From the streets of Washington, it would be hard to tell that a crisis is brewing over an American aircraft carrier — not in the Middle East but in northeast Asia. Far more important than the routine movement of U.S. carriers in the Middle East is the already much-delayed bilateral U.S.-South Korean naval exercise originally scheduled for early June and the question of whether the USS George Washington (CVN 73) will ultimately participate. The Washington put to sea from U.S. Fleet Activities Yokosuka, Japan, on July 9 and is currently operating in the Pacific Ocean, but it is unclear whether it will take part in the joint naval exercise, whenever (if ever) it finally takes place. A formal investigation of the March 26 sinking of the South Korean corvette ChonAn (772) determined that a Russian (Soviet-era) or Chinese torpedo almost certainly launched from a small North Korean submarine was responsible for the sinking. On May 27, a week after these findings were released, the U.S.-South Korean anti-submarine exercise was announced, scheduled for early June. This would have been a fairly rapid turnaround for an exercise, and the purpose was purely psychological — to demonstrate a strong American commitment to South Korea and to showcase their close defense relationship. The South Korean media immediately began to play up the involvement of the USS George Washington. (click here to enlarge image) The aircraft carrier is not the principal American anti-submarine warfare asset (which, doctrinally, is the U.S. Navy's nuclear-powered attack submarine fleet), and a carrier is hardly an appropriate or necessary asset that close to South Korean air bases on land and disputed waters off shore. But the presence of a carrier — still one of the strongest symbols of U.S. military power — would be important from the South Korean perspective to emphasize the depth of American support and that U.S. support was about more than just anti-submarine warfare. The more important message would be the American willingness and capability to counter North Korea, even amid Chinese opposition. In short, South Korea needed to show both North Korea and its own citizens that the United States remained strongly committed to South Korea's defense, particularly since the sinking had once again degraded public perception of Seoul's defensive capabilities and perhaps reshaped North Korea's perception as well. As a result, while a delay for organizational reasons and a hesitancy to dispatch a U.S. carrier are not necessarily without grounds, the repeated delay has had an impact in Seoul. The underlying American hesitancy has been over the consequences of antagonizing Beijing. Though American carriers transiting and operating in the Yellow Sea are not unprecedented, the idea of U.S. naval forces approaching the Shandong Peninsula and Korea Bay — the maritime approach to Beijing itself — is naturally unsettling to the Chinese public as well as the political and military leadership, posing a potential domestic political problem. While they are aware that it would be a political maneuver, not a military one, the symbolism would hardly play well in China. Adding to the perception troubles for Beijing, China's navy has been trying to assert Chinese claims over the South China Sea, but such an ambition would seem unrealistic if Beijing were shown to be unable to keep a U.S. aircraft carrier out of the much closer Yellow Sea. Given the importance of the American-Chinese relationship, the U.S. decision to engage in a naval exercise with the South Koreans — to say nothing of deploying a carrier — must be made in the context of the broader management of that relationship. But what Seoul has seen is the U.S. hesitation to fulfill what South Koreans perceive to be a basic and fully justified request of its closest ally in an important — albeit limited — crisis. Watching the United States fail to honor that request for fear of inviting some Chinese ire (the potential deployment of the USS Washington has been all over the Chinese news media and government statements for weeks) has resonated deeply in the South Korean psyche as a sign that the American security guarantee is not reliable. South Korea is trying to use the naval exercise and the American carrier in order to pressure China to dial back its support of a once-again emboldened regime in Pyongyang. A minor American-Chinese crisis does not necessarily harm South Korea's interests, and forcing an overt demonstration of the American military commitment to South Korea only strengthens it. But both attempts have backfired. South Korea has failed to pressure Beijing directly and failed — very visibly thus far — to obtain an American show of force. Indeed, even before the ChonAn incident, Seoul was realizing that it would have to request (and the United States has now accepted) a delay in the scheduled handover of operational wartime control of the South Korean forces (which the United States has held since the Korean War). The transfer, originally slated for less than a year and a half from now, will not take place until the end of 2015. While this delay has been building for some time, the ChonAn incident only compounded signs of South Korean military weakness, making the demonstration of the American commitment to Seoul through a show of force all the more important. Desperate to actually get the joint exercise under way, Seoul has even offered to conduct them on its eastern coast in order to sidestep Chinese and American concerns. But a symbolic exercise far from the intended target of the symbolism is unlikely to fully satisfy South Korea, and much of the damage may already have been done. In other words, South Korea is now facing a post-crisis rethinking of the ChonAn incident and the country's ability to defend itself, concerned as it is about an ally and security guarantor it fears can be intimidated into inaction by China. While South Korea does not have any alternative but to continue to work closely with the United States, the U.S. delay and reluctance has already made a deep impression on the defense establishment in Seoul, and it will undoubtedly be an important aspect of internal defense planning in the years ahead. Meanwhile, Pyongyang has pulled off another coup — not only getting away with an act of war without meaningful reprisal but also bringing world attention back to its doorstep. The six-party talks — opposed for the moment by Seoul because it knows once the talks begin the ChonAn incident will be overshadowed by broader issues (exactly what North Korea wants) — now seem on the verge of resuming. Perhaps even more troubling for Seoul is the prospect of bilateral talks between the United States and North Korea, possibly facilitated by China, which would leave South Korea somewhat on the sidelines. If either one of these scenarios plays out, Pyongyang will have succeeded in outmaneuvering Seoul after making it appear militarily impotent and by creating the circumstances for Seoul to question the strength of the American commitment.