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ANALYSIS: Younger Koreans View America as Real Threat
Everyone:
I ran across this analysis piece by a Knight Ridder writer earlier this week and finally found the time to post it. The bolding contained within is mine. Read the article and contribute to this thread as you see fit afterwards.
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This all leaves me with a single question: What prevents South Korea and North Korea from signing a formal peace treaty ending the Korean War?
Surely a formal peace treaty between the two nations would help the North feel less "threatened" by U.S. and South Korean forces, would it not? We could then move out some, or all, of the 37,000 troops we have there (along, presumably, with a good deal of material), thereby lessening the North's paranoia even more.
I think that's what needed to ensure peace on the Korean peninsula (and it would also enhance prospects for reunification in the future): a full, formal peace treaty between NK and SK (negotiated by NK and SK, w/no U.S. participation, since this is a matter between the Koreas). From there, begin honest-to-God negotiations for reunification, ala Germany.
Gatekeeper
I ran across this analysis piece by a Knight Ridder writer earlier this week and finally found the time to post it. The bolding contained within is mine. Read the article and contribute to this thread as you see fit afterwards.
***
S Korea’s younger generation increasingly anti-American
By Michael Dorgan
Knight Ridder Newspapers
SEOUL, South Korea — Sipping a latte in Seoul’s trendy downtown Myeong-dong district, 20-year-old Park Jin-woo pondered a paradox that has huge implications for South Korea, the United States and all of northeast Asia.
It’s this: As South Korea’s younger generation has grown more Western in recent years in its tastes and lifestyle, it has become increasingly anti-American.
The North Korean nuclear standoff has revealed deep strains within the once rock-solid U.S.-South Korean relationship. Underlying those strains is a generation gap in South Korea that pits a generally pro-American older generation against a younger generation increasingly suspicious of the United States and less worried by North Korea.
‘‘Older people do not understand our clothing and our hair styles,’’ said Park, gesturing toward his own fashionably ****gy henna-dyed locks. ‘‘And older people, including my parents, do not believe that North Korea has changed its attitude. But younger people believe that North Korea will gradually — not suddenly, but gradually — change.’’
Seoul’s Myeong-dong district, where 20-year-old Park was having coffee at Starbucks, is full of American fast food restaurants and clothing franchises. Young Koreans on the streets would not look out of place in Chicago or San Francisco. Bookstores and record shops reflect a strong influence, if not dominance, of American culture.
But just a few blocks away at the fenced and fortified U.S. Embassy, which is perpetually surrounded by riot police to fend off protesters, young Koreans gather almost daily to denounce America.
Sometimes their numbers are small, sometimes large. One evening this week, only a few dozen showed up at a demonstration called to protest the acquittal of two U.S. soldiers involved in a road accident last summer that killed two teenage girls. On New Year’s Eve, more than 10,000 gathered to demonstrate over the same issue. Many protesters at both events called for the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from South Korea.
The United States has no plans to withdraw its troops because they are crucial to South Korea’s security and the stability of northeast Asia, American officials say. But a U.S. official in Seoul, who asked that he not be identified, said recently that plans are underway to move the command garrison out of the capital to lower the U.S. military’s profile and ease tensions. The ‘‘future shape’’ of the U.S. role in South Korea’s security is under study, the official added.
‘‘The United States is a bigger threat to South Korea than North Korea is,’’ said Han In-suk, a 17-year-old high school student who attended one of this week’s protests despite orders from her parents not to go.
Han’s anti-American sentiments are incomprehensible to Lee Sung-soo, a slim 76-year-old Korean War veteran who ran a small auto parts business before he retired.
‘‘I’m worried about the generation gap,’’ he said. ‘‘The young guys are very simple in their thoughts.
They don’t know who keeps peace on the Korean peninsula.’’
According to Lee, peace on the peninsula and prosperity in South Korea are in large part due to the security umbrella provided by the United States.
‘‘If North Korea has nuclear weapons, it will destroy us,’’ he said. ‘‘We need U.S. troops in Korea.’’
The generation gap between Han and Lee is explained partly by the vast difference in life experiences of older and younger South Koreans.
Those over 55 have painful memories of a brutal war in which more than 2 million people died, including 33,000 American soldiers. Those over 40 have vivid recollections of grueling poverty and hardship, as well as terrifying threats from North Korea.
South Koreans in their 20s and 30s have no experience of war. Most have not suffered privation. Rather, they have enjoyed the growing affluence and rising expectations in one of the world’s fastest growing economies.
