최근 한반도정세 및 한미군사동맹관계 변화 = The Recent Korean Peninsula and the US-Korean Military Alliance

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Almost a year has passed since a new crisis developed as North Korea admitted to a new nuclear weapons development program. Although the tension between North Korea and the US has subsided as they have accepted the six-party talks, the fundamental problem of the North Korea nuclear weapons has not been resolved. Despite the strong evidence that all the parties are realigning their policies towards the future talks as they have agreed to hold the second round of talks, it is necessary to examine the impact of the changes in Washington`s strategic posture and military strategy towards the Korean peninsula. In particular, its policy implications for the future South Korean-US alliance is crucial in order to formulate South Korea`s responses towards the crisis. Therefore, this study has analyzed the influence of the new US security policy towards the Korean peninsula along with its implications among the major powers in the face of the current challenges. However, it is the finding of this study that Washington`s current intention is ambiguous since there is no clear indication whether Washington prefers a complete resolution or partial settlement of the crisis. Also the US is not likely to succumb to North Korea`s strategy of brinkmanship and blackmail, and might decide to reinforce its own views and time-table regarding the issue if they chose to do so. Furthermore, it seems clear that regardless of whatever, resolution the future talks yield, South Korea and Japan are likely to bear burdens of paying for North Korea`s change, although in varying degrees depending on the agreement. In any event, it is important for South Korea to maintain the principle of peaceful settlement through diplomatic negotiation, and encourage North Korea-US talks, possibly with supports from various international organizations and exchanges of special envoys. If this is one significant step towards the peaceful settlement, it is plausible that an additional reinforcing measure, what we call dual-guarantee mechanism, could be created, if South Korea and the US could find ways through which they could fortify trust in the time of changes. South Korea should take an initiative to lay down a groundwork upon which the principle, direction and boundary of the future South Korean-US and the South-North relationships are to be based in order to establish peace and prosperity in the East-asian region. And South Korea should formulate preventive measures and crisis management mechanism to react to the North Korea nuclear crisis to guard against unforeseen future contingency.