preface
There are many countries in the world that regard China as an enemy, and the United States and Japan are even more firmly eyeing China. But to say that the biggest "clamour" against China depends on our neighbor - South Korea. South Korean President Yoon Seok-yue is a typical pro-American faction, and he must be pro-Japanese regardless of national opposition.
The United States is the world's number one power, Japan has also had glory, and small South Korea dares to be arrogant, which simply makes people laugh out of their big teeth.
Yin Xiyue has no bottom line to be pro-American and flattering
Recently, the Taiwan Strait issue has been escalating, the United States and Japan have constantly challenged China's bottom line, and South Korea has followed the two countries' "not to be outdone" to make a big fuss about China's Taiwan issue.
Yin Xiyue said: Oppose China's use of force to resolve the Taiwan issue, and Taiwan is not only a matter for China, but also for the whole world. Taiwan, like the Korean Peninsula, cannot be resolved unilaterally by China.
You say it's ridiculous, a South Korea that has been pinched by the United States economically and militarily, dares to intervene in the matter of Taiwan, China. Without the United States, with the military strength of North Korea, the Korean Peninsula would have been unified long ago.
South Korea has even shown its loyalty to the United States, showing that it is a staunch ally of the United States in Asia, a member and defender of the US-Japan-ROK alliance, and its loyalty is unrelenting.
Yin Xiyue himself did it, and the unlimited "licking" of the United States and Japan was indeed "loyal".
On May 21, 2022, shortly after South Korean President Yoon Seok-hyeol took office, South Korea and the United States held a summit meeting between the two countries, and at the welcome dinner, Yoon Seok-yue made a strange move - saluting the American flag.
This is "unprecedented" in South Korean history, and Yoon Seok-hyeol was the first South Korean president to salute the American flag.
Subsequently, he received a wave of scolding from the South Korean people, and the Korean media called the matter an "unprecedented diplomatic shame."
Yin Xiyue's "flattery" to the United States is vivid, and the same is true for Japan.
In 2023, under the guise of "simplifying the curriculum," the Yoon Seok-yue government will formulate a revision plan for the education curriculum, planning to delete 129 historical events from textbooks, including "Japanese comfort women."
This is already outrageous, and the South Korean Ministry of Education even glorifies Japanese colonial rule.
The tragic history of "Japanese comfort women" is no longer mentioned in textbooks, and Japan's colonial policy towards Korea is touted as "bringing about industrial and economic changes to Korea."
At that time, Japan's oppression of the Korean people was inhumane, and the phrase "fluttering" in textbooks summed it up, Japan itself never faced the inhumane history of World War II, and the Yoon Seok-yue government tried to dilute it.
During World War II, Japan colonized South Korea, invading and oppressing the local people. Japan's large industrial company, Mitsubishi Corporation, forcibly requisitioned labor here to produce weapons and other military materials.
These forcibly recruited labourers, including young people, the elderly and women, are forced to work in extremely harsh conditions for more than 12 hours of intense labour.
Treatment? Not to mention, the salaries are extremely meagre, barely able to get a small amount of food and water, and simply cannot be supported. Under such oppression, many of the forced laborers were weak, sick, and even died.
"Japanese comfort women" is a painful scar that does not want to be uncovered, and China also has it. Japan is still reluctant to acknowledge its past oppression and exploitation of East Asia.
Japan's forced conscription of labor and comfort women has brought destruction to the local area and untold suffering to the people.
Such a national hatred, the Yin Xiyue government even wanted to pass it off, and even make compensation for Japan.
On March 6, 2023, the South Korean government announced a plan for the South Korean government to compensate on behalf of Japan for those victims of its oppression and exploitation during World War II.
Japan, for its part, said it would not apologize or compensate, insisting that the Japan-South Korea issue had been resolved in 1965.
The combination of these two things is simply "bizarre", bizarre and infuriating. Where does the South Korean government stand to compensate South Korean victims on behalf of Japan? The Korean people who were invaded by Japanese imperialism at that time could not even wait for an apology from Japan.
Anger at Yoon's actions erupted in South Korea, and protests broke out. People took to the streets, marched and demonstrated, and even said, "Yoon Seok-yue don't come back in Japan!" ”
Yoon's administration was selling out the dignity of the country and the suffering of its fellow citizens to cater to the United States and Japan. Is he crazy?
