The most dramatic example of the way in which China ’s rise has been transforming relations in the region, however, is South Korea. [925] After the Second World War it became an intimate ally of the United States, a relationship which was cemented in the Korean War, with no small part of its subsequent economic success due to its position as an American vassal state during the Cold War. Yet over the last decade it has been moving closer to China both at a governmental and a popular level. [926] China is now easily the country’s largest trading partner and South Korean firms have invested heavily in the mainland, with China the largest destination for Korean foreign investment. [927] Over half the students from East Asia studying for advanced degrees in China come from South Korea. [928] More than 1 million South Koreans visited China in 2003, while 490,000 Chinese made visits to South Korea. Each week, there are over 700 flights between the two countries. [929] The crisis over North Korea and its nuclear weapons has also served to bring China and South Korea closer together, with the latter discovering that it had more in common with the cautious Chinese position of restraint than the more aggressive American approach under Bush. Indeed, China ’s handling of the crisis and its emergence as the key mediator with North Korea has enhanced its standing both with South Korea and in the region more widely. [930] The fact that the United States has meanwhile strengthened its defence ties with Japan has further alienated South Korea, which views Japan with considerable enmity as a result of the latter’s conduct during its colonial occupation of the country. [931]
South Korea’s attitude towards North Korea and China on the one hand and the United States on the other, however, remains the subject of major domestic argument: after the two liberal administrations of Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun, which emphasized reconciliation with North Korea and sought closer relations with China, the election of conservative president Lee Myung-bak in 2008 marked a shift towards a tougher stance on North Korea and a closer relationship with the United States. There is also tension between China and South Korea over the precise ancestry of the ancient kingdom of Koguryo, which occupied territory in North Korea, South Korea and also over the Chinese border, and is claimed by both Korea and China as part of their history. In the longer run, however, it seems likely that South Korea will continue to move closer to China and further away from the United States, perhaps to the point where eventually the US-Korean alliance will be dissolved – but that is unlikely to happen within less than a decade, probably rather longer. [932] In the meantime, it is possible that the United States will eventually withdraw its troops from the Korean Peninsula if and when a solution is found to the present crisis. [933] The rapprochement between China and South Korea is a powerful echo of earlier times when Korea was a close and important tributary state of China, a situation that lasted many centuries until China ’s defeat in the Sino-Japanese War. [934]
