Showdown Time for Roh and Bush

It is no exaggeration to say that this weekend’s Korea-U.S. summit in Washington will be the most momentous of the 41 Korea has had with its ally. At stake during the fourth meeting between presidents Roh Moo-hyun and George W. Bush will be the direction of the Seoul-Washington relationship, the North Korean dispute and thus, finally, nothing less than the future of the Korean Peninsula.

There is a smell in the air that some kind of decision has been reached and some kind of change is being sought. Bush has had time to think, taking a breather from the Iraq War, and seems to have decided that the first year of his second term is the right moment to tackle the North Korean problem head-on. Washington