The reason why the Yoon Seok-yue government is pro-Japanese
The Yoon Seok-hyeol government wants to repair relations between South Korea and Japan this morning due to three factors.
The first is to deal with the situation on the Korean Peninsula.
After coming to power, Yoon Seok-yue positioned North Korea as the "main enemy," and North Korea also clearly defined it as an "enemy." Hostilities between the two sides have escalated.
Since 2022, North Korea has passed nuclear weapons legislation, established a nuclear attack strategy, and launched ballistic missiles with high intensity, and its military activities have reached an all-time high. The South Korean government is in panic.
In the face of the continuous improvement of North Korea's nuclear and missile capabilities, the Yoon Seok-yue government has further strengthened its supervision and vigilance with North Korea, and is eager for the United States to send strategic weapons to conduct joint military exercises.
Then North Korea sent tougher countersignals, sending artillery to shoot in the eastern and western waters of the Korean Peninsula and sending drones deep over Seoul.
There are also rumors that North Korea is about to conduct its seventh nuclear test. After studying and judging by the South Korean side, it is speculated that North Korea's nuclear test is ready, and it is only waiting for a favorable time.
Therefore, any disturbance at the North Korean nuclear test site tugs at South Korea's tight heartstrings.
South Korea's military power can be defeated by North Korea at any time, and it has to rely on the United States. It is important to know that North Korea's ICBMs can cover the central part of North America, that is, the United States. South Korea hopes to quickly cooperate with the United States to carry out an extended threat policy against the DPRK and restart the "extended threat strategic consultation" between South Korea and the United States.
In addition to turning to the United States, South Korea also wants to borrow Japan's military power. Japan's intelligence capability and anti-missile capability should not be underestimated.
But to reach safe cooperation with them, forced labor disputes are a big obstacle.
In 2016, Japan and South Korea signed the Korea-Japan Agreement on the Protection of Military Information, but because of this dispute, the agreement was almost abandoned and in a state of instability.
As a result, South Korea was unable to obtain Japanese military support in intelligence and anti-missile support.
In order to give South Korea a sense of military security and outside support, the Yoon Seok-hyeol government decided to resolve the dispute on the basis of hurting national feelings.
The second is to rebuild the values of the "democratic alliance"
Yoon Seok-yue is a prosecutor by training, and Western values have shaped his perception of foreign policy, so he has a strong personal value color in diplomacy.
He believes that South Korea and Japan are neighbors and share universal values such as democracy and market economy. In the current international situation, the two countries need to face various challenges together.
But relations between the two countries have been sclerotic, and the two countries have not made state visits since 2001. Japan has also been blocking South Korea's accession to the G7 mechanism and the Quadrilateral Mechanism of the United States, Japan, India and Australia. Yoon Seok-yue believes that South Korea-Japan relations also affect South Korea-US relations. If South Korea takes the initiative to make overtures to Japan and break the deadlock in relations between the two countries, it will be able to broaden South Korea's international space.
Yoon regards improving relations between South Korea and Japan as a diplomatic priority and fights a "speed war."
The forced labor dispute lasted for years, and after he came to power, he forcibly resolved it with "lightning" speed.
Japan saw that South Korea took the initiative to show goodwill, and it is no longer the same as before. The two countries began discussions to lift export controls imposed by Japan on South Korea in 2019.
The third is to push South Korea-US relations to a higher level.
The relationship between the United States and Japan is well known, and as mentioned earlier, Yoon Seok-yue believes that one of the reasons why it is difficult to upgrade South Korea-US relations is the long-term trough of South Korea-Japan relations.
Indeed, there are factors in this regard, and the United States continues to be anxious about the stalemate between South Korea and Japan. If the two "little brothers" do not deal with each other, the old nature is very troublesome, and has been trying to ease the relations between the two countries and urge the two countries to cooperate more closely. The reason is none other than that both countries can help contain China and North Korea.
When Moon Jae-in was in power, he maintained a strategic balance between the United States and China, was relatively friendly to China, and kept a certain distance from both the United States and Japan.
