HONOLULU -- South Koreans are openly nervous about what the election of George W. Bush portends for the Korean peace process. Many also seem privately hopeful that the incoming president might, as one security analyst put it, "save us from ourselves."
The anxiety is based on the assumption -- in my view, grossly exaggerated -- that a Republican administration will take a more hardline, combative approach toward North Korea that could somehow undermine the South's policy of engagement with the North. No one in South Korea wants to see this happen. But there are many who are nonetheless concerned about the current fast pace of rapprochement and what they perceive to be its one-sided nature. They are, therefore, hopeful that a firmer U.S. approach might have a sobering effect on Seoul while also encouraging, if not compelling, Pyongyang to be more forthcoming in its dealing with the South.
It is important for Bush to send an early signal to both Koreas that his administration is committed to the process of engagement and fully supportive of South Korean President Kim Dae Jung's "sunshine policy." This includes signaling continued support for the U.S.-North Korean Agreed Framework, under which Pyongyang froze its earlier nuclear-research activities in return for heavy fuel-oil deliveries and the eventual construction of two less proliferation-prone light-water nuclear-energy reactors. Construction is under way, and while Seoul (and Tokyo) are scheduled to pay the lion's share, U.S. financial obligations remain considerable.