There’s growing skepticism among the American public about U.S. commitments abroad., matched with growing doubt among allies and partners—monitoring political currents in the United States—about the credibility of those commitments. Even for those who still retain faith in Washington, concern is rising about U.S. capacity to meet its commitments, considering increased demands on U.S. attention and resources amid ongoing wars in Ukraine and the Middle East. Observers question if the United States can properly meet what it calls its pacing challenge—China—in the Indo-Pacific or beyond.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and other U.S. officials have argued that the United States can walk and chew gum at the same time, mainly because of its unparalleled network of allies and partners. To uphold what it calls the rules-based international order, Washington has increasingly leaned upon existing alliances and partnerships that exist largely outside of the multilateral institutions that previously underpinned that order, such as the United Nations and World Trade Organization.
Instead, Washington has sought to strengthen long-standing treaty alliances (i.e., NATO as well as the U.S.-Japan and U.S.-South Korea alliances) and tried to reenergize or establish various minilateral bodies throughout the Indo-Pacific, ranging from the Quad (Australia, India, Japan, and the United States) and AUKUS (Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) to IPEF (Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity) and Chip-4 (a proposed grouping of Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the United States). However, these groupings have achieved only limited traction and continue to face significant hurdles.
The United Nations Command (UNC), a U.S.-led multinational command headquartered in South Korea (formally named the Republic of Korea, or ROK), is often overlooked in discussions of the minilateral architecture that Washington hopes to construct in the Indo-Pacific. To be sure, there are good reasons for this. The UNC has a narrow scope, and its own history was marked by long periods when it was understaffed and relatively unimportant, even on the Korean Peninsula.
Nevertheless, the UNC has a much longer history and is far more institutionalized than other minilaterals, such as the Quad or AUKUS. If the broader multilateral architecture has fallen into disrepair, building a latticework of institutions and bodies underneath it may be the next best alternative. The recent ROK-UNC defense ministerial meeting provides an opportunity to underscore recent efforts to modernize the UNC.
The UNC was established in the early stages of the Korean War as a U.S.-led, multinational warfighting command, made up of 15 member states that sent forces and five others that provided medical or humanitarian assistance. However, UNC member state commitment quickly waned after the armistice was signed and most members withdrew their forces.
And following the establishment of the U.S.-ROK Combined Forces Command in 1978, all warfighting responsibilities were passed from the UNC to that group, while the UNC remained focused on implementing, managing, and enforcing the armistice. Over the next 20 years, it was deemphasized and understaffed.
In the early 2000s, South Korea’s remarkable political and economic transformation resulted in many UNC member states, such as Australia, Canada, and the U.K., strengthening diplomatic ties with Seoul and, by extension, recommitting in various ways to the UNC. Improved inter-Korean relations brough increased attention to the UNC’s role overseeing the demilitarized zone and military demarcation line between the two Koreas. Additionally, North Korea’s nuclear program meant the UNC’s armistice enforcement responsibilities took on added significance. Successive four-star U.S. commanders in chief of the UNC began to see increased involvement by the group’s member states as an untapped resource.
Starting in 2008, a multinational coordination center was established under United States Forces Korea, a U.S. unilateral command, but later folded into the UNC as part of the broader so-called revitalization campaign begun in 2015 (and ended in 2018). The center facilitates multinational planning and coordination in and outside of U.S.-ROK military exercises.
In 2018, the Canadian and U.S. governments co-hosted the Vancouver Foreign Ministers’ Meeting on Security and Stability on the Korean Peninsula. It brough together 18 foreign ministers from the ROK, Japan, and UNC member states that provided support to Seoul during the Korean War, marking the first diplomatic consultation based upon UNC affiliation since the war. And since 2018, successive Canadian, Australian, and U.K. officers have served as the deputy commander at the UNC headquarters, with another Canadian three-star general recently appointed to the position.
Under the new terminology of UNC “modernization,” the U.S.-ROK alliance has welcomed increased member state involvement on the Korean Peninsula, with Washington and Seoul aligning their messaging on the issue. For example, during the alliance’s Ulchi Freedom Shield combined military exercises in August, ROK and U.S. officials announced the participation of UNC personnel in a joint statement, a subtle yet noteworthy shift in strategic communication given that previous announcements were unilaterally made by United States Forces Korea.
Moreover, the ROK itself has begun to welcome greater UNC member state participation in its own military activities. In October, bomb disposal teams from Belgium, Canada, New Zealand, and the Philippines, alongside U.S. personnel and naval assets, participated in South Korea’s multinational mine warfare drills. Simultaneously, ROK and U.K. forces engaged in combined, high-tech military training drills at the Korea Combat Training Center, which included a company of the British Army’s Scots Guards.
Importantly, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol has been outspoken in his praise of the UNC as playing a critical role in peace on the Korean Peninsula. This stance differs from both his progressive and conservative predecessors, who criticized the UNC for infringing on South Korean sovereignty, whether by limiting inter-Korean engagement or hamstringing the ROK’s self-defensive measures against North Korean provocations. Yoon has also openly noted that the UNC’s rear bases and facilities in Japan play an important role in deterring North Korea, marking one part of a broader effort to boost bilateral ROK-Japan ties.
The ROK-UNC Member States Defense Ministerial Meeting held on Nov. 14 in Seoul, the day after the annual U.S.-ROK Security Consultative Meeting, built upon these previous efforts. The meeting was notable in that it was the first such meeting hosted by the ROK and combined defense ministers and representatives from 17 UNC member states, although only South Korea and United States sent their highest-level defense officials.
