Screw south korea, pull U.S. troops out

Politics International Politics
21

Quite right. A necessary correction.

Destabilising in two situations:

  1. If it allows the North koreans to drive a wedge between the South, the US, Japan, and China. But so far, the South Korean Government has stood fast and not taken the bait.

  2. If it riles US opinion so much that the troops are pulled out.

South Korea’s Government has done its job, by standing up to its citizens. Its now the turn of US citizens to show that they have a bit more spine and are a bit less parochial and narrow minded than their Korean “friends.”

22

[quote=“imyourbiggestfan”]

[quote=“daltongang”]
there is a point where continued insults born by us without comment becomes more destabilizing[/quote]

Destabilising in two situations:

  1. If it allows the North koreans to drive a wedge between the South, the US, Japan, and China. But so far, the South Korean Government has stood fast and not taken the bait.[/quote]

That is a joke. The SK government knows which side of their bread is buttered. But will they take the hard stand and say what needs to be said to their people about the issue, or just ignore it and in cases tacitly support it, snug as a bug in a rug that their thick-headed American friends would never leave them in the lurch?

[quote]2) If it riles US opinion so much that the troops are pulled out.

South Korea’s Government has done its job, by standing up to its citizens. Its now the turn of US citizens to show that they have a bit more spine and are a bit less parochial and narrow minded than their Korean “friends.”[/quote]

How much spine does it take to let people walk all over you? Not very much. What is destabilizing is when the rest of the world sees us as patsies that will sit quietly by and take insults without comment when an interest is at question.

23

[quote=“daltongang”][W]ill they take the hard stand and say what needs to be said to their people about the issue[/quote] They have already started to do precisely this. The President Elect has called for an end to anti-American protests and has described such attitutdes as “suffocating.”

I don’t think it is seen like this. South Korea is not “walking all over” the US. There are some radicals whipping up popular sentiment and using the accidental death of two schoolgirls to generate a bit of press. The view that the US should leave is quite marginal.

If the US were to retreat from ITS OWN INTERESTS in North Asia and the Korean peninsula, due merely to the rantings of a few radical 30 year old Koreans, then the world would laugh! Enemies on all sides would be heartened that the whipping up of anti-war/anti-US sentiment would be enough to make the US cave in and withdraw to isolation. Then, US allies would say: “Where is your spine? How can you let name-calling dictate US policy? What happened to the world’s last superpower?”

24

[quote]

But you have to remember that trade is a two-way bargain… they do not make their living off the “grace” of the US consumer. (Or, you could equally well say that the US consumer benefits from the “grace” of the Korean manufacturer.)

The truth is that there are certain products (including semiconductors, cars, textiles) that South Korea makes cheaply and well. The US benefits from being able to buy these instead of having to manufacture them at home. Therefore, it is in the interests of both Korea and the US that there be a stable prosperous economy in South Korea and that, consequently, the threat from the North be neutralised.[/quote]

The truth is that good semiconductors and textiles are very well made in Taiwan. The US can buy these things from here or the mainland or Mexico. As for their cars, how do US consumers benefit from driving disposable cars that consistently rate poorly in crash tests?

They DO get bonus points for churning out good looking, cheap appliances and electronics, complete with slick ads for them, that don’t carry the tackiness of their Taiwanese counterparts (computers and Proton not inlcuded). As an American consumer who has bought a lot of their products in the past as well as spent their money during vacations there, they have a lot of balls pulling this kind of crap.

25

I asked a group of South Korean engineers I was having dinner with one night while there on business what they thought about having the US military on their soil keeping the North Koreans at bay. I told them it honestly seemed to me a little strange how such a proud (read ‘nationalistic’) country could feel okay about having foreign troops on their soil for so long.

They told me it was purely an economic decision. Having another country pay a large part of the cost of protecting them from North Korean invasion kept the cost of their own goods down because they didn’t have to extract higher taxes from the own economy to pay for it all – and so ultimately increase the cost of their goods. They didn’t say it but I sensed they looked upon us as foolish for doing it.

The irony of it is that most of the US troops serving in South Korea return to a civilian economy where the only jobs they can find are low-wage service jobs because the high-paying factory jobs their fathers worked in have been shipped to South Korea – or Taiwan.

26

Samsung Electronics is the lowest cost manufacturer of semiconductors. Korea is also the world market leader in several man-made textile products that Taiwan simply cannot produce. Hyundai cars - you may not like them, but the trade mags are saying that quality has improved. The US can buy goods elsewhere, sure, but it makes sense to diversify your markets and also, if the South korean supply was declared “off-limits” prices would go up and you would lose out.

But listen, you don’t have to take my word for it: the mere fact that people buy these goods of their OWN FREE WILL and IN PREFERENCE TO BUYING ELSEWHERE proves my point and negates yours. There are significant US economic interests in Korea.

