. When President Trump responded that he would like to meet Kim within the year, Washington gained justification for a new round of direct U.S.-North Korea talks. Kim, without even being present, suddenly emerged as the biggest beneficiary — his name echoing in Seoul and Washington alike.
The real issues, however, did not appear in the public session. They were discussed behind closed doors, in an 80-minute meeting that included lunch but was largely devoted to their conversation. There, one must assume, the agenda included agricultural market access, tariffs, defense cost-sharing and the future of U.S. forces in Korea. Yet no written agreement emerged. Where did these issues go? The answer is obvious: They have been deferred, only to return as an American “bill” to be presented to Seoul in due course.
Most striking of all is the scale of the commitments already reported. The figures now circulating are staggering: $350 billion in investment, $100 billion in U.S. energy purchases and — added during this summit — another $150 billion in new pledges. In total, that’s $600 billion, a sum that exceeds South Korea’s entire annual government budget of roughly $500 billion. Yet no official text or joint statement has been released, leaving the details opaque.
If these numbers do reflect a genuine understanding between the two governments, they raise a serious constitutional question. Under international law, substance matters more than form. When an agreement imposes major financial obligations, it can carry binding force. By that logic, such commitments should receive parliamentary scrutiny. Instead, the legislature has remained silent — no hearings, no debate, no acknowledgment of the stakes. How can obligations larger than the national budget move forward in near-total secrecy? How can a democracy justify decisions of this magnitude without even a minimal airing of dissent? That is what makes the situation so alarming: Decisions of historic scale are unfolding with none of the scrutiny or accountability essential to democracy.
The economic consequences are not hard to foresee. If corporations pour hundreds of billions of dollars abroad, domestic investment capacity will shrink. Where will the jobs come from? How will young people’s futures be secured? Deindustrialization is not a distant possibility but a looming reality. And yet public attention has been consumed by the trivial: the pen used to sign the White House guestbook, the golf club President Lee presented to Trump, whether he managed to avoid a “Zelenskyy moment.”
The same distortion appears in public opinion surveys. One poll reported 53 percent of responders viewing the summit positively, 41 percent negatively. But on what basis? With no joint statement and no clear results, what exactly were people judging? Was it the optics of Lee smiling next to Trump? Or the confidence he tried to project in front of the cameras?
The atmosphere at the end of the summit suggested that differences remained, whether on security, trade or investment. Trump’s decision to not see Lee off after the meeting was symbolic. Had he been satisfied, he surely would have done so. For now, political considerations kept those differences from surfacing. But in the upcoming defense ministers’ meeting and the next U.S.-Korea security dialogue, Washington is likely to present specific demands. What was left unmentioned from the closed-door session will soon arrive in Seoul, with numbers and conditions attached.
Even more troubling is the president’s posture toward North Korea’s nuclear threat. Kim Yo-jong, Kim Jong-un’s sister, has mocked Lee repeatedly, deriding Seoul’s talk of denuclearization as reckless nonsense. Pyongyang has already declared it will never abandon its nuclear arsenal. Yet during his visit, Lee publicly pledged that South Korea would “never possess nuclear weapons” and would “strictly adhere to the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty).” How should this be understood? Does he actually believe North Korea will denuclearize? If so, is he living in another world?
Around the globe, states pursue strategic ambiguity. Only Seoul continues to tie its own hands, loudly repeating the mantra of denuclearization. Meanwhile, Washington seems more concerned with intercontinental ballistic missiles aimed at the U.S. than with total denuclearization. The likely result: The U.S. reduces its risk, while Korea and Japan remain exposed to Pyongyang’s short- and medium-range nuclear missiles. In such a reality, is it wise for Seoul to keep declaring it will never develop nuclear weapons? Why do we lock ourselves into a position that even North Korea openly mocks?
So here is where we stand. Economically, Seoul has promised to send astronomical sums abroad. In security, it awaits the inevitable bill. Diplomatically, its leader repeats Kim Jong-un’s name in Washington. Is this the grand strategy Korea aspires to? Where exactly are we standing, and where are we going? Beyond partisan battles and ideological divides, the fate of the Korean community itself is at stake. Perhaps the gravest danger is not in what was agreed or left unsaid, but in the distorted atmosphere at home — where the trivial overshadows the essential.
Park Jung-won (park_jungwon@hotmail.com), Ph.D. in law from the London School of Economics, is a professor of international law at Dankook University.