Retired Navy Adm. Harry Harris, the U.S. ambassador to South Korea, said he is optimistic about the alliance with the key Asian ally as turbulence mounts on both ends of the peninsula heading into the new year.

Coming weeks will likely “set the tone” for 2020 in terms of how North Korea reacts to a fast-approaching, end-of-year deadline it imposed for concessions from the United States, Harris told the Honolulu Star- Advertiser on Friday. He is scheduled to speak at today’s National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day commemoration.

North Korea, which has carried out 13 short- and medium-range missile test launches since last spring, is frustrated that a deal has not come to fruition.

Ri Thae Song, North Korea’s vice minister of foreign affairs, warned in a statement Tuesday that dialogue touted by the United States is “nothing but a foolish trick” and threatened that it is up to America “what Christmas gift it will select to get” — leading to worries about a resumption of long-range missile tests.

“North Korea, for sure, gets a vote” in how the near future will shape up. “Give it two more weeks and we’ll probably have a pretty good view if they do something untoward here as an outcome of this deadline,” Harris said in a discussion of the region’s challenges.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration is reported to be seeking a 500% increase to as much as $5 billion from South Korea in a cost-sharing agreement to keep about 28,000 U.S. troops on the peninsula. The current agreement is set to expire at the end of the year.

Harris said he does not believe there has been a resulting erosion of trust with South Korea.

“I believe our alliance is as strong as it has ever been,” the former head of U.S. Indo- Pacific Command at Camp H.M. Smith said. “That said, there are issues inside the alliance, just like there are issues inside many alliances that we have around the world. And it’s the strength of the alliance that allows us to work through these difficult and challenging issues.”

Asked about the $5 billion figure, Harris said, “We’re in the midst of the negotiations now — they just finished a round in Washington, (and) the next round is later this month — so I don’t want to talk specific numbers.”

But he did say that the United States believes that a “rich nation like Korea can and should do more to help defray the costs” of U.S. troops stationed there for the nation’s protection.

Harris, ambassador to South Korea for just over 17 months, commanded U.S. Indo-Pacific Command from May 2015 to May 2018. Before that he headed the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor.

Harris was briefly stationed at Naval Air Station Barbers Point around 1990, flying P-3 Orion sub-hunting and reconnaissance aircraft.

If the cost-sharing “Special Measures Agreement” with Seoul expires without a new deal at the end of the year, it would trigger furloughs within the first quarter of 9,500 to 10,000 Koreans who work for U.S. Forces Korea, Harris said.

Harris noted that the separate North Korean end-of-year deadline for a deal with the United States is a self- imposed one.

“Don’t know what it means,” he said. “Don’t know what this ‘Christmas present’ thing means. But I can assure you that U.S. forces and our Korean allies under Combined Forces Command are ready for any eventuality.”

He added that “President Trump has been clear that he’s ready to continue negotiating.”

As the United States faces increased tension with South Korea over cost- sharing there, Foreign Policy reported that the Trump administration wants a fourfold increase in the $2 billion Japan pays per year to station 54,000 U.S. troops there.

Asked about China’s growing influence, Harris said the thinking prevailed for a long time that China’s pursuits “would converge with our notion of a global free and open order.”

“It didn’t work that way,” Harris said, adding that the realization has been reached that China is a competitor with the United States.

“Competition doesn’t have to mean conflict,” he said. “But it means competition. And we’re going to compete head-on where we need to. And as I used to say at (Indo-Pacific Command), we’ll confront if we have to. But competition of itself doesn’t necessarily have to lead to that. And I’m hopeful that it won’t.”