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| Vice Defense Minister Shin Beom-chul speaks during a briefing at the Ministry of National Defense in Seoul, July 21. Yonhap |
Experts expect bilateral defense talks to end in partial success
By Kang Seung-woo
South Korea and Japan are expected to agree to smoother operation of their intelligence-sharing pact in Wednesday's vice defense minister talks in Seoul amid the new South Korean government's efforts to better relations with its neighbor, according to experts, Tuesday.
However, a 2018 radar lock-on dispute, a bigger roadblock to bilateral military cooperation, will remain a tough nut to crack, they added.
Seoul's Vice Defense Minister Shin Beom-chul and Tokyo's Vice Defense Minister for International Affairs Masami Oka are scheduled to hold an in-person meeting on the sidelines of the annual Seoul Defense Dialogue that kicked off on Tuesday.
The meeting will be the first in six years, raising speculation over whether or not the regional neighbors will be able to resolve pending bilateral military issues.
The talks also come as the Yoon Suk-yeol administration is eager to improve bilateral ties, which have been soured for years due to territorial and historical disputes.
"While a meeting of vice defense ministers may not resolve longstanding irritants in Korea-Japan relations, it is a good indicator of normalizing defense cooperation," said Leif-Eric Easley, an associate professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University.
"The Seoul Defense Dialogue is an important mechanism for security policy coordination and Japan's participation could lead to normalizing bilateral military exchanges and intelligence sharing."
Shin Jong-woo, a senior researcher at the Korea Defense and Security Forum, said there was a growing need between the two countries to get the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) back on track.
The GSOMIA is a bilateral security agreement between South Korea and Japan to share sensitive military and intelligence information. The former Moon Jae-in administration nearly let the pact expire in 2019 in response to Tokyo's tightened controls on exports to Seoul.
However, South Korea conditionally suspended the decision to terminate the agreement, following a resolution passed in the U.S. Senate calling on Seoul to renew it, leaving the pact in a somewhat unstable state, as the South Korean government had said that it could scrap the GSOMIA at any time.
"The Moon administration threatened to terminate GSOMIA but it has survived, although the precarious state has prevented the two sides from sharing sensitive military information fully," Shin said.
"However, amid escalating North Korean nuclear and missile threats, South Korea and Japan are highly anticipated to agree on the importance of the stable operation of GSOMIA."
The Yoon administration has already hinted at normalizing the intelligence-sharing pact. Foreign Minister Park Jin expressed hopes in June to normalize it as soon as possible following his meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington, D.C. The Japanese government responded positively to the South Korean stance. Plus, Washington wants the pact to remain stable in order to utilize it against China as well as North Korea.
Along with the GSOMIA, the radar feud is another sticking point in the bilateral ties.
The incident took place in December 2018 when Japan's maritime patrol aircraft conducted a menacing low-altitude flyby over a South Korean warship and Tokyo accused the vessel of locking its fire-control radar on the plane, generally considered as an act one step away from actually opening fire. The Republic of Korea Navy denied the accusation, saying that the vessel was on a humanitarian mission to rescue North Korean fishermen in distress.
In addition, the Japanese side has claimed that the Moon administration drew up guidelines allowing its naval ships to use their fire-control radar against close-flying Japanese surveillance aircraft, which was also dismissed by the South Korean military.
Recently, the South Korean vice defense minister expressed the government's intent to resolve the issue in his interivew with Japan's Mainichi Shimbun.
Nevertheless, analysts do not buy into his remarks, questioning his intentions.
"While the two countries are engaged in a blame game, it is questionable why he brought up the issue abruptly and was confident about it," said Kim Yeoul-soo, chief of the Security Strategy Office at the Korea Institute for Military Affairs.
"When it comes to the radar feud, I guess that they may lay the issue to rest by agreeing to prevent such an incident from reoccurring. It is not feasible to establish the full facts."
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