Now here’s something I can really sink my teeth into.

On the 1st of April, Bruce Klingner of the Heritage Foundation published a background piece called “New South Korean President Brings Conservative Policy Change.”  (The entire piece can be downloaded in PDF form here.)

After years of depressing developments and even setbacks in U.S.-South Korean relations, the election of moderately conservative South Korean President Lee Myung-Bak promises to inject a well-needed and refreshing measure of common sense—what Lee is calling “pragmatism”—into South Korean policy vis–à–vis the communist North Korean regime of the Dear Leader Kim Chong-il.  This, in turn, will do wonders for U.S. relations with the South, and will allow the two countries to present a more unified front in the daunting task of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula.

Here are some excerpts from the paper:

The February 25 inauguration of conservative Lee Myung-bak as South Korea’s president will do much to repair the damage wrought by five years of the progressive Roh Moo-hyun administration. Under Roh, Seoul’s relations with the U.S. and Japan deteriorated, its outreach to North Korea was counterproductive, and domestic and foreign investors were driven overseas by vacillating economic policies and South Korea’s declining competitiveness.

Lee is expected to improve strained relations with Washington, implement a more pragmatic policy toward North Korea, and establish a business-friendly environment. President Roh’s departure also sets the stage for greater integration with the U.S. on security policy and more effective multilateral efforts to denuclearize North Korea. The result should be a firm foundation for realizing the full potential of the bilateral relationship.

President-elect Lee will enjoy a honeymoon period of positive U.S. opinion, especially during an early summit meeting with President George W. Bush. However, to maintain U.S. support, Lee will have to avoid political landmines. He must describe his North Korean policy more fully, continue a vigorous outreach to the foreign business community, and deliver on his economic promises.

[…]

Lee’s election represents a rebuff not only of Roh, but also of the progressive movement. After 10 years of liberal policies, the electorate rejected the message, not just the messenger. If, as some claim, Lee’s victory was due to the public’s overwhelming desire for a corporate executive–style president to improve the economy, then progressive Moon Kook-hyun, the chief executive officer of Yuhan-Kimberly, would have received more than 5.8 percent.

Lee has played to his public image by portraying himself as a pragmatist rather than as a conservative, not only to distinguish himself from candidate Lee Hoi-chang, but also to distance himself from the unpopular authoritarian excesses of past conservative administrations. “Pragmatism” has become the moniker for the Lee administration, replacing the Roh administration’s “participatory government.” In his inauguration speech, Lee repeatedly used the term to differentiate his administration, emphasizing that “we must move from the age of ideology into the age of pragmatism.”

Yet despite his assertions, his “pragmatic” economic, education, and foreign policies are based on the conservative principles of the Grand National Party (GNP) and directly opposed to the progressive, redistributive policies of the Roh administration. The one area in which Lee differed with conservative candidate Lee Hoi-chang was on the degree of reciprocity to demand from North Korea in the engagement policy.

Polls show that the public has become more conservative since 2003, though retaining a preference for progressive views on some social issues. The result is that the political center in South Korea is now occupied by a pragmatic conservatism.

Ah, and there’s the key.  Elect a more conservative president, add a dash of “progressive fatigue” among the electorate, and you set the stage for the ability to toss some “sticks” into a North Korea policy that has for too long been characterized as being “all carrot”.  Says Klingner:

[P]rogress in the six-party talks at the time of the election and the inter-Korean summit did not resonate strongly with the public. A series of broken North Korean promises has inoculated the populace against inter-Korean euphoria. There has also been growing criticism over Roh’s unconditional engagement policy of providing massive benefits to Pyongyang without securing political reform and moderation in North Korean behavior.

[…]

Lee Myung-bak’s pragmatic demand for conditionality in Seoul’s engagement with North Korea will increase allied leverage in the six-party talks and reduce Pyongyang’s ability to play the U.S. and South Korea against each other. A realistic policy that requires reciprocity and transparency from North Korea will also be more consistent with the six-party talks’ goal of using coordinated multilateral diplomatic efforts to leverage Pyongyang’s implementation of its nuclear commitments.

