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The outgoing Asia director at the U.S. National Security Council, Victor Cha, says the U.S. is the only country armed with enough military power and diplomatic connections to bring together several countries to tackle a massive crisis. Talking about the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami, Cha told the Washington Post, ¡°You see that in the crisis of this magnitude, what is the country that steps up and provides the public good? It wasn't China. China's role was helpful but peripheral. It was the United States.¡±
Now deputy chief negotiator to the six-nation nuclear talks, the former academic led a debate on the rise of China and the eclipse of the U.S. However, he confessed he drastically changed his views while watching the U.S. lead aid for Indonesian tsunami victims, which came shortly after he started his new job as Asia expert at the White House in Christmas week in 2004. ¡°It¡¯s not only that we responded but that everyone is looking to us to respond,¡± he said.
The former Georgetown University professor leaves the White House and returns to teaching this week. Under the title ¡°NSC Post a Real-World Lesson for Cha,¡± the Washington Post chronicled the fluent Korean-speaker's years at the White House. Originally an advocate of a hardline approach toward North Korea, which he characterizes as ¡°hawk engagement,¡± Cha eventually drafted a memo that helped persuade President George W. Bush to give the green light to U.S. negotiators for a bilateral meeting with their North Korean counterparts in Berlin earlier this year -- an idea that had earlier been taboo.
¡°Cha caught Bush's eye by arguing in his memo that it is time to test North Korea's intentions -- seeking an agreement with specific actions and a limited time frame,¡± the daily reports. Last month, Cha became the first U.S. government official to make a trip to North Korea in five years, accompanying New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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