South Korea Moves Left Will the new President return to a policy of appeasing North Korea?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/south-korea-moves-left-1494355883
South Korean voters turned out in record numbers Tuesday, and early returns showed leftist Moon Jae-in leading with a comfortable plurality to become the next President. The left turn is understandable after the impeachment of Park Geun-hye for corruption, but it will complicate U.S. efforts to eliminate North Korea’s nuclear-missile threat.
Mr. Moon was leading as we went to press with about 40% of the popular vote, as he took advantage of a divided center-right majority. Ms. Park’s downfall split the conservative Saenuri Party, and her former supporters were divided between two candidates who each received more than 20% support.
Ms. Park was wise regarding North Korea but her domestic failures opened the door to Mr. Moon, a human-rights lawyer. Prosecutors have indicted her on 18 counts of bribery and abuse of power, and the revelations have sparked a backlash against the country’s largest companies, the chaebol. Mr. Moon has promised long-overdue reforms to create a level playing field for smaller companies.
But instead of cutting the government’s role in the economy, the true source of corruption, Mr. Moon has pledged fresh intervention. He wants to raise taxes on the wealthy and large companies, increase the minimum wage, and force companies to give temporary workers permanent status and reduce working hours. The French Socialists would approve.
Mr. Moon’s desire to appease North Korea marks a return to the Sunshine Policy that failed in the mid-2000s when he was an aide to center-left President Roh Moo-hyun. Mr. Moon wants to pursue reunification based on economic integration, offering a formal peace process if the North will give up its nuclear weapons. He also wants to reopen the Kaesong Industrial Zone, which provided the North with $100 million a year in hard currency until its closure in 2016.
This ignores Pyongyang’s long record of broken promises and its clear intention to reunify the Korean Peninsula on its terms using nuclear weapons as leverage. In recent weeks the North has detained two more U.S. citizens, a reminder that the regime treats engagement as an opportunity to take hostages.
All of this will complicate the Trump Administration’s attempt to increase pressure on Pyongyang as the North develops nuclear missiles capable of hitting Seattle. North Korea will try to drive a wedge between the U.S. and South Korea to re-establish its cash lifeline, and China may pressure Mr. Moon to reverse the South’s recent deployment of the Thaad missile-defense system. But the only chance of ending the nuclear threat is a united front toward the North and its Beijing patrons.
President Trump inadvertently assisted Mr. Moon’s election with his ill-timed demand that South Korea pay for Thaad, though his aides walked that back. Mr. Trump has to work with Mr. Moon but he’ll have to be clear that the North now threatens the U.S. mainland as well as South Korea. Mr. Trump can send a signal of seriousness by applying U.S. sanctions more stringently on entities that do business with the North. That would put South Korean companies on notice that a return to Kaesong could bar them from U.S. business.
Mr. Moon says the U.S.-Korea alliance will remain the cornerstone of his country’s security. That’s good to hear, but Mr. Trump will have to be clear that a return to appeasement is unacceptable.
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