WTH Extra! Martial Law in South Korea? Zack Cooper Explains
What the Hell Is Going On
AEI Podcasts
4.4 • 633 Ratings
🗓️ 5 December 2024
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Late Tuesday night South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol declared martial law, accusing the opposition party of “legislative dictatorship” and vowing to eradicate “pro-North Korean anti-state forces.” Almost as suddenly as martial law was declared, the legislature voted unanimously for it to end – sending the very military forces that attempted to lock down the National Assembly packing. What do Yoon’s actions mean for the future of South Korean politics? How might a collapse of South Korea’s conservative party affect U.S.-Korean relations? And what are the broader implications for American allies and partners in Asia?
Zack Cooper is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he studies US strategy in Asia, including alliance dynamics and U.S.-China competition. He also teaches at Princeton University and serves as chair of the board of the Open Technology Fund. Zack previously served as the assistant to the deputy national security adviser for combating terrorism at the National Security Council and as a special assistant to the principal deputy undersecretary of defense for policy at the Department of Defense. His upcoming book is Tides of Fortune: The Rise and Decline of Great Militaries (Yale University Press, 2025).
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| 0:00.0 | This podcast is brought to you by the American Enterprise Institute. |
| 0:03.0 | If you like what you hear, please subscribe, rate, review, and share. Thanks for listening. Here's our show. What the hell's going on? What the hell is going on? What the hell is going on? I don't know what the hell he's talking about. You don't have to know what the hell is on it. What hell's the matter with these guys? We don't know what's going on. What hell's going on? |
| 0:01.1 | Who in God's name |
| 0:21.7 | knows what it's all about. Hi, I'm Danielle Pletka. And I'm Mark Tiesen. Welcome to our podcast. What |
| 0:33.6 | the hell is going on? Mark, the world appears to be falling apart. What's the latest? |
| 0:39.8 | Well, Americans woke up to see that there was martial law in South Korea, and then by the time |
| 0:45.3 | they went to bed, the martial law had ended. It was the shortest military coup in modern history. |
| 0:50.9 | Most people, most of our listeners, I assume, do not spend a lot of time studying |
| 0:54.5 | South Korean politics. And their most recent memory of the South Korean president, if they paid |
| 1:00.5 | any attention at all, was hearing him saying, bye-bye, Miss America pie at the White House |
| 1:04.8 | at a state dinner the other night. In fact, let's play a little piece of the musical talents |
| 1:09.1 | of the South Korean president. A long, long time ago, I can still remember how that music used to make me smile. |
| 1:24.7 | And now I knew he fed my chains |
| 1:27.7 | That I can make those people dancing |
| 1:31.0 | Maybe they be happy for a while |
| 1:37.7 | So those are the musical stylings of the president of South Korea |
| 1:41.0 | Danny, he went from singing bye-bye Miss America Pie to declaring |
| 1:45.8 | the world's shortest martial law. What the hell? You know, I mean, this was political |
| 1:54.8 | malpractice of the worst order. And it's one thing, if you are a guy who's got your own party in power, |
| 2:05.0 | and you control the president's house, in Korea it's the blue house, and you control the legislature, |
| 2:11.6 | and you control the press, and everybody's favorable, that's not the way it is. This is more like Donald Trump and the |
| 2:20.6 | media is controlled by the far left and Congress is controlled by the Democratic Party and he decides |
... |
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