Biden to ease tensions over defense cost-sharing talks

U.S. Democratic Presidential candidate Joe Biden speaks at the Chase Center in Wilmington, Delaware, Wednesday (local time). Political experts widely agree that a Joe Biden presidency would bring a relatively favorable situation to Korea in terms of ongoing negotiations between Seoul and Washington over this year's defense cost-sharing. Yonhap

By Jung Da-min

Political experts widely agree that the election of Joe Biden as the next U.S. president would bring a relatively favorable situation to Korea in terms of ongoing negotiations between Seoul and Washington over this year's defense cost-sharing for the stationing of the U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) here.

They said Biden's diplomatic policy, which would focus on restoring "traditional" relationships with allies ― emphasizing alliances with countries that share the values of liberalism over economic interests ― would bring an early agreement in the talks.

The U.S. and Korea have yet to reach an agreement over this year's cost sharing, the 11th Special Measures Agreement (SMA). Korea has proposed a 13-percent increase of the cost of keeping 28,500 troops of the USFK, but U.S. President Donald Trump has demanded a near 50-percent hike to $1.3 billion from the $870 million contributed last year.

People at Seoul Station watch a TV report about ballot counting in the U.S. presidential election, Wednesday. Yonhap

"A Biden administration would quickly try to conclude an SMA with Seoul; and very quickly ― perhaps in the high-single digits. Biden and his advisers see alliances not in terms of dollars and cents but how they knit important nations to Washington in an international system that has kept the peace broadly between the world's most powerful nations since the end of World War II," said Harry Kazianis, the senior director of Korean Studies at a Washington-based think tank Center for the National Interest.

"These alliances, according to Biden, are what make America a superpower and are Washington's greatest strength, something money can't ever buy, as many alliances like the U.S.-ROK alliance, were forged in blood."

Biden and his Democratic Party have criticized Trump's policy for undermining alliances in terms of mutual defense.

In the section of "Reinventing Alliances" in the party platform, they criticized Trump's decision in late July to withdraw nearly 12,000 U.S. troops from Germany, saying it was a "punitive" action toward Berlin after it refused the Trump demand to increase its share of NATO costs to 2 percent of the country's GDP. The Democrats also criticized Trump's demand for Korea to pay a dramatic increase in this year's SMA.

"Biden is likely to complete negotiations with Seoul over the defense cost-sharing with a slight increase in Seoul's burden, likely to a level that the Korean government has presented," said Kim Jun-seok, a politics professor at Dongguk University.

Kim said, however, that Korea's diplomatic choices could be limited under Biden's diplomatic policy which would entail restoring the trilateral alliance among Japan, Korea and the U.S.

The trilateral alliance has been weakened over recent years, especially due to ongoing rows between Seoul and Tokyo over historical and economic issues stemming from the Korean Supreme Court's October 2018 ruling that ordered Japanese companies to compensate surviving Korean victims of forced wartime labor.

National Assembly Foreign Affairs and Unification Committee Chairman Rep. Song Young-gil, right, talks with Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha ahead of a plenary session of the committee at the Assembly, Thursday. Korea Times photo by Oh Dae-geun

But overall, Biden's election as the next U.S. president will improve bilateral relations, according to Ramon Pacheco Pardo, KF-VUB Korea chairman at the Institute for European Studies of Vrije Universiteit Brussels and associate professor of International Relations at King's College London.

"I expect the Republic of Korea-U.S. relations to dramatically improve … He has repeatedly said that he wants to 'work with allies,'" Pacheco Pardo said, citing Biden's recent op-ed with a Korean news agency in which he emphasized the importance of the alliance.

"Furthermore, the people advising him on Korean and East Asian affairs are all supportive of the ROK-U.S. alliance. Thus, I would expect Biden to move quickly to conclude a new defense cost-sharing deal which is more rational for South Korea," he said.

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