3
focused on the potential global nuclear threat emanating from the regime of Kim Jong-il.
The U.S. alliance with South Korea and the American bases there are obviously crucial as
Washington tries to cope with the perceived unpredictability of the North Korean leader.
But the Pentagon is simultaneously worrying about the budgetary and personnel costs of
static alliance commitments in both Europe and Asia that detract from its ability to wage
effective counterinsurgency wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Over the past several years it
has altered its strategic basing concept through the Global Defense Posture Review, to
emphasize maintaining launching points for quick and flexible troop movements
wherever they are needed (the so-called “lily-pad concept”), rather than continuing to
station large and cumbersome forces at permanent locations. U.S. President George
Bush’s statement in August 2004 about the pullback of U.S. troops from Europe and
Asia,
1
which generated so much controversy from both Republican Sen. John McCain
and the Democratic Party campaign of John Kerry, was really nothing new, for those who
had been following the issue. Nor was it something that originated in purely civilian,
political thinking about the bases. It was just one more step in the Pentagon’s overall
base realignment plan, and the fact of a major pull-back from South Korea had been in
the works for over a year.
Meanwhile the government of President Roh Moo-hyun in Seoul is continuing the
“Sunshine Policy” of former president Kim Dae-jung, reaching out cooperatively toward
the North Korean government of Kim Jong-il in Pyongyang. Many in the South Korean
public say they are worried that the United States will undercut these peace process
11
See Elisabeth Bumiller, “Bush Tells Veterans of Plan to Redeploy G.I.s Worldwide,” New York Times,
Aug. 17, 2004.
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