No one said managing the U.S.-South Korea alliance would ever be easy, but we seem to be going through a particularly challenging period at present. For much of this year, the focal point of the relationship has been the March 2001 summit between U.S. President George W. Bush and South Korean President Kim Dae-jung. The summit left all involved feeling a little uneasy about the role the U.S. would be willing to play in inter-Korean relations. The delay in U.S.-DPRK contacts pending the recently concluded North Korea policy review did nothing to assuage the worriers.