Korean unification is not impeded by the presence of US troops, but by the demands of the DPRK over the nature of what the unified state would look like; it seems unlikely that the current Regime would give up its power just like that.
Remember that US troops were stationed in Berlin/ West Germany prior to German unification (i'll admit its not the exact same situation since the East German economy was relatively much stronger pre-unification than the current DPRK economy).
If you're suggesting that we should just let the DPRK take over ROK... well, I don't think any of the ROK inhabitants would like that.
> Korean unification is not impeded by the presence of US troops, but by the demands of the DPRK over the nature of what the unified state would look like.
The fact that the American military gets to decide what the Korean people want or what the reunification process will look like, is the single biggest factor hampering the peace process.
But as you know, that's not actually what's happening. If South Korea wanted they could kick the U.S. out and let North Korea come take over their government and be reunited. The U.S. would be very concerned about that, of course, but the American military is not really preventing this from happening. U.S. forces are in Korea for beneficial reasons to the U.S. and the West, but also at the behest of South Korea. Realistically, many people (from Trumpers to left-wingers) want U.S. forces out, albeit usually for different reasons, whereas the Korean government would prefer they stay in comparison.
Now, with that being said is American military presence an issue for North Korea? Yea definitely. But if the U.S. withdrew troops it's not like Korea would all of a sudden be reunited. There's a laundry list of issues that would need to be resolved. American military presence is just North Korea's go-to excuse because they seek to divide the South Korean and American alliance.
If North Korea wanted to, they could just open the borders, stop starving their people, and all that jazz. Why do they need to do all of that crap? Because 25,000 Americans are in South Korea? Yea ok.
There are actually evil people in the world that don't live in America. Many of them live in North Korea, happily starving people, raping women, and executing people for no good reason.
Remember that US troops were stationed in Berlin/ West Germany prior to German unification (i'll admit its not the exact same situation since the East German economy was relatively much stronger pre-unification than the current DPRK economy).
If you're suggesting that we should just let the DPRK take over ROK... well, I don't think any of the ROK inhabitants would like that.