In a worst case scenario, the Camp David trilateral summit may ultimately be significant not as the beginning of a new era, but rather as a point marking the end of an old era
South Korea needs to build domestic constituency that supports the India-Korea bilateral relationship in the longer-term. It needs to go beyond the rhetoric.
The National Security Strategy released by the Yoon Administration is not about national strategy but about an ongoing domestic political competition.
When President Yoon visits Washington, nobody will ask what kind of middle power it is, but when they ask why South Korea is not doing more to assist Ukraine – they’ll basically be asking the same thing.
Seoul’s Indo-Pacific Strategy has been broadly welcomed by a number of states, but making it future proof won’t be an easy task.
The middle power term will still be used because it’s an easy label to throw about for politicians and journalists but academics should be held to a higher standard.
In the end, stopping South Korea from heading down the nuclear path requires less academic waffling, and more diplomacy.
Twenty years ago, the United States had an opportunity to prevent North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, and in twenty years’ time, nobody should look back and say the United States once had an opportunity to prevent South Korea’s nuclear weapons program.
There’s an oft-repeated anecdote that circulates amongst the more cynically minded foreign policy analysts in Seoul – if you understand how to sell washing machines, you understand South Korea’s foreign policy.
On both sides of politics in South Korea, Australia’s currently seen as little more than a mine, farm, beach, or a place to learn English – its relevance increasing only momentarily because of tighter resource markets and Australia’s increasing appetite for military hardware.
