Moon's 2 UN Speeches

By Stephen Costello

President Moon Jae-in’s speech last week to the United Nations General Assembly in New York contained some of the most important points that can be made by South Korea to the world community today. As a middle power in the rich and growing region of Northeast Asia, his full-throated endorsement of U.N. goals, and of U.N. indispensability, were welcome.

Describing the new government’s approach to governing, he made a most modern and democratic statement by a head-of-state: “My administration is pursuing bold measures to change the economic paradigm in order to deal with economic inequalities that stand in the way of growth and social cohesion.”

Moon’s linkage of the candlelit rallies of last year to the best goals of the U.N. was bold, moving, and accurate. As he said, they “…Created a historic moment that is evidence of the brilliant achievement of the spirit of the United Nations.”

To back up verbal support for the U.N., he also made a clear and important promise: “In the years to come, the Republic of Korea will significantly increase its contributions to the United Nations in all sectors.”

These positions, if acted upon, can leverage and greatly expand the power and influence of the ROK. Any country with ambitions to lead in today’s world must do so with multinational support, and that means empowering the U.N. to be a partner in its initiatives.

Inexplicably, the President did not remind the members of the success of the multilateral process that supported the US-DPRK agreement of 1994, and which was leveraged through South-North Korean engagement beginning in 1998 to achieve the greatest regional stability ever. The involvement of the U.N. and other international institutions was critical to that success.

This message of the need for partnerships, at this time, must be seen as part of the push-back against the unilateralism, nationalism and expansionism which has characterized several governments in recent years. Those governments will always try to use the U.N. to avoid responsibility and to selectively apply global standards, so the Secretary-General must be both sophisticated and tough about their behavior. China, Russia and the U.S. are just three of the governments that have abused their U.N. memberships in these ways. By the end of the week Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was receiving generally good reviews for his gaining confidence.

President Moon’s speech was building power until it came to an abrupt transition. It was as if the text was the work of two different voices. At first a professional and experienced foreign policy voice; and then, logical and strategic confusion. The transition sentence was this: “At the same time, I am entrusted with a responsibility to safeguard the people’s rights to peace ― to an undisturbed daily life ― as a universal value.” It was one of those sentences that ― while technically correct ― tells the reader that he has just left the previous ideas behind, and is now in uncharted territory.

What came next was probably the most revealing look into the thinking of the president and his advisers that we outsiders have seen. It’s hard to know what to say about this. Rather than go into detail, I will list points that together will mean everything in determining whether this ROK administration slides into international and strategic irrelevance, or gets its bearings and begins to use Korea’s many tools to stabilize the Peninsula and the region.

In the second part of the speech, the strategic realities of the North Korea issue are reduced to simple choices by Pyongyang. They should choose peace rather than war or threats. They should decide to stand on the right side of history. They should choose the path of dialogue.

The clear direction of the candlelit rallies was to work for direct dialogue with North Korea, and to reject the strategic dead-end represented by the THAAD deployment. In this speech Moon instead substituted ideas and language that are beyond naïve; they are incoherent. They do nothing but mimic the shallow talking points of the Trump administration. The bitterness felt by Moon’s “candlelight supporters” has only begun to be felt.

Moon repeatedly claims the “international community” is united in one voice, when it is in fact deeply divided, particularly among countries in Korea’s neighborhood. He invests South Korea’s full support in the U.S. policy of extreme sanctions without negotiations, and ignores the fact that several key U.N. countries are demanding no-preconditions talks. The second part of Moon’s U.N. speech could have been spoken by Donald Trump, Park Guen-hye or Lee Myung-bak.

Overall, what did the President do in New York? Did he pledge to direct his foreign minister to work with the U.N. secretary-general to gather the most involved countries, under U.N. auspices, and hammer out an acceptable path to freezing nuclear and missile activity, reducing ROK and U.S. military activity, and putting trustworthy security and economic development guarantees for the DPRK into binding agreements? He did not. Rather, he met with President Trump and agreed to purchase military equipment worth billions that his country cannot afford and does not need.

Meanwhile, 38North.Org has published an article that finally states what has been clear for months: extreme sanctions on the DPRK in the current context amount to an economic war, and are not intended to bring the North “to the table.” Joseph DeThomas, career ambassador and nonproliferation expert, states: “President Trump’s new Executive Order on North Korea sanctions is a unilateral declaration of economic warfare designed to bring the North to its knees...” He concludes that “It is unlikely to be successful largely because the U.S. does not have the time, the patience or the diplomatic possibilities to make it work.”

The greatest worry is that Korea could now miss the most promising chance since the Korean War to match its government to the power and capabilities of its public. We have been advised for months to be patient with the new team, that they will eventually understand their responsibilities. With this speech, and with ROK government interactions with the U.S., China, Russia and others, it is becoming hard to remain hopeful.

Stephen Costello is a producer of AsiaEast, a web and broadcast-based policy roundtable focused on security, development and politics in Northeast Asia. He writes from Washington, D.C. He can be reached at scost55@gmail.com.