[quote]All goes swimmingly in the movie “Whistling Princess” until the Americans, dressed in black, arrive at a rock concert. As the princess kisses a hunky Seoul rocker, with a unification ballad reaching a crescendo, the Americans blow up the place with hand grenades and rocket launchers. “I thought I took a creative stance, changing the Americans from good guys to bad guys,” said Peter Lee, the filmmaker, in the office of his film company here. “Actually, I like the U.S. I visit the U.S. two times a year.”
Such is the world of South Korean cinema, which has seemingly embraced the government’s Sunshine Policy, started in 2000 to extend an open hand to North Korea. No longer are North Koreans portrayed as devils; that role now belongs to the Americans.[/quote]
I understand the government having to pretend that the Kim is a nice guy and the North Koreans are their friends, in order to hasten reunification. That’s just good diplomacy; they’re scared of nuclear weapons being pointed at them, and have to pat North Korea on the head, “Good doggie, good doggie.” But when the people actually start believing that the U.S. is a greater threat to their security than North Korea - which has missiles and a million hostile troops on the border pointed at them! - they’re just living in a nationalist fantasy world.
How unsurprising. The older generation that actually remembers the war and has a sense of history don’t hate Americans. It’s the kids with no experience of reality and no sense of history, who have forgotten exactly why those 37,000 American troops are there, who hate the U.S.
[quote]While older South Koreans have denounced the movie as na
I have trouble understanding the attitude of South Koreans. I’m no expert on the place, but I’ve read of the north sending infiltrators into the south who ended up killing civilians, and this has happened during the past 5-10 years.
Its just a game for South Korean college kids. They’ve been doing it since the 1980s and most grow out of it when they no longer get to wear sneakers and jeans and become drunken salarymen. A rite of passage with very little real political overtones at all.
You can bet they’ll change their tunes fast enough if the north invades or nukes 'em.
What is the benefit of having troops in Seoul, given that North Korea can shell the city from its side, including with chemical and biological weapons. Or even nuclear ones? Wouldn’t the US troops be incapaciated fairly quickly? I’m not a military expert, but it would seem to me that the maintenance of strong U.S. air power makes more sense than keeping a lot of soldiers there.
I agree, I think the US should just pull out and let the Koreans solve their own problems. Just hope I’m not still in Taiwan when nuclear war breaks out…er… well wait… does anyone know the wind patterns up there?
by all means, set a time table and follow it. tell the wealthy koreans that US troops will pull out in X years. give em time to get their house in order. we (americans) have been feeding them at the teat for fifty years. sooner or later, no matter how much baby is gonna cry, weening is essential. if baby doesn’t cry and gives up the tit easily, all is that much better.
the sooner the better. the NK boss needs the bogeyman to stay in power. let’s take our bogeyman back home where he is loved an appreciated (oh, bush is doing what to military benefits? that’s another thread.).
expansionist capitalist don’t shrink in sizebut they’ll relocate to a better position. if you were bushie, where would you try to relocate a huge,vital arsenal of your imperial military-industrial complex? global warming is gonna make the aleutian islands one heck of an armed spot.
I do not like having US troops in South Korea ( I do not like being in NATO either). From what I understand, having US troops stationed in South Korea acts like a tripwire. If the North invades, then the US President can go to the people and say, “Hey folks, we (meaning the US) are being attacked. Let’s send more dudes in”.
I do not like having US troops in South Korea ( I do not like being in NATO either). From what I understand, having US troops stationed in South Korea acts like a tripwire. If the North invades, then the US President can go to the people and say, “Hey folks, we (meaning the US) is being attacked. Let’s send more dudes in”.[/quote]
I understand the argument, but isn’t it a bit oudated given that the North has chemical, biological and nuclear weapons. Any direct hits on the U.S. troop concentrations in Seoul would mean thousands of casualties. That’s compared to less than 400 in Iraq so far.
Firstly; I do not have any view on whether or not the U.S. or any other country should have troops stationed in South Korea.
I think there are a lot of Koreans who see it as one country, or at least that all Koreans, from North and South, are of one nationality. This strong sense of identity is something that other countries need to be aware of and sensitive to in their diplomatic relations; I’m sure the U.S. already is.
I could care less about the North and South Korea situation too since I’m not there right now…
But here’s some food for thought:
a) how would you feel if the US of A permanently had ~30,000 troops in your home country and don’t have any plans to leave(possibly for generations to come still)
b) why has neither a sitting Democrat nor a Republican President ever decide to just pull the troops out of Korea?
