Will S. Korea and Japan sign the bilateral military agreement?

In the face of North Korea’s provocations, South Korea, the U.S. and Japan must cooperate. The joint forces between South Korea and the U.S. have prepared some operational plans for a possible emergency scenario with one condition that backward units, mostly from U.S. forces in Japan, should support a fight against North Korea. In reality, the coalition between South Korea and the U.S. forces will not be strong enough to stand against North Korea during wartime in the absence of Japan’s assistance. Unfortunately, Japan has become a pain-in-the-ass country in an effort to solidify the coalition among three countries. For example, Japan’s intolerant claims about its misbehaviors in the past and unsettled history issues continue to put a drag on creation of the “organic cooperative system” among South Korea, the U.S. and Japan. It seems that widespread anti-Japanese sentiment in South Korea does not allow any forms of military cooperation with Japan. On top of that, some South Koreans are taking a suspicious view that this move will lead to South Korea being subordinated to the relation between the U.S. and Japan.

The General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) would be a case in point. South Korea and Japan are not making any progress on signing the bilateral military agreement, while the U.S. is demanding finalization of it as soon as possible. GSOMIA will allow two countries to share military information under the legal protection. GSOMIA, prepared in 2012, includes 22 provisions pertaining to classification, storage, transfer and destruction of military information without any description about the content of information. In other words, the agreement provides that each country can choose the type of information it wants to share.

South Korea even signed a military information protection agreement with Russia, which was an enemy country of South Korea in the past, in order to engage in an arms trade in 2002. GSOMIA between South Korea and Japan was close to being approved at the close-door cabinet meeting during the Lee Myung-bak administration in 2012. The consequence of the government’s attempt to sign the agreement behind the doors was diabolical. Due to the increased controversies, the deal was nullified just one hour before finally signing the paper and a presidential-secretary resigned. South Korea’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Yun Byung-se called for the need to enhance military relationship between Seoul and Tokyo during his talks with Japan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Fumio Kishida at the U.N. General Assembly last month. However, no one is showing up to support GSOMIA.

Another obstacle hindering military cooperation between two countries is the heightened awareness to “Japanese rearmament” after Shinzo Abe became Japan's prime minister. Abe’s re-interpretation of its Constitution including the Article 9 Peace Clause about renouncing war, abandoning the right of belligerency and not exercising military forces in order for the nation to be engaged in acts of self-defense is leading to greater suspicion that Japan is evoking the time of wartime militarism.

조숭호기자 shcho@donga.com