According to the Global Times, on August 17, South Korean President Yoon Seok-yue delivered an important speech at the 100-day inauguration event, on the one hand, proposing to provide assistance to north Korea in exchange for the denuclearization of the peninsula; On the other hand, south Korea proudly declares that it will become the world's fourth-largest arms exporter.
Some media believe that this is a wonderful irony, while telling other countries not to build nuclear weapons, turning their heads to show off their strong weapons manufacturing and export capabilities.
Analysts believe that Yoon Seok-yue's proposal is a good starting point, but it is just a mirror and a dream, wishful thinking, and it has not been said in the heart of the North Korean government, and it will have no effect.
At the day's event, Yoon Seok-yue said that he had said that after taking office as president, he would find an opportunity to have a dialogue with North Korea, and that his dialogue would make substantial progress not just a political show.
Yoon Seok-woo first expressed his sincerity to the North Korean side, saying that South Korea can provide economic assistance to north Korea to help North Korea develop.
While South Korea wants North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons, that doesn't mean it wants to force It to give up its nuclear weapons on the condition of aid. As long as the North Korean side can show enough sincerity, the South Korean side is willing to provide enough assistance.
Yoon Also said that only if he makes suggestions first, the North Korean side will respond. Yin Xiyue is showing that he is fighting for the initiative.
It's just not known whether North Korea will catch the olive branch thrown by Yoon Seok-yue at the moment.
Subsequently, Yoon Seok-yue announced to the public a "good news" that South Korea will become the world's fourth-largest arms exporter. The news came very suddenly, but it was true.
South Korea has always had arms exports, but its share is not large, with exports of $560 million in 2021, but this year it surpassed Italy and jumped to fourth place.
This was mainly thanks to a large order from Poland, which, after the outbreak of the Russo-Ukrainian War, gave its old tank support to Ukraine, and the number of tanks in its own troops was insufficient.
Poland was prepared to take the opportunity to replace the more advanced American M1 series tanks, and also placed orders with the United States. However, the production capacity of the United States is insufficient, and the US military is also in urgent need of a large number of tanks, and the order cannot be delivered in time.
The Russo-Ukrainian War was going on very quickly, and Poland was worried that it would affect its national defense posture and urgently needed to replenish enough tanks. At present, the only one who has the ability to provide weapons in the NATO system and has sufficient production capacity is South Korea.
As a result, Poland has urgently ordered 1,000 Panther K2 tanks from South Korea, in addition to orders for self-propelled howitzers and light fighters.
In addition, in February this year, South Korean military companies also received a weapons order of up to $1.7 billion from Egypt, so south Korea's military export rankings have improved by leaps and bounds this year.
This situation shows that South Korea itself has a strong weapons production and manufacturing capability, of course, not how strong South Korea's own research and development capabilities are, but the result of the intentional arrangements of the United States that year.
After the Korean War, the United States regarded South Korea as the most important forward base and logistics supply station, and arranged a mature weapons manufacturing system here, which played an important supporting role in future wars in East Asia.
However, Yoon Seok-yue has just proposed a plan to the North Korean side to provide assistance for non-nuclear weapons, and he himself has demonstrated South Korea's super weapons production capacity, which is indeed somewhat out of date.
Everyone knows very well that North Korea's industrial level is backward, the international environment is very closed, although their army is very large, but the weapons are very old, the manufacturing and maintenance capabilities are not strong, and the reason why they can be strongly supported at present is because of the nuclear weapons in their hands.
If North Korea loses its nuclear weapons, it may be difficult to resist south Korean attacks based on conventional weapons alone, so Yoon Seok-yue's wishful thinking may not be achieved.
In addition, even if Yoon Seok-yue really wants to improve inter-Korean relations, he does not have the initiative, and the situation on the Korean Peninsula is closely related to the United States.
Recently, the United States, Japan, and South Korea have frequently conducted exercises in the Pacific, and they have clearly targeted North Korea, and the North Korean side is very angry.
Ironically, on the same day, the North Korean military conducted a weapons test, which is undoubtedly a statement. I don't know how Yin Xiyue will feel after getting the news?