Taliban Kill Another Korean Hostage
by Richardson ~ July 31st, 2007. Filed under: Asia, Central Asia, Religion, Terrorism.Taliban killed another Korean hostage in Afghanistan after the latest deadline for negotiations expired on Monday. Qari Yousuf Ahmadi, a purported spokesman for the Taliban, told the Chosun Ilbo, AFP and AP by phone, “’Finally tonight at 8:30, we killed one of the Koreans named Sung Sim with AK-47 gunshots.” He claimed the armed group also killed one German hostage.The victim is presumed to be Shim Sung-min. The body of the hostage had been dumped in the Qarabagh district of the southern province of Ghazni, Ahmadi said. Shim is the second Korean killed by the militants after the Rev. Bae Hyung-kyu, who died last Wednesday. Shim recently quit his job and was preparing to go to an agricultural graduate school.
Korean media and blogosphere will try their best to shift the blame to the United States (in fact they are already doing so), but the outcry by much of the public will be against the terrorists, not the West.
Nonetheless, a majority of the Korean public, for now, seems to favor being nice to terrorists (read negotiation) to get the hostages released “while there is still time.” This kind of sentiment is not unique to South Korea. Indeed, in a strange and perverse way, it is a sign of sorts that South Korea now belongs to “the civilized world.” This is the kind of public sentiment one would find in, say, Spain or Italy (or Japan, for that matter and increasingly the United States) — civilized, prosperous, and pacifist nations where people seek to avoid conflict and prize “the good life.”
In a similar situation, there would have been another sentiment entirely in the South Korea of 30-40 years ago: a blood-curdling tribal-warcry of REVENGE — the kind of sentiment that made ROK Marines so effective and awe-inspiring in Vietnam.
It is a self-loathing pathos of a post-modern capitalist democracy where victimhood trumps victory on the moral plane — why fight like dog-faces and win when suffering from aggressions of others is a far nobler endeavor?
Are we now reaching the apex of the reaction against the kind of virulent nationalism and imperalism of the 19th Century and the early 20th Century that resulted in the bloodbath of the two world wars?
Can people arouse themselves from a cozy, air conditioned Starbucks to muster rage and anger against those who harm their tribe or is such “primitive” feeling passé along with rabbit hunting on one’s backyard?
I have long resisted a cyclical view of history, but when I think of where Western post-modern society is headed (the prizing of clever words and legal arguments and the disappareance of mensch-ness), I cannot help but visualize how helpless the silk-clad Mandarins must have looked as illiterate nomadic warriors broke into their cities or how pathetic the Byzantine magnates must have appeared as they fled their estates from the ravages of Varangians and Arabs.
Perhaps they lost their civilizations despite all the advantages of superior technology, learning, organization, and wealth, because, in the end, they simply lost their desire for vengeance.
July 31st, 2007 at 6:51 am
Men without chests?
July 31st, 2007 at 7:23 am
Has anybody heard in all of this how the “Arab/Muslim street” is reacting (or not) to this story?
This horrible story is stretching out long enough, and is getting enough global media attention, and is horrible enough, that I think we should be focusing also on how the societies in the different Muslim nations are taking all of this.
You would hope that there would be an increasingly loud chorus of condemnation of such killings. In an ideal world, as soon as the kidnapping took place, there would be a loud outcry from that part of the world which would put pressure on “fringe” groups not to do stuff like this.
And if the reaction is muted as best…..that also tends to encourage things in other ways….
July 31st, 2007 at 9:28 am
What the **** these ******* koreans were doing in Afghanistan? Were they there to convert the Islamists into Christians?! This is crazy. In fact, whole of the S.Korea is getting crazy. 17000 of Christian missionaries in such a tiny country. They were Buddhists….now, 50% of the Korean population has converted into Christians. It wont take long for the remaining 50% to convert. [deleted]. If the hostages are killed, Koreans themselves would be as much responsible as Talibans.
[A note from admin: keep it clean, thanks.]
July 31st, 2007 at 11:33 pm
I think the comment from “shekharc” makes it crystal clear why I wrote the original entry here.
August 1st, 2007 at 9:28 am
[...] James Na yesterday: It is a self-loathing pathos of a post-modern capitalist democracy where victimhood trumps victory on the moral plane — why fight like dog-faces and win when suffering from aggressions of others is a far nobler endeavor? [...]
August 1st, 2007 at 1:56 pm
The elusive James Na. On blog A, then gone; blog B, then gone. In Seattle, then suddenly gone. Found you again. Keep it up.
Oh my, do I agree. (I blogged at Sound Politics for a year or two.)
August 2nd, 2007 at 12:11 pm
usainkorea:
Very little, if at all. However, various Arab ambassadors in Seoul expressed their sympathy to ROKG.
ron:
Not that elusive. I still have my blogs, but they are inactive because of my day job. I occasionally blog here for Richardson.
When I started this job, I also stopped writing op-eds for The Seattle Times.
Lastly, my thanks to Michelle Malkin for the link!
August 2nd, 2007 at 12:35 pm
“I think the comment from “shekharc” makes it crystal clear why I wrote the original entry here.”
You picked out shekharc’s English as non-native. You’re good, James, you’re good. It’s almost painful to encounter ‘non-native’ speakers such as yourself and Won Joon, who write better in English than I do.
August 2nd, 2007 at 3:20 pm
???
I was referring to the anti-Christian rant.
August 2nd, 2007 at 4:13 pm
Your post seems to be addressing Korean lack of outrage against the Taliban, so I thought you had taken Shek for a South Korean. Reading your linked entry, I see your perceptions about anti-Christian sentiments aren’t directed at a particular nationality or region of the world.
August 2nd, 2007 at 9:33 pm
The National Assembly is sending a delegation to the U.S. with an unclear mission. I am shocked that Park Jin is involved in this as well:
http://news.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2007/08/03/2007080300038.html