Even though the North Korean government continues to threaten South Korea over its joint military exercises with the United States, powerful leftists in Seoul are making comments that are out of step with the current situation.
Hong Hyun-ik, who was recently appointed chancellor of the Korea National Diplomatic Academy, which trains South Korean diplomats and other public servants on international affairs, equated North Korean missile provocations with the defensive joint drills.
Hong, the head of security and strategy studies at the Sejong Institute, said during a TV appearance on Tuesday that “there is a chance that North Korea would conduct short-range missile launch exercises and it is illogical to think that North Korea should not do exercises while we are doing them.” He added that “North Korea is considering the contents of our joint military exercises with the United States, such as the decapitation exercises, and we reduced the scale of the exercises, but we still have scenarios like conducting counterattacks on the North.”
“Isn’t the word decapitation frightening already?” he asked. He added that the North Korean dictator’s sister Kim Yo-jong was angry about this issue.
Hong said that the North Korean situation is very bad right now due to COVID-19 and floods in the country’s northern region. He said that Kim Jong-un is very cautious since there is a chance that the people’s anger could turn into a riot. “So, I think that North Korea has no other option but to provoke, but since they know that the United States and South Korea would not remain silent to their grave provocation, there is a chance that they will just do it at the short-range missile launch level.”
Hong also argued that the decision made by South Korea and the United States in late 1992 to resume suspended joint military exercises led to North Korea withdrawing from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1993. He apparently blamed South Korea and the United States for the first North Korean nuclear crisis in early 1990s.
He said last week that the South Korean economy is 53 times bigger than North Korea’s and “we do not have to do the joint military exercises with the United States.” He also argued that the South Korean government should inform North Korea about the details of the joint military exercises, which are a state secret of the second-highest degree.
Hong explained Tuesday that the media is distorting his comments. “The media was portraying me as anti-America and pro-North Korea, but what I was saying was that we do not always have to do these exercises.”
“What I meant by informing North Korea of the joint military exercises is not that we should let them know of the details, but that we should inform them about what they are most interested in knowing, such as whether we are doing decapitation exercises or something like that at this time,” he said. “It is a distortion of my comments if they describe me as saying we should inform North Korea of details such as what date we are deploying certain troops to a certain location.”
His term as the head of the Korea National Diplomatic Academy begins on August 12.
Kim Yo-jong released a statement on Tuesday that lambasted Seoul and Washington for their joint military exercises and demanded the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the Korean peninsula. She called the exercises “an unwelcoming act of self-destruction” and that “a dear price should be paid as they threaten the safety of our people and further imperil the situation on the Korean peninsula.”
“The dangerous war exercises pushed ahead by the U.S. and the South Korean side disregardful of our repeated warnings will surely make them face more serious security threat. Whatever the scale and mode, the joint military exercises are of aggressive nature as they are a war rehearsal and preliminary nuclear war exercise for further rounding off the preparations for putting into practice the operational plan with the preemptive strike at us as the gist.”
She added that “for peace to settle on the peninsula, it is imperative for the U.S. to withdraw its aggression troops and war hardware deployed in South Korea.”
“As long as the U.S. forces stay in South Korea, the root cause for the periodic aggravation of the situation on the Korean peninsula will never vanish.” She also said that North Korea would work on a “powerful preemptive strike for rapidly countering any military actions against us.”
South Korea’s Cho Tae-yong, former First Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs and a current lawmaker from the main opposition People Power Party (PPP), released a statement that said Kim Yo-jong’s comment “clearly shows that the final goal of North Korea in calling for the suspension of the joint military exercises is the withdrawal of U.S. forces.”
“Under these circumstances, the Moon Jae-in administration and the ruling Democratic Party are trying to appease North Korea by talking about ratification of the Panmunjom Declaration at the National Assembly and officially ending the Korean War,” he said. “It is insane.”
Thae Yong-ho, a former senior North Korean diplomat who became a South Korean lawmaker for the PPP, interpreted Kim Yo-jong’s comment as “trying to legitimize preemptive nuclear strike.” Thae also pointed out the fact that Kim’s statement ended with the line, “I release this press statement upon authorization,” which can mean that it was approved by Kim Jong-un. “Kim Jong-un gave the authorization to Kim Yo-jong and implied that his sister can push the nuclear button, and the United States’ calculation became complicated as there is a possibility that Kim Yo-jong can use nuclear weapons even after Kim Jong-un is eliminated in an emergency.”
Thae also added that the recent withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq and Afghanistan “may have given encouragement to the Kim siblings.”
The two Koreas revived their communication hotlines on July 27. They had been disconnected after North demolished the Kaesong liaison office in June 2020. On the day Kim Yo-jong announced her threatening remarks, the North Korean side did not respond to a regular hotline call from South Korea.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said in a briefing on Monday that, “Nothing’s changed about our need for readiness on the Korean Peninsula and our desire to work in lockstep with our ROK [Republic of Korea] allies on a training regimen that improves that readiness and keeps that readiness strong.”