Under President Roh, South Korea pursued a unilateral, uncoordinated policy that undermined the multilateral and conditional approach of the six-party talks. By providing billions of dollars in unconditional aid and promises of yet more largesse, Seoul minimized its influence over Pyongyang and marginalized its effectiveness in the talks. With a guaranteed pipeline of benefits from South Korea, North Korean leader Kim Jong-il had less need to comply with the “action for action” requirements of the talks.

Lee will maintain South Korea’s engagement policy but will condition economic, humanitarian, and political benefits on the pace of North Korean denuclearization. This is a significant departure from Roh’s approach of unconditional, asymmetric provision of benefits without demanding any reciprocal economic or diplomatic concessions from North Korea.

But will Lee follow through with his promises? Klingner asks.

Although Lee has promised more conditionality when engaging North Korea, his policy toward North Korea remains vague enough to be a Rorschach test that allows for diverse and even contradictory interpretations. After Lee’s election, U.S. analysts concluded that his demand for imposing conditionality when engaging North Korea represented everything from mere campaign rhetoric that masked a desire to maintain the status quo to a full embrace of a neoconservative hard-line strategy.

Right.  So how far will Lee be willing to go when demanding reciprocity from the Kim Chong-Il regime?  Interestingly, the new president is at this very moment facing his very first test.  Here’s an interesting piece from Agence France-Presse (via One Free Korea):

SEOUL, April 4, 2008 (AFP) - North Korea has asked China to provide massive food aid for its hungry people amid a flare-up in tensions with former major donor South Korea, a news report said Friday.

‘This means the North won’t look to the South for food aid, at least for a while,’ Seoul’s Hankyoreh newspaper quoted a diplomatic source as saying. ‘China has not yet responded to this request.’

A leading analyst also said the North’s leader was likely to turn to his traditional ally.

‘Following the April 18-19 US-South Korea summit, Kim Jong-Il is likely to visit China to strengthen their traditional alliance as ‘brotherly neighbours’ and request massive food aid,’ Professor Yang Moo-Jin of the University of North Korean Studies told AFP.

In recent years, the impoverished hardline communist state has received around 400,000 tons of rice and about 300,000 tons of fertilizer a year from the prosperous South.

But the North is furious about the decision by Seoul’s new conservative government to link economic assistance to progress in nuclear disarmament.

The North, which relies on international help to feed many of its people, accepted aid and investment worth billions of dollars from South Korea through a decade-long ‘sunshine’ engagement policy under liberal presidents.

Ah!  Has the dreaded “sunshine” policy run its liberal course at last?  It sure looks that way.  And the North Koreans are mightily perturbed by this distasteful turn of events.  The AFP article continues:

[North Korea’s] party newspaper Rodong Sinmun, in an article blasting President Lee Myung-Bak as a traitor and US sycophant, said this week it no longer needs Seoul’s help.

“The DPRK (North Korea) will be able to live as well as it wishes without any help from the South, as it did in the past,” it said.

[…]

On Thursday, the North announced it was suspending all dialogue with South Korea and closing the border to Seoul officials, its toughest action in a week of growing cross-border tensions.

The North said it acted after Seoul refused to apologise for remarks by its military chief, which Pyongyang interpreted as authorising a pre-emptive military strike.

Analysts say the North may be testing Lee’s resolve and trying to sway opinion against his conservative party in next week’s parliamentary election.

They say Pyongyang may also stage more missile tests, or naval maneuvers near the disputed Yellow Sea border — the scene of bloody clashes in 1999 and 2002.

Late Thursday, the North’s navy command said three South Korean warships had entered its waters in a “serious military provocation” — a charge denied by Seoul.

I wouldn’t worry much about the military bluster emanating from North Korea, either, since 2008 promises to be yet another year of famine for the Hermit Kingdom.

Yeah, Lee has the North Koreans perturbed, all right.  They’re so perturbed that they’re liable to shoot themselves in the foot.  Again.

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