Hearing of the House Armed Services Committee: Strategic Implications of U.S. Troop Withdrawals from Korea

HEARING OF THE HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE SUBJECT: STRATEGIC IMPLICATIONS OF U.S. TROOP WITHDRAWALS FROM KOREA

June 15, 2004 Tuesday

CHAIRED BY: REPRESENTATIVE DUNCAN HUNTER (R-CA)

WITNESSES: PETER BROOKES, THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION; MICHAEL E. O'HANLON, BROOKINGS INSTITUTION

LOCATION: 2118 RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING, WASHINGTON, D.C.

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REP. RICK LARSEN (D-WA): Norwegians before Swedes, that's a wise choice, Mr. Chairman. (Laughter.)

Mr. Brookes, you keep saying that South Korea can do more.

They've got the proposed 13 percent increase to the defense budget. It might tick up the percentage of GDP going into the defense budget. So it can do more. Can you be specific about what ROK can do in terms of more?

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REP. LARSEN: Does South Korea have a strategic interest beyond North Korea that would push them more into navy and air assets? I mean, or would these be purchased or developed strictly for the North Korean problem?
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REP. LARSEN: This may have come up in a previous hearing; I'm not sure. The Defense Department has talked about the $11 billion over the next several years in the capability investment in South Korea. And maybe we have details on what that would mean or maybe we can't talk about it in this setting, but do you all have an idea of what that $11 billion is going to go to?
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REP. LARSEN: Okay.

Dr. O'Hanlon, discussing your grand bargain earlier and going to your book, I was struck by a comment out of your book. You said that it's not that we don't have an approach to North Korea; it's that we don't have an approach to our regional partners, and that is trying to, you know, give them the incentive to participate. And I think when you discussed that earlier, you didn't mention sort of the punch line is that you sort of walk though this with North Korea to show whether or not they're going to be good-faith partners or not, and when they don't show they're good-faith partners it shows our other regional partners that we have a reason to be tough. It's not just that we're there just to try to negotiate with-negotiate away the nuclear problem on the peninsula, but to show the regional partners that they don't have a partner in North Korea. Is that accurate?

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REP. LARSEN: I think from our perspective, we may, you know, look at the U.S. experience with North Korea over the last 10 years and say what more do we have to show? But that is not the case from our partners in the region.
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REP. LARSEN: Just quickly, Mr. Chairman.

Now, taking that and just boiling it down to the 12,500 troops we're talking about, how does that redeployment fit, does it fit, should it fit into the broader issues that we're trying to negotiate in that region?

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REP. LARSEN: Mr. Brookes, it might be fun to hear your response.
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REP. LARSEN: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

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