June 4, 2026, marks the first anniversary of President Lee Jae-myung’s inauguration. Given that his government took office in the wake of a sudden presidential resignation and impeachment crisis, with no transition period whatsoever, there were genuine concerns at the time about whether normal governance was even possible.
One year on, the Lee administration has largely put those concerns to rest. Against a backdrop of sweeping domestic and global turbulence, including a KOSPI index that has crossed the 8,000 mark for the first time, the government has recorded meaningful achievements across a range of policy areas. In this column, I assess the foreign affairs, security, and unification portfolio specifically: where the government has earned credit, where it has fallen short, and what South Korea must do next.
Key achievements
The Lee administration’s first year can be summarized under three broad headings, each oriented around the twin goals of national interest-centered pragmatic diplomacy and the building of an autonomous defense capability.
The first is the pursuit of pragmatic, ideology-free global diplomacy. The government framed its foreign policy around the concept of being a “globally responsible middle power,” prioritizing tangible national interest over ideological alignment. It navigated trade negotiations with the United States on strictly pragmatic terms and adopted a similarly flexible posture toward Japan and other regional partners. In a period defined by sharpening U.S.-China competition, the administration has worked to secure South Korea’s strategic autonomy through diversified diplomacy, and has managed risk relatively well even in the volatile security environment emanating from the Middle East.
The second achievement is the advancement of autonomous defense capabilities and the groundwork laid for the return of wartime operational control (OPCON) from the United States. Since taking office, the Lee government has significantly increased the defense budget, with a stated target of 3.5% of GDP by 2035, under the principle of taking responsibility for peace independently rather than relying solely on alliance deterrence. Active dialogue with Washington has yielded meaningful progress on nuclear-powered submarine cooperation and nuclear fuel enrichment, both longstanding policy goals. Some critics have raised concerns about defense instability arising from an accelerated OPCON transition, but taking into account South Korea’s elevated international standing, changes in U.S. policy toward the peninsula under the second Trump administration, more than two decades of preparation, and the possibility of addressing shortcomings after the transfer, I believe an early OPCON return is a timely and proactive security policy commensurate with South Korea’s national power and international standing.
The third achievement is the articulation of a realistic three-phase denuclearization framework. The Lee government has proposed a sequenced approach consisting of a freeze, a reduction, and finally complete denuclearization. This reflects a clear-eyed recognition that complete, verifiable, and irreversible dismantlement (CVID) is not achievable in a single step. As a practical roadmap for drawing North Korea and other interested parties back to the table, the phased approach has real merit. North Korea is not currently refusing negotiations in order to entrench its nuclear-armed status, but it will become increasingly difficult for Pyongyang to ignore this proposal indefinitely.
Where reconsideration is needed
The Lee government has not produced an unbroken record of success. In the choppy waters of real-world politics and a sharply deteriorating inter-Korean climate, there have been meaningful inconsistencies and policy missteps that warrant serious examination.
The first concerns the “peaceful two-state formula” and the constitutional controversy it has generated. In response to Kim Jong Un’s declaration of an “adversarial two-state” framework in December 2023, the Lee administration, led by Unification Minister Jeong Dong-young (정동영, the cabinet minister responsible for inter-Korean relations policy), officially embraced the concept of a “peaceful two-state relationship oriented toward unification” and enshrined it in the ministry’s white paper. This has drawn sharp criticism from two directions: that it violates Article 3 of the South Korean Constitution, which asserts sovereignty over the entire peninsula and enshrines the obligation to pursue peaceful unification; and that it reflects an excessive preoccupation with achieving inter-Korean rapprochement at the expense of a clear-eyed reading of North Korean intentions.
A state must plan not just for one or two years but for decades and generations. Kim Jong Un is pursuing a Copernican shift in the strategic order with a long time horizon. Our government, by contrast, appears to be cycling back to policies that have already failed, still counting on Kim’s goodwill. The rhetoric sounds plausible, but the details are absent.
We must seriously consider the risk that we are being drawn into Kim Jong Un’s strategic patience game: in the short term, severing inter-Korean ties to consolidate internal control; in the long term, building a nuclear foundation for territorial ambitions. We may also be forfeiting the leverage and leading role we need in any future rapid change scenario or unification discussion.
