[Reporter’s Notebook] Four Years Into the Russia-Ukraine War, Ukraine Is Now Seeking a "Korean-Style Division"

U.S. Opposes Stationing Troops in Ukraine
Role of U.S. Forces Korea Also Beginning to Change

On the 22nd (local time) in Kyiv, Ukraine, firefighters are extinguishing a fire caused by a drone attack by Russian forces. Reuters-Yonhap

The Russia-Ukraine war marked its fourth anniversary on the 24th (local time). However, the sound of gunfire has not stopped. Last month, the United States, Ukraine, and Russia did sit down at the negotiating table to discuss ending the war, but they have failed to find a breakthrough.

The biggest obstacle to the negotiations is Ukraine's security in the postwar period. Ukraine is currently demanding a "Korean Peninsula-style division" system. It wants to establish a demilitarized zone along the roughly 1,200 km-long boundary with Russian-occupied territory and to build a security framework in which a combined forces command, with troops dispatched from the United States and Europe, is stationed there. Through this, it plans to secure long-term national security, as South Korea did after the Korean War, and to carry out a large-scale reconstruction project.

In the early stages of the war, Ukraine strongly opposed such a division scenario. It appealed to the international community for support, vowing to recapture all the territory seized by the invading Russia and to restore the borders to the prewar lines. However, as the war has dragged on for more than four years, people's livelihoods have begun to collapse completely. A rapid ceasefire and economic reconstruction have taken priority over territorial restoration.

The party that has come out against Ukraine's wishes is the United States. U.S. President Donald Trump has made it clear that not a single American soldier will set foot in Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has even stated in public since last month that he is negotiating with President Trump over the stationing of U.S. troops. However, the U.S. government has not taken any position. This is interpreted as an intention to adhere to its existing stance of providing only limited military supplies, with absolutely no plan to dispatch troops or to form a combined forces command together with European countries.

The reality of division on the Korean Peninsula is a tragedy for the Korean people. But in Ukraine, it is cited as a solid security foundation. This means that the international order is changing rapidly as time goes by. Even the term "New Cold War," which was in vogue up until the Biden administration in the United States, has in effect long disappeared. The Trump administration is continuing its attempts to annex Greenland, and the once-sacrosanct Atlantic alliance of the 1980s is now on the brink of collapse. The European Union (EU), no longer able to trust the United States and fearing a possible U.S. withdrawal from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), is even drawing up plans to build its own 100,000-strong European defense force.

In this reality, the division of the Korean Peninsula must also be reconsidered. The division system on the Korean Peninsula that has continued since the Korean War can be overturned at any time depending on the geopolitical security situation.

Changes are already visible in the movements of U.S. Forces Korea. On the 18th and 19th, U.S. Air Force F-16 fighter jets that took off from Osan Air Base in Pyeongtaek conducted training flights to an area near China's Air Defense Identification Zone (CADIZ) over the West Sea and faced off against Chinese fighter jets. U.S. Forces Korea, which had focused on deterrence against North Korea, has now moved to actively checking China. Some analysts say this shows that the shift in U.S. military strategy, which has hinted at an expanded role for U.S. Forces Korea in the region, has already begun. We must recognize that the wave of major transformation in the international order, triggered by the war in Ukraine, has already reached right to our doorstep.