Korea's terrible DC blunder

By John Burton

The Korean government has done itself a great disservice in cutting funding to the US-Korea Institute (USKI), which will force the think tank's closure. There is no upside, only downside in the decision.

With this one action, the Moon administration has alienated the close-knit and influential "Korea watchers" community in Washington, D.C., at a time when it needs its support as Seoul prepares for the upcoming South Korean and U.S. summits with North Korea.

There is already skepticism about the Moon administration among many U.S. experts on Korea. Most of these analysts have national security backgrounds in government, including working at the Defense Department, the CIA and the National Security Council, and adopt a conservative and hawkish position on Korean issues.

In contrast, the USKI, which is housed at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, D.C., is known as being one of the few liberal U.S. institutions on Korean affairs, which makes the Moon administration's decision even more inexplicable.

As a former U.S. nuclear negotiator with North Korea and dean of the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, Robert Gallucci, the USKI chairman, is widely respected within the Korean analyst community. The USKI's website, 38 North, is viewed as one of the most authoritative sources of information on North Korea.

So why has the Moon administration taken such a bone-headed and self-defeating decision? The answer is a complex one that has been obscured by the partisan debate in Seoul over the action.

The groundwork was laid over the last several years by penny-pinching lawmakers in the National Assembly who questioned the need for the government to fund USKI and the Korea Economic Institute in Washington, D.C. They accused these two organizations of being ineffective and a waste of taxpayer money. There were attempts last year to freeze or cut their funding.

But several top aides in the Moon administration saw this funding issue as a pretext to remove Jae H. Ku, the USKI's longtime director, and Jenny Town, the dovish assistant director. It is still unclear why Ku was being targeted. Some say the Blue House regarded him as being too conservative, while others claim the Moon administration just wanted to place its own man in the post.

Whatever the case, it has been an open secret for months within the Washington-based Korean watchers' community that the government wanted Ku's removal. Gallucci flew to Seoul last December to fight for Ku's retention, saying the government's interference amounted to an infringement on academic freedom given USKI's affiliation with Johns Hopkins University.

The Moon administration may be technically correct in claiming that the push for Ku's removal stemmed from the USKI's allegedly poor bookkeeping in confirming to National Assembly demands, but this was not the chief motivation.

The actions of both the Blue House and National Assembly lawmakers also betray a poor understanding of how Washington, D.C., operates. Providing several million dollars a year to both the USKI and KEI is a cheap price to pay for making Korea's voice heard in a town swamped by lobbyists representing other foreign governments.

Both the USKI and KEI have established a good reputation for serving as reliable sources of unbiased information about Korea. But Korea's efforts in delivering its message to U.S. policymakers are now under threat.

The government's attempted "purge" of USKI will only strengthen the view in Washington, D.C. that Moon is a left-wing ideologue. It will also undermine a recent effort by Cho Yoon-je, the new Korean ambassador to the U.S., to bolster the country's "public diplomacy" efforts by expanding the embassy's outreach team.

The Moon administration's treatment of the USKI amounts to a public humiliation of Gallucci and could discourage other prominent U.S. officials to support Korea's cause in Washington, D.C. For example, Kathleen Stephens, the former U.S. ambassador to Korea, is expected to be named shortly as the new head of KEI. But will she be willing to accept the post if it will mean dealing with constant interference from Seoul?

The Korean government's intervention in the USKI comes at a time when there is a growing debate over the foreign manipulation of think tanks in Washington, D.C. Respected think tanks, such as the Brookings Institution, have come under fire for accepting large donations from Middle East governments that have allegedly influenced their activities and research. Korea cannot afford to be seen in the same light.

It is time for Seoul to undertake damage control. The Moon administration must immediately restore funding to the USKI and tell the National Assembly that this amounts to a donation that should not be subject to nit-picking legislative oversight. It must also revert to a policy of adopting a hands-off approach in allowing the USKI and KEI to pursue their activities best suited to an American environment and not one subject to micro-managing by Seoul.

John Burton (johnburtonft@yahoo.com), a former Korea correspondent for the Financial Times, is now a Washington, D.C.-based journalist and consultant.