Through this comment of his, Kerry, who currently seems to be the front-runner for the presidency, has forecasted the future of the U.S. policy should he win office, a policy that would approach the issue from exact opposite direction of the “North Korea as Axis of Evil” policy by the Bush administration. For North Korea, Kerry’s plan of direct contact and improvement of the two countries' diplomatic relationship basically would allow North Korea to get much closer to its long-cherished dream of taking the initiative in discussing matters relating to the Korean Peninsula.

Direct diplomatic contact between the United States and North Korea is not an approach too late to take. The South Korean government also supports it, and furthermore, South Korea hopes that the two countries would conclude a treaty of amity someday. We must, however, understand that the U.S.-North Korean diplomatic relationship would have a totally different impact on the Korean Peninsula depending on the Korea-U.S. alliance. In relation to the changes in the Korea-U.S. alliance, the attitude of the United States towards South Korea and North Korea would definitely change. If the United States hold a summits meeting with North Korea to talk about peace treaties and unification issues without a strong Korea-U.S. alliance as its foundation, no doubt, South Korea could lose its place as an ally, making it hard to avoid fundamental changes in terms of political power on the Korean Peninsula. Of course, we cannot presuppose that the United States would go straight to North Korea without consulting South Korea. Nevertheless, everything depends on the future changes in the Korean-U.S. alliance.

What we can observe from Kerry’s comment is the heartless reality, the essence of international politics. Unification of the Korean Peninsula is not as simple as what naive social activists, political leftists or youths think. There is a high probability in which the decisions made by the United States, China and Japan would most likely determine the fate of the Korean Peninsula. The unification of Germany was made possible through a similar manner. Kerry’s comment clearly opened our eyes to the importance of wisely managing our alliance with the United States. This is because wise management of that alliance is linked to the unification process on the Korean Peninsula. This is the time when making smart choices is necessary in dealing with this heartless reality.