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Wed, September 26, 2018 | 17:55

Opinion > Columnists > Lee Seong-hyon >

Moon Jae-in's foreign policy challenge

The G20 meeting in Germany served as a good platform for President Moon to display his flair for public diplomacy. But when it came to the actual outcome, a local newspaper gave a rather harsh pronouncement: “fruitless.” The categorical summary is not Moon’s fault, but rather it reflects the barren international environment with reduced room for diplomacy.

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-07-11 17:05

Moon's bigger challenge in Washington

For President Moon Jae-in, crafting a successful photo-op moment with President Donald Trump is not the biggest challenge he will face during their first summit later this week. His bigger and more important challenge is to beat the widespread (and quite persistent) perception that he is another Roh Moo-hyun. It was psychiatrist Karl Menninger who observed decades ago that attitudes and perception are more important than facts and reality. President Moon has some work to do on Washington’s perception of him. Most of all, the Washington policy community remains quite suspicious that the Moon ...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-06-27 17:37

Moon's public diplomacy

Scenic Jeju island is one of South Korea’s best places for public diplomacy. It has natural beauty and a story to tell. If President Moon Jae-in has to visit Jeju Island for public diplomacy, the best timing could be one for the annual Jeju Forum and the other for the Jeju 4.3 Uprising memorial service. Public diplomacy is seen as a manifestation of soft power - the ability to shape a perception through attraction. Joseph Nye states that soft power is associated with intangible assets such as an attractive personality, culture, political values and institutions. In other words, a country's s...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-06-13 17:29

Envoy, THAAD and Korea-China ties

The seating arrangement “mishap” during the meeting between Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping and South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s special envoy, Lee Hae-chan, was seen as seemingly innocuous, but in fact, was a carefully planned diplomatic discourtesy. It was meant to send a signal to the newly minted Moon government that it should not entertain the idea that the change of government does not automatically mean that Seoul can now recover its relations with China, without having to halt the deployment of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) battery here. As a presidentia...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-05-30 18:12

Washington Post on Moon

“On first day in office, South Korean president talks about going to North,” read the headline of a Washington Post report. It was a prominent report about Moon Jae-in’s first speech at the National Assembly after he was just sworn in as the new president. In the craft of journalism, it is the headline that carries monumental importance. It is the “summary” of the news in one sentence. It sets the tenor of the news. It “frames” the entire article that follows. Moreover, busy readers often only skim this and move on, forming a quick idea of the matter at stake. In a nutshell, a title in journ...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-05-16 17:52

Best way for Trump to persuade China to up the pressure on North Korea

Trump’s expression of willingness to meet with Kim Jong-un, essentially, should be seen as his signal to China, rather than to Kim. Trump’s North Korean policy, despite his harsh criticism of Obama’s handling of Pyongyang, is the same as Obama’s: to outsource the North Korean problem to China to solve. It won’t work. The U.S. and China don’t share enough strategic trust in East Asia, as evidenced by their discord on THAAD. Trump’s best strategy on North Korea is to make China less relevant in the game and enact his diplomatic rhetoric into action; meet Kim over hamburger.

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-05-02 17:34

China may regard North Korea as a tacit 'core-interest'

Resting on observations on China’s diplomatic behavior with North Korea, a theory can be entertained to state that China may regard North Korea as an unspoken “core interest.” If this theory holds ground, then it would indicate that Donald Trump’s ongoing artful deal-making outreach to Xi Jinping, so as to invite Xi to serve as a “hitman” on Pyongyang, is bound not to materialize. The extended larger implications may be profoundly disturbing for the future of a Sino-U.S. strategic relationship. According to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), "core interest" is the highest level of national i...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-04-18 16:47

Trump's 'without-China' approach on North Korea

Donald Trump’s warning that he would deal with North Korea “with or without China’s help” may in fact have a chance to succeed as a viable new alternative. It reflects a judgement on China’s role on the matter and hints at shifting to a “plan B.” It is disempowering China from its “larger-than-role” stake on the international policy narrative on North Korea. Solving the North Korean conundrum with the U.S. initiative would mean sustaining U.S. leadership and enlarging U.S. interests in the region where the two major powers are increasingly more competing against each other. Trump did not spe...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-04-04 17:29

Why Moon is likely 'bad moon' for China

It appears THAAD is set to continue to be deployed in South Korea, despite China’s vociferous protests, economic retaliation, and state-mobilized “voluntary” boycotts of Korean products. Against the Chinese pressure and overbearing attitude that reminds Koreans of the old Chinese empire that had treated Korea as a vassal state, the anti-China sentiment in South Korea is rising, Seoul and Washington are expediting the THAAD deployment, and the Korea-U.S. alliance is strengthening. This all goes against Chinese strategic calculations. In addition, the likely next South Korean president is like...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-03-21 17:47

China's THAAD strategy

South Korea should buckle up for a long, arduous ride against China’s tidy incremental economic pressure to backpedal on THAAD. China will continue to ratchet up its “economic card” as the primary means to inject pain into South Korea’s economic bloodstream because it proved very effective in making other countries surrender. China won’t stop, much less pause, because it also believes that there is a real chance for South Korea’s next administration, likely under a progressive president, to reverse the decision. South Korea’s strategists should map out a plan in which its economy can sustain...

Lee Seong-hyon | 2017-03-07 17:15

US starts THAAD deployment in S. Korea

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Inter-Korean Summit in Pyongyang