For a “foreign policy expert” Joe doesn’t know that Japan and Korea weren’t happily together and then split up after WWII. Japan actually took Korea by military force in 1910 and made it their colony. They destroyed Korean cultural sites, enslaved their people, took their land and gave it to Japanese citizens. Nobody in Korea, North or South, wants to get together with Japan ever again. JFC Joe!
not even back then:
Major military efforts were taken by Kublai Khan of the Yuan dynasty in 1274 and 1281 to conquer the Japanese archipelago after the submission of the Korean kingdom of Goryeo to vassaldom. Ultimately a failure, the invasion attempts are of macro-historical importance because they set a limit on Mongol expansion and rank as nation-defining events in the history of Japan.
And you’re point being? Because of what happened a thousand years ago Biden can’t try to strengthen their relations? It is a good thing that Biden attempts that and Biden has done great work in that area. In 2023 for the first time in a long time the number of Japanese surveyed that thought positively of South koreans was greater than those who thought negatively. These surveys started in 2013 at 40% japanese thinking negatively of South Korea. Now it’s at 32% with a sharp decrease in 2022-2023.