Why Defend South Korean Ingrates? by Justin Raimondo

Like the child who innocently asks “Where are the Emperor’s clothes?” Donald Trump has once again blurted out a truth that none of the “adults” in the room are supposed to acknowledge. In an interview with Reuters, the President averred:

“On the THAAD system, it’s about a billion dollars. I said, ‘Why are we paying? Why are we paying a billion dollars? We’re protecting. Why are we paying a billion dollars?’ So I informed South Korea it would be appropriate if they paid. Nobody’s going to do that. Why are we paying a billion dollars? It’s a billion dollar system. It’s phenomenal. It’s the most incredible equipment you’ve ever seen – shoots missiles right out of the sky. And it protects them and I want to protect them. We’re going to protect them. But they should pay for that, and they understand that.”

Ah, but they don’t understand it – and neither does H. R. McMaster, Trump’s newly-appointed National Security Advisor, who rushed to assure Seoul that the President didn’t really mean what he clearly said. And the South Koreans, who are in the midst of a presidential election – the vote is on May 5 – are in a uproar.

Moon Jae-in, the liberal candidate who is favored to win, opposes the antimissile deployment, and criticizes the decision by his impeached predecessor to go ahead with it without seeking parliamentary approval. He is the author of a recent book wherein he writes that South Korea must learn to “say no to the United States.”

Installation of the system began in March, under the agreement between Washington and Seoul, but now Moon is raising questions about the nature of that agreement. The New York Times reports that “The gap between Mr. Trump’s comments and what South Koreans have been told by their government about the cost of the deployment ‘makes it clear that there was a serious flaw in the decision to deploy Thaad,’ [Moon spokesman] Mr. Youn said on Friday.”

To continue reading: Why Defend South Korean Ingrates?