Every year, New York becomes the epicenter of diplomacy as world leaders pour in to speak at the UN General Assembly. Few of the addresses made the news, but those by the leaders of the US, Iran and Israel struck a defiant tone amid war in the Middle East. President Lee Jae Myung’s speech was one of the most notable by a South Korean leader in years.
Hoping to ease tensions with North Korea, Lee outlined a three-step plan toward denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. The first step is a freeze on the development of nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missile programs. The second step is a reduction in nuclear weapons, followed by their complete elimination in the third.
To move his proposal along, Lee encouraged the US and North Korea to resume dialogue, with the goal of “ending the war on the Korean Peninsula and transitioning to a peace regime.” Separately, Lee suggested that North Korea could be given relief from economic sanctions in exchange for freezing its nuclear weapons program.
President Lee’s ideas have roots in the center-left's “Sunshine Policy” of direct dialogue with North Korea during the Kim Dae-jung presidency (1998-2003). This approach continued to inform North Korea policy under Roh Moo-hyun (2003-2008) and Moon Jae-in (2017-2022). It is defined by the hope that dialogue and engagement will bring positive changes in behavior. It also reflects the desire for South Korea to sit at the center of efforts to reach out to North Korea.
Traditional conservatives, by contrast, have opposed dialogue with North Korea and have focused on strengthening the alliance with the US and developing closer ties to Japan. The Lee Myung-bak (2008-2013) and Park Geun-hye (2013-2017) presidencies reversed the “Sunshine Policy” entirely, while Yoon Suk Yeol (2022-2025) pushed for closer military cooperation with Japan.
Both stances reflect Cold War-era strategies taken by the two competing superpowers, the US and the Soviet Union. The era alternated between a desire for peaceful coexistence and aggressive competition designed to weaken the rival. Advocates pushing peaceful coexistence were labeled “soft,” while hardliners were cast as “warmongers.” With the Korean Peninsula remaining the last frontier of the Cold War, it comes as no surprise that this dichotomy lives on in South Korea.
Seen in this context, President Lee’s approach to North Korea appears to offer little that's new, but it differs from his center-left predecessors in actively seeking a US role in North Korea policy. Lee wants to prod President Donald Trump to open up dialogue with North Korea.
Focusing on Trump is problematic. To his credit, Lee has dealt with Trump far better than the leaders of other US allies. Lee understands that public criticism of Trump is futile; instead, he has tried to ease tensions over trade issues while turning Trump into a vehicle to reach out to North Korea.
The problem with this approach is that Trump has a little more than two years left in office. Trump’s approval ratings are now lower than at almost any time during his first term, and he has become a drag on Republican candidates in the upcoming midterm elections. A Democratic sweep will ensure that the last two years of his administration will be tied up in congressional hearings and a possible third impeachment.
The US president, however unpopular, retains strong influence over foreign policy. Trump could easily engage with North Korea regardless of his standing at home. He might be interested in leaving a legacy as a “peacemaker,” but after the military strikes on Iran, that prospect has dimmed. His main interest in North Korea is extracting praise from Kim Jong-un rather than serious diplomacy.
All of this means that pinning hopes on Trump is risky. He is on a trajectory to leave office a deeply unpopular president. Republican presidential contenders will likely distance themselves from Trump by doubling down on a hardline stance toward Pyongyang.
Democratic candidates for president, meanwhile, will most likely move in the opposite direction from Trump with a renewed interest in human rights and climate change. For North Korea policy, this will manifest itself in stronger critiques of human rights abuses and continued support for denuclearization.
In this situation, any opening that Trump produces, but particularly one on nuclear weapons, will almost certainly be abandoned by the next administration. Fortunately for President Lee, he will have a year and a half at the end of his term to work with that administration.
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Robert J. Fouser
Robert J. Fouser, a former associate professor of Korean language education at Seoul National University, writes on Korea from Providence, Rhode Island. He can be reached at robertjfouser@gmail.com. The views expressed here are the writer’s own. — Ed.
khnews@heraldcorp.com