"To realize peace on the Korean peninsula, and to develop exchange, cooperation between both Koreas, they are the, you know, immediate target of our government"
About this Quote
Peace is framed here less as a lofty aspiration than as a managerial deliverable: a “target” with a timeline, ownership, and measurable outputs. Coming from Kim Dae-jung, this language is telling. A dissident-turned-president known for betting his legacy on engagement, he’s selling rapprochement not as sentiment but as statecraft. The phrase “exchange, cooperation” does the heavy lifting, pushing peace away from abstract ceasefire rhetoric and toward the practical mechanics of reducing hostility: trade, visits, joint projects, bureaucratic habits of contact.
The subtext is aimed at two skeptical audiences at once. Domestically, Kim is signaling that engagement isn’t capitulation; it’s a disciplined national agenda. Internationally, especially to Washington and Tokyo, he’s presenting inter-Korean outreach as aligned with security goals rather than a freelancing détente that could undercut alliance strategy. Calling it an “immediate” target also hints at urgency: the window for dialogue on the peninsula tends to open and slam shut with leadership cycles in Pyongyang, shifts in U.S. policy, and spikes of military tension.
Then there’s the revealing verbal hitch: “they are the, you know.” In a polished diplomatic setting, that stumble reads as an effort to soften what is effectively a directive. Kim is trying to sound pragmatic without sounding triumphalist, aware that “peace” on Korea is never a purely South Korean project. Even in its clumsy syntax, the sentence captures his doctrine: normalize contact first, let trust be the byproduct, and treat reconciliation as work the state must relentlessly schedule.
The subtext is aimed at two skeptical audiences at once. Domestically, Kim is signaling that engagement isn’t capitulation; it’s a disciplined national agenda. Internationally, especially to Washington and Tokyo, he’s presenting inter-Korean outreach as aligned with security goals rather than a freelancing détente that could undercut alliance strategy. Calling it an “immediate” target also hints at urgency: the window for dialogue on the peninsula tends to open and slam shut with leadership cycles in Pyongyang, shifts in U.S. policy, and spikes of military tension.
Then there’s the revealing verbal hitch: “they are the, you know.” In a polished diplomatic setting, that stumble reads as an effort to soften what is effectively a directive. Kim is trying to sound pragmatic without sounding triumphalist, aware that “peace” on Korea is never a purely South Korean project. Even in its clumsy syntax, the sentence captures his doctrine: normalize contact first, let trust be the byproduct, and treat reconciliation as work the state must relentlessly schedule.
Quote Details
| Topic | Peace |
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