Differences of opinion do not end there. Most older South Koreans still regard the United States as a protector that saved the country from an invasion by North Korea 53 years ago. They want the 37,000 U.S. troops that remain in South Korea to stay as a deterrent to North Korea.
A growing number of younger South Koreans, though, view the United States not as a protector but as a bully impeding unification of the Korean peninsula.
‘‘My parents suffered during the Korean War and they began to believe that South Korea has to depend on the United States,’’ said Park, a computer science major at Ajou University just outside of Seoul. ‘‘We were born after the South Korean economy began to develop, and we have begun to think that South Korea can survive on its own.’’
But the generation gap cannot be blamed entirely on different life experiences. It also is a byproduct of President Kim Dae-jung’s ‘‘sunshine’’ policy, which for the past five years has promoted eventual reunification of the divided Korean peninsula through a process of aid, investment and dialogue with isolated and bankrupt North Korea.
The policy won President Kim a Nobel Peace Prize but has not produced many tangible results. However, it has led to a decline in the perception that the North is a threat, in large part because North Korea’s propaganda machine has re-targeted most of its verbal attacks on Washington and Tokyo rather than Seoul.
The South Korean president, in his push for better relations with North Korea, has dangerously downplayed the military threat from North Korea, his critics say.
He has done so, they say, even though most of North Korea’s million-man army remains offensively deployed near the South Korean border and even though North Korea’s missiles have grown more numerous and lethal.
‘‘The government is partly to blame for the generation gap,’’ said KyongMann Jeon, an analyst at the Korea Institute for Defense Analysis, a government-funded research organization in Seoul.
He and others say that Kim even downplayed the disclosure by the United States last fall that North Korea, by pursuing a secret uranium enrichment program, had violated several international agreements not to develop nuclear weapons.
Jeon said the Kim administration apparently feared that a strong condemnation of North Korea would expose the failure of his approach toward the North and generate a voter backlash in last month’s presidential election. Kim backed candidate Roh Moo-hyun, who campaigned on a ‘‘sunshine’’ policy platform.
Roh spoke to the anti-American sentiments held by young voters. He boasted of never having visited the United States and criticized politicians who had for ‘‘kowtowing’’ to the superpower.
It was a winning strategy. Roh, who will take office next month, won the election by winning support from the vast majority of voters in their 20s and 30s.
Security analyst Soon Young-Sun, also with the Korea Institute for Defense Analysis, said the election marked a profound shift in the politics of South Korea and in U.S.-South Korean relations.
Young voters whose thinking has been shaped by the ‘‘sunshine’’ policy ‘‘have the energy and power to push policy over the next five years,’’ she said.
By Michael Dorgan
Knight Ridder Newspapers
SEOUL, South Korea — Sipping a latte in Seoul’s trendy downtown Myeong-dong district, 20-year-old Park Jin-woo pondered a paradox that has huge implications for South Korea, the United States and all of northeast Asia.
It’s this: As South Korea’s younger generation has grown more Western in recent years in its tastes and lifestyle, it has become increasingly anti-American.
The North Korean nuclear standoff has revealed deep strains within the once rock-solid U.S.-South Korean relationship. Underlying those strains is a generation gap in South Korea that pits a generally pro-American older generation against a younger generation increasingly suspicious of the United States and less worried by North Korea.
‘‘Older people do not understand our clothing and our hair styles,’’ said Park, gesturing toward his own fashionably ****gy henna-dyed locks. ‘‘And older people, including my parents, do not believe that North Korea has changed its attitude. But younger people believe that North Korea will gradually — not suddenly, but gradually — change.’’
Seoul’s Myeong-dong district, where 20-year-old Park was having coffee at Starbucks, is full of American fast food restaurants and clothing franchises. Young Koreans on the streets would not look out of place in Chicago or San Francisco. Bookstores and record shops reflect a strong influence, if not dominance, of American culture.
But just a few blocks away at the fenced and fortified U.S. Embassy, which is perpetually surrounded by riot police to fend off protesters, young Koreans gather almost daily to denounce America.
Sometimes their numbers are small, sometimes large. One evening this week, only a few dozen showed up at a demonstration called to protest the acquittal of two U.S. soldiers involved in a road accident last summer that killed two teenage girls. On New Year’s Eve, more than 10,000 gathered to demonstrate over the same issue. Many protesters at both events called for the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from South Korea.
The United States has no plans to withdraw its troops because they are crucial to South Korea’s security and the stability of northeast Asia, American officials say. But a U.S. official in Seoul, who asked that he not be identified, said recently that plans are underway to move the command garrison out of the capital to lower the U.S. military’s profile and ease tensions. The ‘‘future shape’’ of the U.S. role in South Korea’s security is under study, the official added.
