The Lost Nomad posted on an article about the changing nature of anti-Americanism in South Korea, and I had to comment.

The article, “Re-writing the Past/ Re-Claiming the Future: Nationalism and the Politics of Anti-Americanism in South Korea,” by Sheila Miyoshi Jager, begins with an example of historical revision that reinterprets with a anti-American slant, as opposed to an anti-Communist or North Korea view. The example is the Taejon (a.k.a. Daejon) Massacre, in which about 7,000 ROK POWs were killed by North Korean forces. The conventional wisdom since the end of the war has been that the people behind such an event are evil, and so is the system that moved them.

However, here is a new way to look at it, which although may lack in logic, makes up for it in nationalism;

As one journalist of the liberal Han’gyore shinmun put it, “the September massacre by the NKPA was an act of retaliation for the previous killings of leftist prisoners by the Republic of Korea (ROK).” (2) Moreover, the July massacre, according to the same source, “was impossible without the agreement or at least, acquiescence, of the American authorities who held commanding authority during the war.” Professor Kang Man-gil of Koryo University voiced these views even more forcefully: “Since pictures were taken and official reports made to the U.S. government by the U.S. military, we cannot but examine the question of American responsibility for the (July) massacre.”(3) What was once reviled as a despicable act of wanton violence committed by the North Korean People’s Army is now being touted as a rational act of vengeance, while the earlier July killings–the new focus of concern– are being blamed on the invisible hand of American forces for allowing the ROK soldiers to pull the trigger. [emphasis added]

Let’s look at the accuracy of some of these statements and assessments.

First the position that the U.S. had to, in some passive way in the least, condone the illegal ROK killing of DPRK POWs, since the U.S. had operational control of forces. The obvious answer is that ROK commanders may have just done as they pleased on occasion, since there is absolutely no sort of documentation or other proof that U.S. forces in any way knew of this beforehand. ROK troops didn’t have (or legally need) permission from USFK when they moved on Kwangju in 1980, either. Second, reports were made to the U.S. concerning the ROKA illegally killing DPRK POWs. The answer is, so what? A report after the fact does not show acquiescence before or during the act. But a Korean professor is saying it, and Koreans will believe it, especially since it only serves to reinforce what a very large segment of the society already wants to believe; the ‘Korean people,’ which includes the North and South, were ultimately the helpless victims of U.S. imperialism.

Unsurprisingly, “Park Myong-nim, a Yonsei University historian who also serves as an advisor to president Roh Mu-hyon on North-South Korean Affairs,” has written extensively on related subjects.

The article that this is related to the trend in how the South views the North since the fall of the Soviet Union. I would add that Kim Dae-jung’s ‘Sunshine Policy,’ and policy decisions beginning with his administration, bear direct responsibility for the sharper turn in sentiment since 2000. The current South Korean President took full advantage of this;

This policy conflict over North Korea in turn has fed into popular anti-American sentiments in South Korea, generating a powerful current that president Roh Mu-hyun rode into the Blue House in 2002. Indeed, in February 2003, Yoon Young-kwan—then a member of Roh’s transition team, later South Korea’s foreign minister who was then ousted for this so-called “pro-American” views—caused consternation in Washington for allegedly preferring a nuclear North Korea to a collapse scenario.

The article concludes rather more kindly that the proponents of such nonsense deserve;

Efforts to finally end the Korean War reveal how pan-Korean nationalism and the current struggle over how to best deal with the North Korean nuclear crisis are intimately caught up in the politics of memory and South Koreans’ need to accommodate North Korea both in their past and in their future.

Read the rest here.