Key to Peace in Korea: Remove US Presence

Key to Peace in Korea: Remove US Presence

By Tony Cartalucci
Global Research, April 13, 2013

On March 26, 2010, the ROKS Cheonan is hit by what appears to be a German-made torpedo, sinks while claiming the lives of 46 South Korean sailors. The world, America at the lead, was quick to point its finger at North Korea before South Korea itself ruled them out as a suspect. North Korea adamantly insisted it was not behind the attack, and despite their paranoid and isolated posture, little beyond insanity could serve as a motive.Despite evidence adding up otherwise, to no one’s surprise a joint “international” investigationby the US, UK, South Korea, Australia, Canada, and Sweden would later conclude that a North Korean submarine was the culprit, leaving even most South Koreans skeptical.During this period of time, America’s position in Asia Pacific was already waning. Endless war in Central Asia and the Middle East, along with a deepening economic crisis in the West allowed other actors to begin eying the seemingly inevitable void soon to be left. Japan under then Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, began reasserting itself over unpopular US military installations scattered throughout the nation. China was continuing to expand its economic and diplomatic influence in the region, luring in even America’s traditional allies like Australia and Thailand.

The sinking of the ROKS Cheonan then “serendipitously” served as a reminder as to why America claims their troops and influence are needed in the region for “peace and security.” The Korean Won tumbled as the US Dollar was temporarily bolstered and Japanese PM Hatoyama not only conceded to US demands regarding US installations, but would also resign over the matter. Literally citing the mysterious, still unsolved sinking of the Cheonan, Washington insisted its need to reassert itself in Asia to counter North Korea, if not for any other reason.

North Korea, either out of shadowy complicity or because of its paranoid predictable nature, became America’s greatest ally in many ways.

November 2010, a similar scenario played out after an artillery exchange between North and South Korea which claimed several lives. America was again bolstered in its highly tenuous position not only in Asia as a whole, but on the Korean Peninsula itself, having been rebuffed on the US-Korean FTA and facing the possibility of US banking interests meeting with Tobin taxes in Korean markets.

South Korean leadership now admits they were conducting joint US-Korean live fire exercises close to highly contested waters in the Yellow Sea before the exchange took place. North Korea maintains this incident was intentionally provoked, as was the sinking of the Cheonan, as contrived incidents of opportunity for the waning American empire to reassert itself.

And like the sinking of the Cheonan, America once again renewed the rhetorical lease on its presence in Asia Pacific.

America’s “Asia Pivot”

Fast forward to today, 2013, and the openly declared US policy entitled, the “pivot toward Asia.” Built upon the ultimate goal of encircling and containing China, it hinges on special interests cobbling Southeast Asia into a regional European Union-style bloc to then be used economically, politically, and militarily against China. In fact, in recent island disputes, this ASEAN bloc is already being tested out as a collective proxy to maintain US hegemony in Asia Pacific.

While the “pivot” appears to be “new” US foreign policy, it is deeply rooted in long-conspired hegemonic ambitions. As far back as 1997, America corporate-financier think-tanks had been documenting their intentions to pursue just such a containment policy with the expressed goal of maintaining American dominance across Asia Pacific. Neo-Con policy maker Robert Kagan penned a fairly insightful 1997 piece in the Weekly Standard titled, “What China Knows That We Don’t: The Case for a New Strategy of Containment,” where he discusses the prospects of an effective containment strategy coupled with the baited hook of luring China into its place amongst the “international order.”

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http://www.globalresearch.ca/key-to-peace-in-korea-remove-us-presence/5331137