So, you admit that their products are good. It is therefore illogical to say that they survive by the “grace” of the US consumer. They provide a good that the US consumer wants.

The point I am trying to make is quite simple: much of the argument that the US should pull out simply because some Korean citizens are saying nasty hurtful things is predicated (or seems to be) on the view that US troops there are simply doing the Koreans a favour. I am trying to demonstrate that this is not so. The US has significant economic interests in Korea and in the rest of North Asia, interests that it would put at risk if it pulled out.

And, yes, let me be quite specific: the IMPORTS that the US buys from Korea are an IMPORTANT (no pun intended) part of those interests.

27

[quote=“Gavin Januarus”]I told them it honestly seemed to me a little strange how such a proud (read ‘nationalistic’) country could feel okay about having foreign troops on their soil for so long.[/quote] I agree that the koreans are proud and nationalistic in general. yet, they are pragmatic enough to realise that without US troops, they would have ended up like the North. The typical attitude of Koreans, in my experience, is that they would prefer to see US troops out, but not until re-unification at the earliest. Those who vocally call for immediate withdrawal tend to be die-hard reunificationists and many will quite happily tell you that reunification is the number one priority regardless of whether it is done as a unified communist country or a unified capitalist one.

[quote=“Gavin Januarus”]They told me it was purely an economic decision. Having another country pay a large part of the cost of protecting them from North Korean invasion… They didn’t say it but I sensed they looked upon us as foolish for doing it.[/quote] Yes. But this does not mean that there is no benefit for the US. Above, we have outlined the range of goods that Korea is able to supply to the US at a price and quality that the US consumer is willing to pay.

They may think the US foolish. But this is because most Koreans in the street subscribe to the view that exports are good and imports are bad. Thus they cannot see how the US gains by being able to import cheaply from Korea, China, Japan, Taiwan.

To paraphrase a favourite quote of mine: “We trade in order to import. Exports are are what we sell only because foreigners are crass enough to demand payment.” The point being exports are simply what you use to buy imports.

[quote=“Gavin Januarus”]The irony of it is that most of the US troops serving in South Korea return to a civilian economy where the only jobs they can find are low-wage service jobs because the high-paying factory jobs their fathers worked in have been shipped to South Korea – or Taiwan.[/quote] I don’t know your point. If it is a point about the plight of US servicemen abroad trying to find work when they return to the US, I do not know if they have more or less success than home-based servicemen in finding a job.

If you are saying that global trade and competition from South Korea has depressed US real wages, then all the evidence says you are wrong. Quite the opposite. In theory, AND IN PRACTICE, average real wages have risen - precisely because the rise in productivity abroad means more goods on the world market. More goods means real wages have risen.

If you are saying that global trade has lowered the wages for UNSKILLED WORKERS in the US, then THEORETICALLY you may have a point. However, the vast majority of the empirical research on this topic suggests that unskilled wages in the US have fallen due to the impact of technological change.

(I would add that it is my view that even if global trade had lowered unskilled wages in the US and raised them in Korea, it would not be a reason to curtail trade - that would simply be to protect your own unskilled workers at the expense of the poor abroad. And that would be just another kind of nationalism/racism. I took this stand in the anti-globalisation thread. You can see all the facts/arguments trotted out there ad nauseam.)

28

The Koreans I know all admit to having taken part in anti-government demonstrations while in university, most of them would (sheepishly) also admit to having joined anti-US protests before they grew up (in those words). It’s just something they do at that age, part of Korean youth culture. Sounds to me like the ‘386s’ just didn’t grow up.

If you’re going to punish S. Korea for anything it should be the crap they pulled during the World Cup. That right there is grounds for letting Kim Jong-il have his way with the place :wink:

29

I think the unpleasant truth is that the US is in Korea for geopolitical rather than economic reasons. The US-Japan relationship is the linchpin of Pax Americana in East Asia. The US provides Japan with security so that the Japanese do not re-militarize. However. the Japanese prefer that South Korea (and, to a lesser exent, Taiwan) function as buffer zones against China. If the US fails to protect these buffer zones, Japan will re-arm.

There is also the advantage that some of the troops protecting Japan can be stationed outside of Japan–i.e. in South Korea. The US does accrue impotant economic benefits from its presence in North Asia, but these are secondary considerations.

Do you seriously think that Dick Cheney and the gang are sitting down in National Security council meetings and saying “Let’s see here. We should stay in S. Korea because the economic benefits to US consumers outweigh the military risks?” Historically, this kind of economic calculus has rarely entered US decision-making on national security issues.

