U.S. Ambassador Mark Lippert Shoots Down Donald Trump's Assertion That Support For South Korea Is A One-Way Street
Frontrunner for the republican nomination for president and former host of "The Apprentice" Donald Trump may think the US is getting a bad deal from South Korea regarding support for the longtime ally's national defense program. But the U.S. Ambassador for the region, Mark Lippert, isn't buying it.
"We feel very good about the resource sharing that we and the Republic of Korea do together as an alliance, it is remarkable," Lippert told the room of American Chamber of Commerce in Korea members on Monday, according to the Yonghap News Agency.
Not referencing Trump by name, the South Korean ambassador cited his time at the Pentagon to pointedly shoot down the Donald's claims.
"You get a sense of the alliances and how much and who contributes what," Lippert said. "Korea does very well in terms of its contribution."
In what has been a recurring theme throughout his 2016 presidential bid, Trump told the Washington Post on March 21 that the US-South Korea deal is not equally beneficial to both parties.
"South Korea is very rich, great industrial country and yet we're not reimbursed fairly for what we do," Trump said.
"We're constantly sending our ships, sending our planes, doing our war games. We're reimbursed a fraction of what this is all costing."
Trump even compared the country to a deadbeat, saying, "personally, I don't think so," when asked if the US benefits at all from the alliance.
"I think we were a very powerful, very wealthy country and we are a poor country now," Trump said. "We're a debtor nation."
