Leadership as petulance

Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu once said, “A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: We did it ourselves.”

Unfortunately, many contemporary leaders don’t seem to credit Lao Tzu so much. We live in an age when people of nations are enthralled with the leaders who have the answers, in digestible sound bites and demonstrate confident action for public interest, as they define it. Unwieldy and divided legislative bodies are too often less manageable, orderly and unproductive. Or they follow the agenda of an executive or would-be leader.

U.S. President Donald Trump has decided to scale down America’s annual military exercises with South Korea. Ostensibly, he is using the language of diplomacy, not wanting to make things sound or look aggressive to the Kim government in Pyongyang and to reduce military expenditures by the United States.

Just behind these calm and reasoned statements are others less diplomatic. South Korea did not choose to support Trump's actions against Iran in the Middle East. Trump dislikes the level of spending that South Korea relies on from the United States. Trump likes North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, these days again at least, and hopes that further diplomatic entreaties might be forthcoming. Trump wishes to apply a “carrot” or punishment to the Lee Jae Myung government.

The ruling party and government have reacted with renewed calls for greater South Korean independence in military matters. This, along with Trump’s rhetoric and actions, has frightened more sober quarters and commentators who see the South Korean-U.S. alliance, which extends to other nations in East Asia as well, as pivotal to national security and international peace this century. Annual drills provide better coordination between Korean and American military forces and joint operations. It’s necessary in the ongoing stasis of inter-Korean relations and the age of Sino-American competition.

Trump’s petulance plays right into the calculations and machinations of Kim, of Russian President Vladimir Putin and of Chinese President Xi Jinping. They are only too happy to see U.S. president alienating one of America’s strongest and staunchest allies and putting America’s allies in the Alliance for Democracy on their heels. Just as Putin and Xi continue to pursue tactics and measures of coordination with North Korea and Iran, Trump tries to exhibit power against the South to obtain more concessions.

South Korea has already made several concessions to Trump’s peculiar type of alliance and diplomacy earlier in his second term. His demand for an America First trade relationship was accepted to the tune of $350 billion. Perhaps his pattern of doubling down for more with those who acquiesce is in effect.

The gradual tenor of much of the security relations between Seoul and Washington will and likely should graduate to greater South Korean independence. It’s unlikely that the South is as fooled by Northern ambitions and machinations as is Trump. Kim is pursuing the long-term militarization of his country for purposes of regime survival. Nothing much more than that. His country remains an economic and cultural backwater. Trump has no plan to do anything much to assist Kim there, not that the latter would accept. But Kim has a penchant for renegadism, which must be understood and proactively faced.

To observe the triangulation and quadrangulation of the Axis of Autocracy members is disconcerting. Russia and North Korea continue building their military cooperation, along with Iran. China does so as well in alignment with its plans for global alternatives to Western democracy and freedom. There are fissures in the plans of this Axis, but now Trump is making their dreams come true, left, right, and center.

And for what? Trump will at best continue to commit the United States to an expensive and only partially effective set of controls to prop up some flow of oil and other goods through the Strait of Hormuz. Meanwhile, the entire affair has enabled the Iranian government to generate greater support for itself at the expense of regional peace and stability. Demanding that allies support American-defined efforts with Iran and elsewhere is Trump’s favorite brand of leadership, but its impact is dwindling, while inflation continues apace and American power, both in terms of credibility and capability, declines. He increasingly finds allies less willing to contribute in the manner he needs to and to the degree he needs.

The tragedy of present American, Iranian, North Korean and Russian leaderships is that apart from their deafening noises and actions, they all are most likely declining as global powers.

While China cooperates, bilaterally and otherwise, with many comers, her ascent isn’t dependent as much on any ally. America cannot hazard thinking this way with respect to South Korea. What once was seen as a developing nation and “little buddy” to the United States is no more. South Korea is a necessary, if not sufficient, partner for the United States in the present context, and our leaders would do well to let contrary notions and actions retreat into the silence and cessation they deserve.

Bernard Rowan (browan10@yahoo.com) is professor of political science at Chicago State University. He is a former fellow of The Korea Foundation and was a visiting professor at the Hanyang University Graduate School of Public Administration.