[quote=“Gener”]I could care less about the North and South Korea situation too since I’m not there right now…
But here’s some food for thought:
a) how would you feel if the US of A permanently had ~30,000 troops in your home country and don’t have any plans to leave(possibly for generations to come still)[/quote]
Grateful. The NKs invaded SK and have, since the tentative peace treaty that put a temporary halt to the conflict, built and maintained one of the largest militaries on the planet. NK maintains a hostile posture and has from time to time sought to infiltrate SK. Given the horrible living conditions in NK, I would be grateful that the US was willing to place its own soldiers in harm’s way to protect me from a second NK invasion.
Because that would almost certainly be inviting another invasion by NK.
(1) Because many of them spent some time in jail or exile, courtesy of a U.S. backed dictatorship.
This naturally encouraged many of them (students, labor organizers, etc.) to gravitate towards Communism–whose symbols, by the way, remain illegal in South Korea under the supposedly democratic government there. (It is actually governed by corruption.) However, leftists are very conscious that North Korean Communism is not the only possibility–in fact, many of them have attended study groups which go over all the possible permutations.
Two words for anybody who thinks Jimmy Carter is better than scum: Kwangju Uprising.
(2) Because the U.S. military has turned portions of their country into a whorehouse, whose Korean hook-staff are typically victims of debt-bondage schemes organized originally by U.S. military officers.
Well, what would be YOUR reaction if you discovered that some other country was scamming or forcing Westerners into prostitution, then keeping them indefinitely as slaves?
(Oh wait–this is actually quite common, and its world headquarters is Israel. Too bad your newspapers didn’t want you to know that.)
[quote=“Gener”]I could care less about the North and South Korea situation too since I’m not there right now…
But here’s some food for thought:
a) how would you feel if the US of A permanently had ~30,000 troops in your home country and don’t have any plans to leave(possibly for generations to come still)
b) why has neither a sitting Democrat nor a Republican President ever decide to just pull the troops out of Korea?[/quote]
Let’s see, I can live in a budding democracy with a vibrant economy that churns out products that consistently gain international recognition and put up with having 30,000 foreign troops, who make a very SMALL percentage of the total population of the country. Or, I can go live in the hell on earth known as North Korea. That’s a toughy.
[quote=“Flicka”]Let’s see, I can live in a budding democracy with a vibrant economy that churns out products that consistently gain international recognition and put up with having 30,000 foreign troops, who make a very SMALL percentage of the total population of the country. Or, I can go live in the hell on earth known as North Korea. That’s a toughy.[/quote]30,000 foreign troops who are there to protect you. While North Korea has 1,000,000 there to kill you.
How did West Germany feel about having (how many was it ?) foreign troops on its soil ?
Never heard of Jimmy Carter or General John Singlaub?
During his 1976 presidential campaign, Singlaub related, Jimmy Carter was among those who advocated a significant U.S. military reduction (if not a complete withdrawal) in South Korea, pending drastic reforms. The South Koreans were horrified at the prospect of abandonment while the North was in the process of a military buildup. Singlaub recalled [as top American commander in South Korea] reassuring them saying, "don
Ahhhh Carter that “man of peace” or at least he was until it was discovered that the North Koreans were developing nuclear weapons despite signing onto his “peace initiative.”
[quote=“tigerman”][quote=“Screaming Jesus”]Why would Koreans hate Americans?
(1) Because many of them spent some time in jail or exile, courtesy of a U.S. backed dictatorship.[/quote]
Really? The topic poll is regarding Koreans in their 20s. How many of those have been in jail and or exiled?[/quote]
Well, I’m sure quite a few have been jailed, just not while a U.S.-backed dictatorship has been in effect!
One interesting angle in all of this is that the U.S. (specifically Reagan) was responsible for saving the biggest political prisoner of all, Kim Dae-Jung, who later became president and won the Nobel Peace Prize (and then turned around and blocked fellow peace-prize winner, The Dalai Lama, for coming to South Korea, but that’s another story). According to the CNN story below and other sources I’ve seen, then-president Chun Doo-hwan commuted Kim’s death sentence and in turn got a state visit to Washington.
As for the 20-somethings, they no doubt base their feeling toward the U.S. more on what happened in Kwangju in 1979 than what happened during the Korean War. They may have been too young to go to jail or engage in the protests, but obviously many of them had older siblings who did participate. Also, many of those who did participate are now in positions of influence, including as university professors, and I’d guess that is where many of the sentiments come from.