In addition to honoring the past contributions and sacrifices of member states, one outcome of the meeting was the participants’ determination to “continue increasing mutual exchange and cooperation between the ROK-U.S. Alliance and UNC Member States to inform our combined training and exercises”; in other words, to build upon existing efforts.
The participants’ joint statement was also of note, declaring “that they will be united upon any renewal of hostilities or armed attack on the Korean Peninsula challenging the principles of the United Nations and the security of the Republic of Korea.” The statement offered a toned-down rehashing of the so-called Greater Sanctions Statement released during the Korean War.
Unlike the 1952 statement, this year’s version jettisoned mention of being “prompt to resist” or expanding the conflict beyond the frontiers of the Korean Peninsula, even though any renewed conflict in Korea would almost certainly expand beyond the peninsula and do so quickly.
The November meeting’s value was more symbolic than substantive. Nonetheless, it provides a framework upon which to build in the future. This could be done in several ways.
First, beginning with this inaugural meeting and in addition to South Korea’s continued strengthening of bilateral relations with individual UNC member states, an official multilateral diplomatic consultative body should be created under the UNC’s name. And South Korea should take a leading role as a host nation of the annual gathering. Currently, the U.S. four-star commander of the UNC/CFC/USFK presides over a regular roundtable attended by ambassadors (and military attaches) from each member country.
However, the UNC should also create and convene the new consultative body, with annual meetings led by South Korea’s Defense or Foreign Ministry. Over time, it also may be worthwhile for other UNC member states not only to increase the level of defense officials attending, but also to host such meetings in their home countries, signaling to their publics the importance of the commitment.
Second, for substantive military cooperation, member states’ participation in the UNC’s “force-providing” mission is necessary. Up to this point, UNC member states have been reticent to clearly delineate what sort of contribution they could or would make in the case of a renewal of hostilities—but they need to indicate more clearly what assistance they could offer.
Further down the road, the UNC should develop an institutional framework for the provision of forces. Once tasks and resources are allocated based on member states’ capabilities and willingness, the UNC should establish institutional mechanisms for government-level requests. Strengthening both multilateral and bilateral cooperation will emphasize South Korea’s responsibility and leadership, especially as the alliance moves toward a future-oriented, ROK-led Combined Forces Command.
Visiting force agreements would clarify South Korea’s status as a host nation and facilitate stable and institutionalized force contributions from member states. These agreements can have several benefits, including strengthening diplomatic cooperation among UNC members, mitigating domestic political resistance in member states, and expediting the process of readying forces for combat. Given that both the United States (as the lead nation) and South Korea (as the host nation) are both invested in this process, a compromise approach to negotiating these visiting force agreements is necessary.
Third, following the joint communique released after the recent U.S.-ROK Security Consultative Meeting , Washington and Seoul should seek to broaden UNC membership through the participation of like-minded countries that share values with the ROK and the United States, anchored in the principles and mandates of the U.N. Charter. This should start with South Korea adding its own general-level officers to the UNC; move on to adding previous member states, such as India and Germany; and potentially expand to others where the situation is currently politically fraught, such as Japan.
Fourth, more effort should go into public diplomacy within South Korea to garner support for modernizing the UNC. The ROK-UNC meeting already caused blowback from Pyongyang, which called it a “dangerous scheme to ignite a new war of aggression.” Beijing also likely views any upgrading of the UNC with profound skepticism. If improved U.S.-ROK-Japan trilateral relations are seen by Pyongyang and Beijing as the creation of an Asian NATO, then a more robust UNC—along the lines recommended above—would only enhance that feeling, which is one that some South Koreans share.
That would require smart public diplomacy to counter. This messaging should emphasize that rather than a U.S.-led militarization strategy that compromises Korean sovereignty, the process would require Seoul’s leadership. And no UNC member state is going to increase and regularize its commitment without determining that it’s in its own interest to do so and that its voice will be heard. In fact, such a process will reduce, relatively speaking, the U.S. ability to shape the environment, since Washington will need to incorporate allied and partner perspectives into both peacetime and crisis-oriented planning.
Moreover, growing multilateral consultation and diplomatic signaling around maintaining peace and stability on the peninsula could help shift some of the balance away from nuclear blandishments and strategic asset deployments as the optimal way to deter North Korea. It may help reduce the temperature by growing the team. Finally, given the intense demands on U.S. resources and attention, it behooves all stakeholders involved to think hard now about ways to upgrade the UNC.
Washington calls North Korea a “persistent threat.” But from Seoul’s view, it is a steadily worsening one. Seoul needs more partners willing to support its defense. For Washington, which had serious doubts about its ability to meet the challenge from China even before the intensification of conflicts in Europe and the Middle East, inviting greater and more formalized allied contributions to the UNC makes sense, especially before a crisis or conflict forces its hand.
The innumerable, complex challenges and enormous demands on U.S. forces and resources in a potential conflict with China are such that Washington needs to clarify what other allies and partners can bring to bear. Shoring up these commitments now, during peacetime, would not only help with preparedness, but also send a powerful collective deterrent signal, thus reducing the chances of conflict to begin with.
A true peace on the peninsula may continue to elude the United States, China, and the two Koreas (at least for the foreseeable future). At the very least, efforts should be made to stabilize the armistice.