מומחים מזהירים: הנשיא החדש של דרום קוריאה עלול לערער את היחסים עם ארה"ב ולהתקרב למשטר הסיני

South Korea's new president, Lee Jai-myung, was sworn in today after an election that the White House called free and fair, while also expressing concerns about Chinese interference. Joining us now from Seoul are two U.S.-China relations analysts, Colonel John Mills. He's a senior fellow at the Center for Security Policy and former U.S. ambassador at large for global criminal justice, Morris Tan. He's also the dean of Liberty University School of Law. Thank you both so much for joining us. Good to see you both. Ambassador, starting with you, now that Lee has won the South Korean elections, given his backing by the Chinese Communist Party, what does his victory mean for relations between the U.S. and China? Well, I think the U.S. recognizes the great power struggle that is happening that the CCP has been very public about and is going on all around the world. And so I think given the gray zone activities that are going on around the world, but including in South Korea, I think that is something that there should be an awareness of. We have reports already that there is searches and seizures, I would deem them illegal searches and seizures, already going on in South Korea. And there's a real danger of political and religious persecution that looks like the Lee administration is not wasting any time to jump into. Very concerning. Well, Colonel, speaking of that, President Trump is expected to have a call with Xi Jinping at some point soon. Do you see Lee's victory impacting the substance of that call? Well, absolutely. And the short two-part message put out by the U.S. government, I think was very effective at acknowledging that Lee is the president of South Korea. However, and it was quite noted in South Korean media, and again, in press releases, these are very important nuances and signals. In the same press, that same breath, it also voiced concern over Chinese Communist Party influence. So that actually was a huge message that was actually very noted by South Korean media. So yes, this is a full-blown great power competition, as the ambassador said. This is the world on fire. And so it remains to be seen during this call, is South Korea brought up? What is the future of the historic ROK-U.S. alliance? And most importantly, we need to get an ambassador over here. We need an ambassador in place. There is only an acting ambassador. There's no substitute for a real ambassador who can assert America's first values. And digging into that ambassador, what about U.S.-South Korea relations? What changes can we expect there? Well, there is concern because there were past statements about the U.S. being an occupying force. There is concern that there will be an attempt to remove U.S. forces that have been the largest deterrent against North Korean aggression, for example. And so there are real concerns here. There were more moderate statements made by Lee Jae-myung shortly before the election. We would like to see if he sticks with those more moderate statements and acts on those. That would be an improvement if he does so. And Colonel, what about U.S. troops in South Korea? Has the new president said anything to hint at whether we'll see a drawdown in the U.S. presence there? Well, past statements, of course, he is quite assertively, let's just be frank, he would like to see U.S. troops leave. He has used the term occupation force and he has applauded Soviet and Chinese elements as liberators. So this is an odd situation. If you did a survey of Koreans, 70 to 80 percent would say America is their best friend. So it's odd trying to understand that in light of Lee being president, who has been quite a questioning of the U.S. ROK alliance. So I think now that he is president, he is going to have to be very careful with his comments and statements and actions. Because the South Korean people, I don't think really totally understood what was going on. And again, they are very strongly pro-U.S. And now there is a president who has questioned the alliance. I don't think, I think there's a little bit of an orthogonal fit and this remains to be worked out. And again, the absolute importance of the American ambassador over here to assert America's first values will help maintain and perhaps even strengthen this alliance during the tenure of Lee.