President Moon Jae-in shakes hands with North Korean special envoy Kim Yo-jong during her visit to Seoul. / Yonhap





By Oh Young-jin



Different from the case of NBC, the U.S. main Olympic broadcaster which mistook the host city, PyeongChang, as being in North Korea, there is a conspicuous reason that the quadrennial event in the South Korean city is not what is expected of a typical Olympics.



It deserves to be called "Polympics" with a capital P standing for politics of a complicated brand ― with fierce, divisive, unifying and confusing elements ― which may reset the existing order on the Korean Peninsula and affect the global one, as well.



The fierce element was made in plain sight when South Korea put all it had on the line and persuaded the United States and by extension Japan to delay the annual ROK-U.S. military drills that would have occurred during the Olympics. U.S. President Donald Trump reluctantly conceded to the combination of pleas and threats by President Moon Jae-in to delay the drills until after the PyeongChang Games.



Of course, there was little difference between pleas and threats, which boiled down to the fact that if the North was cajoled and given no piece of the action, it would play its game, spoil the Games and let the tension spiral out of control.

Then, there were the sacrifices expected from the South Korean female ice hockey players as the result of the formation of a joint team ― in terms of playing time and slots on the roster.





U.S. Vice President Mike Pence is with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at the PyeongChang Olympics opening ceremony. Behind them are North Korean special envoy Kim Yo-jong and its ceremonial leader Kim Yong-nam. / Yonhap