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President Yoon Suk-yeol of South Korea speaks at a joint press conference following a trilateral summit with the leaders of the US and Japan at Camp David in Washington, DC, on Aug. 18. (Yonhap)

Concerns are being voiced about the potential for South Korea to end up saddled with a subordinate role in the US foreign affairs and national security strategy aimed at containing China and checking its influence, after the leaders of South Korea, the US, and Japan announced their intent to exercise influence and establish leadership in the Asia-Pacific region during their trilateral summit at Camp David on Friday.

Analysts warned of the growing risk that South Korea may end up roped into distant disputes, such as issues surrounding the Taiwan Strait and territorial conflicts in the South China Sea.

Speaking Friday about the results of the summit, National Security Office First Deputy Director Kim Tae-hyo explained that the three sides had “agreed to exchange information and discuss response plans in the event of a concrete provocation [in the Indo-Pacific region] that is deemed to be directly connected with our interests, whether that means a common regional threat or some form of challenge.”

“This document is a political pledge to strengthen regional discussions,” he added.

While the provisions in question do not represent a duty per se, they can be interpreted as amounting to a “trigger clause” for a joint response to threats.

An official with Korea’s presidential office explained that this extended to “unilateral attempts to alter the status quo, all forms of provocation involving the use of weapons, and acts of economic coercion.” This clearly targets China, which is involved in territorial disputes in the South China Sea.

During the summit, the three leaders announced plans to launch a “trilateral Indo-Pacific dialogue” and “trilateral development policy dialogue” to coordinate development and support policies for the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and countries in the Pacific region. This means extending trilateral cooperation not only to responses to threats posed by North Korea, China, and Russia but also to establishing leadership in the Indo-Pacific region.

Kim Tae-hyo expressed the “hope that trilateral cooperation by South Korea, the US, and Japan will evolve into the most comprehensive and multi-layered cooperative framework in the region.”

He also anticipated that trilateral cooperation would “function alongside AUKUS and the Quad as a powerful cooperative framework to promote peace and prosperity in and outside the region.”

Re-launched in 2017, the Quad is a framework for security cooperation involving the US, Japan, Australia and India. AUKUS, which was launched in 2021, is a defense and foreign policy exchange and cooperation framework consisting of the US, the UK and Australia.

Both frameworks have the aim of checking or containing China and establishing leadership in the Asia-Pacific region.

The South Korean presidential office stressed that expanding the scope of trilateral cooperation would be beneficial to the national interest.

“There are enormous benefits that come from operating and participating in a framework of trilateral cooperation,” a senior official with the presidential office said, adding that it was “created because we are confident it will have a ‘win-win’ effect.”

But many analysts are concerned about the prospects of Seoul’s relations with Beijing and Moscow worsening and South Korea ending up drawn into unwanted conflicts in the South China Sea and Asia-Pacific region.

“Geopolitically, South Korea is close to China, Russia, and North Korea, which share the same diplomatic agenda in terms of peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula,” said Wi Sung-lac, South Korea’s former ambassador to Russia.

“The deepening of our relationship with the US and Japan to a new level will only increase distrust with China and Russia,” he predicted.

Kim Jung-sup, the vice president of the Sejong Institute and a former director of the Ministry of National Defense’s planning and management office, explained that “because South Korea has to contend with the North Korea variable unlike Japan, it has a different structure to its national interests vis-à-vis China than Japan.”

Kim predicted, “Our relationship with China is going to cement itself as a relationship of tensions and conflict.”

Some also expressed worries about South Korea facing a limited scope of diplomatic activity.

Kim Jong-dae, a guest professor at the Yonsei Institute for North Korean Studies, said, “There clearly are benefits to be gained from trilateral cooperation, but I’m not sure whether we’ve prepared or done the calculations in terms of how high the cost is going to be.”

“It’s unclear how much of a position of leadership we can establish in trilateral cooperation when South Korea’s position is so weak, in that we have no wartime operational control and are not a signatory to the Armistice Agreement [in the Korean War],” he added.

“This could weaken our base for multilateral diplomacy with neighboring countries,” he predicted.

Under the circumstances, some advised that Seoul needs to establish a diplomatic space of its own.

Lee Sang-man, a professor at the Kyungnam University Institute for Far Eastern Studies, said, “If the US and China start communicating and South Korea goes along with whatever the US’ position is, we might find ourselves in a situation where things change and whatever benefits we were getting dry up.”

By Jang Ye-ji, staff reporter

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