The unfinished denuclearization agenda
The three-phase denuclearization roadmap deserves credit as a realistic framework, but it has not been backed by sufficient follow-through. While we have continued to articulate principles, North Korea has continued to qualitatively and quantitatively upgrade the tactical nuclear capabilities it has directly targeted at South Korea. If this continues for years or decades, what will the peninsula look like?
We need to feel some urgency. Complacency, denial, and wishful thinking are not options. The trilateral South Korea-U.S.-Japan coordination framework and the Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG), the bilateral U.S.-South Korea mechanism for coordinating extended deterrence and nuclear planning, both strengthened under the previous Yoon Suk-yeol administration’s Camp David Declaration, have lost considerable momentum. Meanwhile, the North Korea-China-Russia triangular alignment has grown more entrenched, further constraining our security environment. It has become almost routine for North Korean denuclearization to go unmentioned in U.S.-China or China-Russia summits, with statements instead increasingly reflecting Pyongyang’s preferred framing.
The third area of concern is the retreat from information infrastructure and the dampening of Korean Wave exposure for North Koreans. I will not relitigate the decision itself, but the fact that the Lee government’s preemptive dismantling of overt and covert information-sharing infrastructure toward North Korea has ultimately aided the regime in blocking North Korean people’s access to the outside world must be honestly acknowledged.
The Korean Wave is a global phenomenon. North Korea must not become the one place on earth where people are entirely cut off from it. Allowing outside information to permeate North Korea naturally, enabling North Korean people to change from within, is not a hostile act. It is the most natural possible expression of care for fellow human beings and for eventual national reunification. We must not lose sight of North Korean people in our focus on Kim Jong Un.
What comes next
The Lee government’s first year has been a period of restructuring the broad contours of foreign, security, and unification policy amid considerable turbulence. The foundation has been partially laid. Now it is time to build in earnest, and structural flaws must be corrected now while correction is still possible.
First, the government must anchor its security philosophy more firmly. Formulas like the “peaceful two-state” concept may sound appealing but risk sacrificing long-term interests for short-term comfort. Advocating peaceful coexistence does not guarantee peace; there is a counterpart, and there are circumstances. There is no reason for us to voluntarily dance to a dictator’s tune, undermine our constitutional foundations, deepen domestic polarization, or narrow our own room for maneuver on the international stage.
A more patient posture, grounded in the two pillars established in 1991, the simultaneous U.N. membership of both Koreas (premised on mutual respect as near-state entities) and the Inter-Korean Basic Agreement (which defined the relationship as a “special interim relationship in the process of pursuing reunification, not a relationship between two states”), would allow Seoul to engage North Korea with both candor and an open door. These principles are the model West Germany followed when East Germany was pushing a “two nations, two states” line. Genuine quality endures; these two pillars remain sound.
In this spirit, I would again draw attention to the new unification framework I proposed in April 2024 in this column, which supplements the existing three-stage National Community Unification Plan (the “민족공동체통일방안”) by adding a “Stage 0” of North Korean system normalization, shifting emphasis from full unification as an immediate goal toward community-building, and preserving active, uninterrupted South Korean engagement with North Korean people both online and offline. Full unification can remain a vision for future generations while we focus on building the common ground that makes it possible.
Second, and in the same spirit, we must find ways to encourage organic change from below within North Korea. I am not calling for the restoration of the loudspeaker broadcasts the Lee government dismantled, nor for a return to the human rights offensive of the Yoon administration. I am saying that North Korean people deserve at minimum an environment in which they can naturally access Korean Wave content that the rest of the world embraces freely. We must not forget North Korean people out of fear of Kim Jong Un’s displeasure. Previous administrations failed precisely because they flew on a single wing. Over the long term, reaching the hearts of North Korean people is the surest foundation for both security and unification; as the proverb goes, persistent drops of water can split stone.
Third, the government must redouble its efforts in the area where it has been most successful: U.S.-South Korea alliance strengthening and pragmatic multilateral diplomacy. The goals of autonomous defense and OPCON return can only be pursued smoothly within a framework of robust mutual trust in the alliance. We must exercise wisdom in expanding our strategic autonomy without eroding the alliance’s core value. Security agencies must operate with precise role differentiation according to their respective mandates, pursuing a common objective through coordinated but differentiated action. Only then can South Korea stand as a truly free and democratic nation capable of leading both North Korea and the international community.
June 9, 2026 at 07:33AM
by DailyNK(North Korean Media)