South Korea’s new Indo-Pacific strategy marks a closer alignment with its American ally’s approach to the region, while also holding out hope that it can maintain its lucrative ties with U.S. rival China.

On Wednesday, the Yoon Suk-yeol administration released its “Strategy for a Free, Peaceful and Prosperous Indo-Pacific Region.” The 40-page document doesn’t contain any surprises. Still, its careful wording and presentation reflect South Korea’s approach to balancing relations between the U.S., its main security ally, and China, its main economic partner.

Yoon announced the Indo-Pacific strategy in November at the ASEAN summit in Cambodia, shortly ahead of his first in-person meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping at the G-20 in Indonesia. This preview not only allowed South Korea to stress the importance of ASEAN and imply Seoul’s neutrality but also gave it time to see how Beijing would react before releasing the whole document.

When South Korea did release the document, the foreign ministry presented it at a gathering of over 40 diplomats, including China’s Ambassador to South Korea Xing Haiming. But Seoul also dropped it at the end of the year, when much of the world has wound down for the holiday season, meaning that the new strategy potentially avoided more extensive media coverage — both good and bad.

On top of this, at a press briefing by a senior presidential official announcing the strategy, one reporter asserted that although they wanted to ask about the document, they didn’t have adequate time to prepare questions because the government released it so late.

Reporters at the press briefing ended up asking far more questions about North Korea’s recent drone incursion than about the Indo-Pacific strategy. Then again, reporters may have asked more questions about the North Korean drones because it was a better headline-grabbing story than the strategy.

Yoon Suk-yeol and Xi Jinping at their first in-person meeting | Image: Office of the President of the Republic of Korea (Nov. 15, 2022)

BALANCING ACT

Much has been made about how South Korea’s Indo-Pacific strategy marks the ROK’s strong shift to the U.S. following Yoon Suk-yeol returning power to the country’s conservatives in this past spring’s presidential election.

Yoon’s predecessor, Moon Jae-in, stuck to his “New Southern Policy,” avoiding the term “Indo-Pacific strategy” used by Japan and the U.S., while his administration tried to balance relations with China.

However, Yoon’s Indo-Pacific strategy doesn’t just share the same name as its American ally’s strategy but also much of the same terminology. Scattered throughout both documents, one can find references to a “rules-based order” and “peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.”

Expectedly, China’s official reaction was reasonably lukewarm.

While Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin expressed his country’s opposition to “an exclusive small group” — likely a reference to the Quad, with which South Korea said it would “seek to gradually expand nodes of cooperation” in the Indo-Pacific strategy” — he added that Beijing hopes that South Korea “will make proactive contributions together” with China to the region.

In releasing the strategy, the Yoon administration has highlighted its intention to maintain good relations with China. Not only did it closely communicate with China while drafting the document, but Seoul’s Indo-Pacific strategy doesn’t mention China nearly as frequently or as critically as Washington’s.

The press briefing with the senior South Korean presidential official even drew attention to how Seoul’s strategy is inclusive of China, while the U.S. sees China as a potential competitor. It also stressed how South Korea wants to promote trilateral cooperation with China and Japan as well as with the U.S. and Japan.

Beijing also likely welcomes the Indo-Pacific strategy lamenting the “spread of exclusive protectionism and supply chain disruptions” and Seoul’s pledge to “work with others to prevent the overwhelming dominance of security concerns over economic issues.”

South Korea has protested elements of U.S. initiatives such as the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Chip 4 semiconductor alliance, which threaten to force it to cut some profitable ties with China.

Yoon Suk-yeol and Joe Biden | Image: The White House (May 21, 2022)

FRIENDS WITH EVERYONE

The Yoon administration’s alignment with Washington’s key regional initiatives suggests that, ultimately, South Korea will side with the U.S. Nevertheless, in regional meetings between the U.S. and its allies, South Korea will likely fight to protect its economic interests with China as much as possible.

South Korea also still hopes that China will help rein in North Korea and friendlier relations between Seoul and Beijing might encourage this.

On Friday, the South Korean special envoy to the DPRK Kim Gunn spoke with his Chinese counterpart, Liu Xiaoming, and called on Beijing to play a more significant role in talking Pyongyang out of testing its weapons.

While China doesn’t seem to be doing much to stop North Korea from launching long-range missiles, there’s always the chance it has put the brakes on its seventh nuclear test, which it apparently finished preparing for several months ago. Then again, North Korea conducted its previous six tests despite Chinese opposition.

A lot will also depend on where tentative relations between the U.S. and China go from here. As a perennial shrimp among whales, this will be a major factor in South Korea’s economic and security fortunes.

Edited by John Lee