The Fall 2024 issue of Korea Policy, Broadening the Alliance: New Frontiers in US-South Korea Cooperation, is a special issue focused on the US-ROK alliance. The issue is motivated by the broadening and deepening of the alliance into what Presidents Biden and Yoon in 2023 called a strategic economic and technology partnership and global comprehensive strategic alliance. The issue explores an array of new and emerging areas of alliance cooperation by charting leader-level commitments that have been made in these areas in recent years; taking stock of progress made; offering realistic, viable, and mutually beneficial paths for further progress; and highlighting various challenges and obstacles that could stand in the way.

Although the issue focuses specifically on the alliance, each area of alliance cooperation – not to mention the global comprehensive strategic alliance concept itself – requires a broader aperture that includes a range of other countries in the region and beyond; minilateral groupings; multilateral institutions; and the views of private sector actors and industry experts. Our various authors will help to provide that broader perspective. The first section of the issue explores US-South Korea cooperation in critical and emerging technologies, including in the areas of artificial intelligence and quantum computing, semiconductor supply chains and technology, clean energy technology, and biotechnology and biomanufacturing. The second section examines new and evolving areas of alliance cooperation, specifically in space, cyber, and defense industrial cooperation, including South Korea’s potential role in AUKUS Pillar Two.