Reports of friction between Seoul and Washington have been arriving almost daily. They have included claims that National Intelligence Service Director Lee Jong-seok's planned visit to the United States fell through, that NIS officials ran into U.S. visa problems and that the agency was excluded from a trilateral Korea-U.S.-Japan body on North Korean cyber threats. Then came a report that U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had conveyed distrust of the NIS to the South Korean side.
The NIS and related ministries have disputed most of these accounts. There were indeed differences in some areas of intelligence cooperation between the two countries, but critics say issues already resolved are being portrayed as ongoing conflicts. That does not mean every report of friction can be dismissed as inaccurate. If Washington is unhappy with Seoul's North Korea policy or the way intelligence is shared, that in itself is a serious matter.
Still, it is worth examining why sensitive diplomatic and security issues have surfaced in the press one after another at this particular moment. Some see a struggle for control between the so-called autonomy camp and the alliance camp within the government's foreign policy and security establishment. Others see grievances over personnel decisions that have accumulated since the change of government spilling into the open. No organized source of the leaks has been identified. Yet the suspicions alone can shake confidence in the government's foreign policy and security command structure.
Talk of Infighting Behind the Friction With Washington
The current situation evokes the clash between the two camps that erupted last year ahead of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Gyeongju and the conclusion of tariff talks with the United States. What has changed is who is on the offensive. At the time, the reading was that the autonomy camp was pressuring the alliance camp. A year later, the suspicion is that the alliance camp is targeting the autonomy camp. Whatever the truth of those suspicions, the fact that disputes over diplomatic direction keep recurring inside the government is not something to brush aside.
The feud between the two camps has little to do with people's lives or the national interest, yet it has gone on for more than 20 years.
Under the Roh Moo-hyun government, the autonomy camp emphasized reconciliation with North Korea and securing room for independent diplomacy, while the alliance camp treated the alliance with Washington as the central pillar of foreign and security policy. Clashes followed over troop deployments to Iraq, the realignment of U.S. forces in Korea and North Korea policy. In 2004, Foreign Minister Yoon Young-kwan stepped down after an uproar over disparaging remarks about the president by ministry officials.
A Replay of a 20-Year-Old Conflict, With the Same Cast and the Same Lines
More than two decades later, neither the cast nor the battle lines have changed much. Back then, the deputy secretary-general of the National Security Council was Lee Jong-seok, now the NIS director, and the head of the Foreign Ministry's North American affairs bureau was Wi Sung-lac, now the national security adviser. With Chung Dong-young, who served as unification minister under Roh, joining the current government, the main figures of that earlier conflict are gathered in one place again.
Differences over foreign policy issues and personnel surfaced from the earliest days of the current government last year. Chung and Wi offered differing explanations of the sequencing of the END Initiative that the president announced at the United Nations General Assembly, and of the nature of inter-Korean relations, fueling controversy. Chung Se-hyun, a former unification minister and a pillar of the autonomy camp, said publicly that "there are so many alliance-camp people inside the government that they are holding the president back."
Lately the picture has flipped. As reports of friction with Washington piled up, the People Power Party called for Lee and Chung to be replaced. The attacks have been aimed squarely at figures identified with the autonomy camp.
Some in the ruling bloc go further, suggesting that grievances accumulated during the reshuffling of foreign policy and security organizations after the change of government have combined with the current political climate to produce leaks of sensitive information. There is also talk that the interests of officials who were favored under the previous government and then pushed out of their posts may be at work. The view focuses on a pattern in which problems in intelligence cooperation with the United States are raised repeatedly through media critical of the government, and opposition figures then use them as material for attacks.
Personnel Disputes After the Change of Government Turn Into a Power Struggle That Hurts the National Interest
If the suspicions are true, the problem goes beyond a simple dispute over policy direction between the two camps. Internal organizational interests created by the change of government, combined with partisan wrangling, would be shaking confidence in the country's foreign policy and security apparatus. With issues piling up in dealings with the Donald Trump administration, the very officials charged with defending the national interest could end up eroding the country's bargaining power.
Pressure from the Trump administration to expand investment in the United States, follow-up steps from the tariff negotiations, the North Korean nuclear issue and strategic competition between Washington and Beijing are all formidable. Even full concentration on negotiating with the United States and drawing changes out of North Korea would not be enough. If disputes over policy direction and personnel spill into political fights over sensitive diplomatic and security information, the biggest loser will be South Korea.
Next month also brings the ASEAN and APEC summits, with the possibility of talks between Washington and Pyongyang. Ahead of such a diplomatic stretch, feuding between the two camps and fights over policy direction can only damage the national interest and weaken South Korea's standing.
The National Interest Shaken by Line Fighting Calls for Pragmatic Diplomacy
On taking office, the president stressed pragmatic diplomacy centered on the national interest, saying, "Let us now send outdated ideologies to the museum of history." Whether from the autonomy camp or the alliance camp, those who want the president's trust and want to advance the national interest should compete through diplomatic results, not through fights over personnel and policy lines.
The two approaches are not a matter of choosing one or the other, and useful policy lines from the previous government should be picked up where appropriate. Widening diplomatic autonomy on the foundation of the alliance is precisely the direction pragmatic diplomacy should take.
The duty of the current foreign policy and security team is to manage relations with Washington steadily while presenting ways to secure autonomy in North Korea policy. If the national interest is set aside and internal conflict simply repeats, neither side can win. This is a moment that calls for cool diplomatic judgment more than ever. There is no time to spare for pointless antagonism between the two camps, or for repeating internal conflict out of partisan interest.