30

I hear this claim regularly by Americans employed in service industries in the US. I’ve never once heard anyone who actually makes a living in industry say anything remotely like this. Let me share an email I just received last week from a colleague in Atlanta who actually designs and makes things for a living there:

Patrick:
Thanks for the message. Sounds like you are quite the enterpreneur - good for you! Glad to hear from a fellow Georgia Tech graduate who is doing so well these days. Precistems has designed power tools for Sears and they are made in HK and mainland China, so I’m familiar with a lot of the issues you face. I might be interested in some sort of joint venture, but right now I’m suffering (as are most of my competitors) from a lack of customers willing to spend money on anything. Things have been slow for months, and I’ve been operating at a big loss. I’m hoping the new year will change things; right now my focus is on getting some billable hours in the door, and I’m not sure that’s what you have in mind at this stage. If you’ve got some current design work that I can do for you as part of developing a relationship, then I would be more than interested. With that said, I will tell you that I’m also concerned about the flow of design work out of the US. This affects me directly since my power tool customer is now going to have existing cheap Asian contract-manufactured power tools lightly modified by the manufacturer’s own in-house engineers and therefore they won’t need my company any more. It also affects my industry (product development) and US manufacturing in general; I won’t be particularly happy if in ten years only Boeing and the Big Three have US-based engineers. What’s your opinion?

Cheers,
John Leffler, PE
Precistems, Incorporated

High Performance Design & Data Solutions <<
precistems.com
404.581.9416 Atlanta
404.581.9417 fax
770.656.2403 cell

31

Haven’t seen anything about that, seen a lot about petulant and violent acts against american civialians and military personal though. Anyway “suffocating?” Gee what a strong stand. Realize that this was not what he was saying to get elected, realize that in a recent poll 53% of South Koreans view the US negatively, 47% positively.

[quote=“daltongang”]How much spine does it take to let people walk all over you? Not very much. What is destabilizing is when the rest of the world sees us as patsies that will sit quietly by and take insults without comment when an interest is at question

[quote]I don’t think it is seen like this. South Korea is not “walking all over” the US. There are some radicals whipping up popular sentiment and using the accidental death of two schoolgirls to generate a bit of press. The view that the US should leave is quite marginal.

If the US were to retreat from ITS OWN INTERESTS in North Asia and the Korean peninsula, due merely to the rantings of a few radical 30 year old Koreans, then the world would laugh! Enemies on all sides would be heartened that the whipping up of anti-war/anti-US sentiment would be enough to make the US cave in and withdraw to isolation. Then, US allies would say: “Where is your spine? How can you let name-calling dictate US policy? What happened to the world’s last superpower?”[/quote][/quote]

53%–more than a few radicals i would say. ok there is some support for the people who shed blood for them, yesterday a few hundred turned out for a pro-us rally. not much compared to the thousands who turn out against the us.

when our soldiers are getting abuse from the general population and the government is not livid at the outrage of it then we are getting walked over. am i saying just pull out? no. but if we are not wanted there and that is being made known then i suggest that hangdogging around is not in our interest and not conduct worthy of our status as a superpower. ending our presence there if it proved necessary would not be the end of the world.

32

Come on! “Geo-political reasons” is just a fancy way of saying US’s regional interests. And that includes economics.

Listen. My original point about the economic interests was to show that trade is a two-way thing. It was prompted by the suggestion that Korea lived off the “grace” of the US consumer, i.e., we are doing them a favour. I was showing that imports are a US interest, too.

The wider point was that US troops are there for US interests as well as to defend South Korea. I also mentioned their importance for the US economic interests in the rest of North Asia, including Japan, Taiwan, and China.

You forget that the US is “stabilising” these countries precisely in order that they can grow and be big trading partners. You cannot divide the political and the economic and say that the economic benefit is secondary. But, whatever, my point is simply that US troops are not just over there “DOING THE KOREANS A FAVOUR.” If you want to widen the reasons behind the US troop presence, it can only strengthen my argument.

Well, you paint a funny picture to try and make my point seem absurd. But it is not absurd. This is precisely what they do. (Although I am sure Dick Cheney does not push the buttons on the calculator himself.) And it is a detailed process, too. A monetary value is even assigned for the life of a US serviceman. So, yes, a monetary figure is even placed on the “price of life.”

Well, I think this is just wrong. But the question is, how could you assume that the US does not make such calculations? It is the duty of the House and Congress to scrutinise the decisions of the president… one of the first things they ask about war is: “What will it cost?” And they want to know this in monetary terms as well as more emotional terms. It is an important part of the decision as to whether the US goes to war.

33

Haven’t seen anything about that, seen a lot about petulant and violent acts against american civialians and military personal though. Anyway “suffocating?” Gee what a strong stand.[/quote]

Well, he has made those comments. The fact that you have not seen them does not mean they did not exist. Given the somewhat “supercharged” environment in Korea, I would say his and the Government’s recent comments have been stronger in tone and nature than the US President’s comments in support of muslims. As indeed they should be stronger.

