Here’s the latest development after Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld suggested removing troops from the front lines in North Korea:
South Korea’s National Assembly on Wednesday authorized the dispatch of non-combat troops to support the U.S.-led war on Iraq….For days, [President Roh Moo-hyun] has struggled to muster support for the deployment of 600 South Korean military engineers and 100 medics in the Gulf, as the parliament wavered amid anti-war sentiment and delayed voting on the bill twice last week….”I came to the conclusion that helping the United States in difficult times and maintaining friendly U.S.-South Korean relations will help a lot in peacefully resolving the North Korean nuclear issue,” he [told Parliament]. [Associated Press, 4/3/03]
Remember, the new South Korean president got elected on an somewhat anti-American, peacenik platform.