Challenges to ROK-U.S. Security Relations

The United States expended some $75 billion and suffered 54, 000 dead and 103, 000 wounded defending South Korea during the Korean War. By 1954, the United States commitment to Republic of Korea (ROK) security had been formalized in a mutual defense treaty. During the 1960s, the military and trade relationship remained close as Korea enjoyed rapid economic growth. But the outbreak of the Vietnam War severely restricted United States resources available for South Korea and fostered an assertion of South Korean independence in the relationship. Although the Vietnam War solidified the relationship between the United States and South Korea, it also demonstrated the limits to United States power. The United States curtailed its commitment to Korean security in an even more direct fashion in 1971, withdrawing 20, 000 troops from the Korean Peninsula. Since the Korean War, the trend in the ROK-United States security relationship has been toward increasing Korean independence.