‘‘The United States is a bigger threat to South Korea than North Korea is,’’ said Han In-suk, a 17-year-old high school student who attended one of this week’s protests despite orders from her parents not to go.
Han’s anti-American sentiments are incomprehensible to Lee Sung-soo, a slim 76-year-old Korean War veteran who ran a small auto parts business before he retired.
‘‘I’m worried about the generation gap,’’ he said. ‘‘The young guys are very simple in their thoughts.
They don’t know who keeps peace on the Korean peninsula.’’
According to Lee, peace on the peninsula and prosperity in South Korea are in large part due to the security umbrella provided by the United States.
‘‘If North Korea has nuclear weapons, it will destroy us,’’ he said. ‘‘We need U.S. troops in Korea.’’
The generation gap between Han and Lee is explained partly by the vast difference in life experiences of older and younger South Koreans.
Those over 55 have painful memories of a brutal war in which more than 2 million people died, including 33,000 American soldiers. Those over 40 have vivid recollections of grueling poverty and hardship, as well as terrifying threats from North Korea.
South Koreans in their 20s and 30s have no experience of war. Most have not suffered privation. Rather, they have enjoyed the growing affluence and rising expectations in one of the world’s fastest growing economies.
Differences of opinion do not end there. Most older South Koreans still regard the United States as a protector that saved the country from an invasion by North Korea 53 years ago. They want the 37,000 U.S. troops that remain in South Korea to stay as a deterrent to North Korea.
A growing number of younger South Koreans, though, view the United States not as a protector but as a bully impeding unification of the Korean peninsula.
‘‘My parents suffered during the Korean War and they began to believe that South Korea has to depend on the United States,’’ said Park, a computer science major at Ajou University just outside of Seoul. ‘‘We were born after the South Korean economy began to develop, and we have begun to think that South Korea can survive on its own.’’
But the generation gap cannot be blamed entirely on different life experiences. It also is a byproduct of President Kim Dae-jung’s ‘‘sunshine’’ policy, which for the past five years has promoted eventual reunification of the divided Korean peninsula through a process of aid, investment and dialogue with isolated and bankrupt North Korea.
The policy won President Kim a Nobel Peace Prize but has not produced many tangible results. However, it has led to a decline in the perception that the North is a threat, in large part because North Korea’s propaganda machine has re-targeted most of its verbal attacks on Washington and Tokyo rather than Seoul.
The South Korean president, in his push for better relations with North Korea, has dangerously downplayed the military threat from North Korea, his critics say.
He has done so, they say, even though most of North Korea’s million-man army remains offensively deployed near the South Korean border and even though North Korea’s missiles have grown more numerous and lethal.
‘‘The government is partly to blame for the generation gap,’’ said KyongMann Jeon, an analyst at the Korea Institute for Defense Analysis, a government-funded research organization in Seoul.
He and others say that Kim even downplayed the disclosure by the United States last fall that North Korea, by pursuing a secret uranium enrichment program, had violated several international agreements not to develop nuclear weapons.
Jeon said the Kim administration apparently feared that a strong condemnation of North Korea would expose the failure of his approach toward the North and generate a voter backlash in last month’s presidential election. Kim backed candidate Roh Moo-hyun, who campaigned on a ‘‘sunshine’’ policy platform.
Roh spoke to the anti-American sentiments held by young voters. He boasted of never having visited the United States and criticized politicians who had for ‘‘kowtowing’’ to the superpower.
It was a winning strategy. Roh, who will take office next month, won the election by winning support from the vast majority of voters in their 20s and 30s.
Security analyst Soon Young-Sun, also with the Korea Institute for Defense Analysis, said the election marked a profound shift in the politics of South Korea and in U.S.-South Korean relations.
Young voters whose thinking has been shaped by the ‘‘sunshine’’ policy ‘‘have the energy and power to push policy over the next five years,’’ she said.
This all leaves me with a single question: What prevents South Korea and North Korea from signing a formal peace treaty ending the Korean War?
Surely a formal peace treaty between the two nations would help the North feel less "threatened" by U.S. and South Korean forces, would it not? We could then move out some, or all, of the 37,000 troops we have there (along, presumably, with a good deal of material), thereby lessening the North's paranoia even more.
I think that's what needed to ensure peace on the Korean peninsula (and it would also enhance prospects for reunification in the future): a full, formal peace treaty between NK and SK (negotiated by NK and SK, w/no U.S. participation, since this is a matter between the Koreas). From there, begin honest-to-God negotiations for reunification, ala Germany.
Gatekeeper
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