Is the U.S. - South Korea Alliance in Jeopardy?

Recently, former senior officials of South Korean President Roh's own administration have expressed serious concern about his approach to North Korea and to the alliance with the U.S. Mr. Straub will examine the prospects for the U.S.-South Korean alliance, especially in light of major differences between the two governments over how to deal with North Korea. He will also explain the origins and the nature of anti-Americanism in South Korea today, and offer his views on how the U.S. and South Korea could put their alliance on a sounder footing.

David Straub retired from the U.S. Department of State in 2006 as a Senior Foreign Service Officer after a 30-year career focused on Northeast Asian affairs. He worked over 12 years on Korean affairs, first arriving in Seoul in 1979, just months before the assassination of President Park Chung Hee. He served as head of the political section at the U.S. embassy in Seoul from 1999 to 2002 during popular protests against the U.S., and played a key working-level role in the Six-Party Talks on North Korea's nuclear program as the State Department's Korea country desk director from 2002 to 2004.

Straub's final assignment was as the State Department's Japan country desk director in 2004, when he was co-leader of the U.S. delegation to talks with Japan on the realignment of the U.S.-Japan alliance and of U.S. military bases in Japan. He currently works as a consultant with Northeast Asia Associates, and lectures on U.S.-Korean relations at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, D.C. He is fluent in Korean, Japanese, and German.