After Yin Xiyue came to power, he unscrupulously favored the United States, leaned on the United States pro-America, broke the strategic ambiguity between China and the United States, and insisted on basing himself on the US-ROK alliance. In order to please the United States and rapidly improve relations with Japan, the stance on China has been seriously regressed.
Sure enough, after South Korea took the initiative to show goodwill with Japan, the United States expressed great welcome.
Fundamentally, Yoon Seok-yue's pro-Japanese diplomacy is subordinate to pro-American diplomacy. South Korea's desire to resolve political tensions with Japan is obvious: to escalate the ROK-U.S. alliance.
South Korea-Japan relations have entered a new era, and their security cooperation among the three countries of South Korea, the United States and Japan can also be closer.
However, the Yoon Seok-yue government has constantly broken the bottom line, rushed on the road of pro-US flattery, obeyed the United States, and made concessions to Japan. This kind of self-dwarfing does not necessarily win the respect of the United States and Japan, the United States and Japan have never been moralistic and equal, and South Korea's behavior will only make it inch.
Moreover, the unilateral concessions of the South Korean government and Japan did not receive the support of the people, which aroused the anger of the people. If the backlog continues like this, it will be detonated sooner or later.
South Korea's recession
However, Yin Xiyue can't manage so much about the affairs of the domestic people. Now the pressure on South Korea's economy is enough for him to "scratch his ears and scratch his cheeks".
Since the THAAD incident in 2016, China-South Korea relations have directly turned to a freezing point, and trade between the two countries has been greatly reduced.
Yin Xiyue also wants to follow the United States to contain China and is preparing to show his strength. The bad news came here.
South Korea's trade deficit in the first half of 2023 surprised it to $10.3 billion. South Korea's economic development depends on a long-term trade surplus, but according to reports, South Korea's trade deficit has lasted for nearly a year.
The high trade deficit explains the decline of the South Korean economy.
But this situation is also South Korea's own choice. China is South Korea, the largest trading country, and the Korean Wave once swept the Chinese market.
South Korea's economy is very dependent on China, and Yoon has vowed to reduce its dependence on China and establish trade relations with other countries. Leaving aside China's vast market, economic problems are inevitable today.
Until there were no problems with the economy, South Korea remained "confident". They believe that China and South Korea have a very strong complementarity in industrial structure, and China only processes its own products and then exports them, which is no different from its direct exports to other countries. So he followed the United States to join the ranks of restrictions on China.
The THAAD incident, coupled with South Korea's restrictions on China, has had an impact on South Korean exports. Now the status of Korean goods in China has repeatedly declined. At that time, Samsung mobile phones were almost no longer used in China.
Korean cars only account for 1% of the market in China, and Korean electrical appliances are basically not bought. You know, the Korean automobile industry is one of the two major export pillar industries. The other is the semiconductor industry, whose largest exporter is still China. However, with the development of China's semiconductor technology, import dependence on South Korea has declined.
Problems in these two pillar industries will also lead to a series of problems in South Korea.
Yin Xiyue also saw this and tried his best to curry favor with the United States, hoping that the United States could help solve it. But can the United States really help? The United States itself is very slow to reindustrialize, and it also says that South Korea cannot make money that China cannot earn.
Although South Korea's trade has shifted to the United States, the U.S. market cannot save South Korea's economic crisis, and the United States cannot solve South Korea's current economic difficulties.
The way out for South Korea's economic development still depends on China. In the first half of this year, China received news from the South Korean ambassador to China: the South Korean side expressed the hope that China can visit South Korea within this year.
epilogue
Although South Korea's military does depend on the United States, South Korea's blind pro-American behavior does not necessarily lead to good results. At present, South Korea's domestic contradictions have deepened, the trade deficit has deepened, and the economy has encountered difficulties. South Korea has already taken care of itself, and it is best for Yoon Seok-yue not to continue to follow the United States to provoke the escalation of the regional situation, otherwise he will only suffer his own evil consequences in the end.
bibliography
NetEase: With the support of the United States, Yin Xiyue once again accused China, and the Chinese side explained the words and criticized them by name
NetEase: After Yoon Seok-yue's provocation over the Taiwan Strait issue, nearly 90% of South Koreans had a negative view of China
World knowledge: Triple factors drive Yoon Seok-yue's radical pro-Japan