South Korea nimbly dodges crossfire of US-China trade war
- From economic to diplomatic to military fronts, private sector and government both taking steps to avoid being caught in a clash of major powers
It’s an uneasy time for Asian nations as the rivalry between China and the United States intensifies and uncertainty hangs on whether they can resolve their trade war beyond the 90-day truce. In this special series the South China Morning Post explores how the China-US rivalry is affecting four countries in Asia. In part two, Lee Jeong-ho looks at South Korea.
As the confrontation between China and the United States spills over from trade to a wider range of issues challenging their relations, South Korea is taking steps on the economic, diplomatic and military fronts to avoid being caught between the two giants.
South Korea, which relies on the US for its security and on China for its economy, is among the nations that stand to suffer serious collateral damage from the trade war. The clashes of the two heavyweights vying for greater geopolitical interests over the Korean peninsula have sandwiched the “middle power”, with South Korea unable to fully accommodate both the US and China’s demands.
This is not South Korea’s first experience being caught between major powers in a period of transition. Indeed, the peninsula’s location has historically drawn great powers to engage it. Koreans have seen their lands used by major powers as a proxy to achieve geopolitical interests in the first Sino-Japanese war, the Russo-Japanese war and, of course, the Korean war, all of which resulted in millions of casualties and total destruction.
Vowing to learn from history, though, South Korea – both the government and the private sector – is implementing a new strategy to actively hedge the risks.
Economic shelter from the trade storm