"If you want peace, prepare for war" is a golden rule of military science. It originates from "De Re Militari" (Concerning Military Matters), regarded as ancient Rome's equivalent of Sun Tzu's "The Art of War." The maxim emphasizes the importance of military training, the establishment of discipline, and reform of the military system, and advocates a posture of strong armament. There is also a maxim cited to emphasize a more proactive path to peace. "They shall beat their swords into plowshares (farming tools such as plows) and their spears into pruning hooks (sickles); nation shall not take up sword against nation, nor shall they train for war anymore" is a passage from the Christian Bible. It conveys the message that if one lives by carrying out God's will, an era so peaceful and prosperous will eventually come that weapons can be turned into farming tools. The two maxims do not contradict each other. Rather, they are complementary. Only when national defense (spears and swords) is solid can citizens devote themselves to everyday economic activity (plows and sickles) with peace of mind, and such peaceful prosperity in turn supports the defense budget.
President Lee Jae-myung referenced the biblical passage about beating spears and swords into plowshares and sickles on the 14th. He did so in a commemorative speech at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls in Rome, Italy. The following day, he met Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican and asked him to visit Korea on the occasion of next year's World Youth Day in Seoul. On the 16th, during the official dinner of the Group of Seven (G7) summit held in France, he urged U.S. President Donald Trump to play a "peacemaker" role regarding the Korean Peninsula, and received a reply that the two would cooperate closely on the North Korea issue. This is interpreted as an attempt to pursue peace by promoting Lee's visit to Pyongyang on the occasion of the pope's visit to Korea, opening a channel for inter-Korean dialogue, and bringing about a subsequent North Korea-U.S. summit and other talks.
The question is whether North Korea will respond. North Korea has belittled President Lee's will for peaceful coexistence and has defined the two Koreas as two hostile states. At the same time, it is evading international sanctions by tightening its ties with China and Russia. Leaning on China and Russia, North Korea has nothing to seek from South Korea and the U.S., and it is obvious that it will continue to build up its nuclear and conventional forces. The reason President Lee still extends a hand of dialogue is that he judges halting at least the nuclear buildup to be the most urgent task. However, if negotiations with North Korea cannot proceed all the way to denuclearization and stop at a nuclear freeze, we will have to live with at least 50 North Korean nuclear weapons over our heads. To make matters worse, if North Korea demands that the U.S. reduce or limit its nuclear umbrella and enters nuclear disarmament negotiations, it will be a security catastrophe for us.
To deter North Korea's nuclear weapons, balance in security policy, such as building up armaments, is as important as a conciliatory peace policy. There are concerns that our current reality is falling behind this trend. North Korea sent troops to the Ukraine war and learned modern warfare such as drones, and then, through the Iran war, witnessed the strengths and weaknesses of the U.S. military's ability to conduct war. By comparison, our military failed to dispatch even a minimal battlefield analysis team to Ukraine. Recently, far from strengthening the South Korea-U.S. alliance, even access to U.S. military intelligence on North Korea has been restricted amid conflicts over policy direction within our security command.
The reality inside the military is even more serious. A considerable number of veteran commanders were swept out in the aftermath of the illegal Dec. 3 martial law incident, and concerns over leadership in the military command continue unabated. It is questionable whether "Kill Chain," the preemptive strike system for self-defense among the three-axis systems for deterring North Korea's nuclear weapons and missiles, will function properly. This is due to an atmosphere within the military of holding back for fear of being charged with treason. The shortage of military manpower resources is also serious, but the solution the Ministry of National Defense recently put forward is a stopgap policy of reducing the current four-tier enlisted rank system (private, private first class, corporal, sergeant) to three tiers. On top of this, with the integration of military academies and noncommissioned officers' discontent over poor treatment, the military system is shaking from top to bottom. Given this, it is doubtful whether we can properly respond to North Korean threats in an emergency.
The recent Iran war, which reached a vague ceasefire agreement 106 days after it began, showed that even the U.S. military, armed with advanced forces, cannot guarantee victory in the rapidly changing environment of modern warfare. In particular, North Korea's Kim Jong-un regime will be thoroughly analyzing artificial intelligence (AI), which has come to determine the course of war; asymmetric forces such as drones and ballistic missiles that drag conflicts into an endless quagmire of attrition; and mine warfare and full-population mobilization strategy (the so-called mosaic strategy) that make amphibious and ground warfare difficult. Our government and military authorities must also stay sharply alert, strengthen practical readiness for actual combat, and elevate the South Korea-U.S. alliance. Without the spears and swords to ward off foreign invasion, we cannot protect an era of peace in which we hold plows and sickles in our hands.