I saw a poll, too, that at the same time suggested that about the same percentage (55-60%) wanted the US troops to stay. Of those that wanted them to go, most said “only after reunification.” Only about 10% of the total polled wanted an immediate withdrawal.

OK, now you are playing word games. I said radicals whipping up popular support.

Having read the newspaper reports of attacks on US servicemen and attacks on western civilians, you should realise what a ballsy thing this was to do - far more ballsy than pottering off to an anti-US protest. That is why so few turned up; you should not take it as an indication of the relative degrees of support for US troops.

Let me be blunt about my views.

  1. US troops are not in Korea solely to defend the South Koreans. There are siginificant US interests at stake in the region.

  2. It is wrong to characterise the presence of troops as “Us doing them a favour.”

  3. Koreans are, as a rule, proud and nationalistic. It is easy therefore for a few radicals to whip up popular protest against the presence of US troops, particularly if those troops have just run over and killed a couple of Korean teenage girls and have subsequently been found not guilty by a military court.

  4. At the same time, most Koreans know that they need the US troops, that they rely on them for security and that the south could not have developed so fast without their presence.

  5. the South Koreans are #$@%&ing annoying. They like to complain about the US and stage anti-US rallies. Some hotheads will attack US servicemen and get into bar brawls with US civilians, etc. But they would turn white at the thought of US troops pulling out immediately.

  6. Responsible Korean politicians have to try and calm the Korean hotheads down, without opening the door to radical anti-US politicians. Its a fine line. That is why Roh is flip-flopping a bit. But he is treading that line quite well…

  7. the US has to protect its interests. It has to put up with this petulance. It has to be the mature one in this relationship.

  8. Were the US to pull out, North Korea would rub its hands in glee - they got the US to stand down from its North Asia commitments, to sacrifice its interests in the region, because of a few street rallies by petulant 30-somethings.

Someone in a previous post mentioned that the Koreans are immature - that the 386s never grew up. I think this is right, particularly of the men.

All the more reason for the US Government and its citizens, who are far more mature, to SUCK IT UP and DO THE RIGHT THING.

Does it hurt US pride? Yes, I guess so. But, if you let that become the sole driving force of US policy, then the US becomes just like South Korea. At that point, I don’t want the US to be global protector any more.

34

GJ. Sorry, I should have replied to yours first. Here goes.

Possibly for the reason that manufacturing jobs as a precentage of total jobs has been steadily declining for decades now, and many manufacturing jobs are done overseas.

You seem to think this negates my point. But no, this IS my point. Manufacturing jobs have declined as a % of total jobs because of rising productivity in the manufacturing sector. There has also been the ability to buy cheaper imports. Thus, the range and number of goods available to US wage earners has risen over the decades. That is what rising real wages are.

Please don’t - I hate argument by anecdote. I do not doubt that manufacturing jobs are declining as a % of the workforce. I challenge your assumption that this automatically means real wages are falling. You cannot extrapolate the experience of one firm (or industry) to a whole economy - you will jump to false conclusions.

When I want to know about the effects of global trade on US jobs and wages, I turn to trade theorists and economists whose professional lives are spent analysing these questions and whose reputations depend on rigorous independent research.

To review current literature on trade and wages over the last 30-odd years: Average real wages have risen in the US; skilled wages have risen relatively quickly; unskilled wages have fallen. Standards of living have improved for all except the lowest 20% of households. (Even this data may be compromised by the inability to reflect product innovations - colour TV instead of B&W, better quality screens, textiles, PCs, mobile phones, etc…)

Global trade has been just one of several factors raising average real wages.

Trade is just too small a % of the overall US economy to account for anything but a small part of the decline in UNSKILLED wages.

It seems more likely that technological innovations have so raised the price of skilled labour and lowered the value of unskilled, that it is technology that has caused the decline in unskilled wages.

GJ.

I am quite happy to continue this part of the argument - but perhaps on a different thread. If you want to talk about global trade and US wages, lets take it up on the anti-globalisation thread. If you want to talk about the US economy in more general terms, please start a new thread. Let’s try and keep this one focussed on US troops in South Korea. On issues of trade/wages, I am likely to quickly get going and cause this thread to drift off-topic - my fault, not yours!

35

"An American soldier was detained by an angry mob, forced to watch an anti-American demonstration at which he was photographed, videotaped, and forced to make a public statement demanding justice from the United States. He was then taken to another location to apologize to the co-chairman of an anti-American organization …

It is hard not to conjure up images of a poor American GI being bound, blindfolded, and dragged, then driven in a beat-up old Peugeot along dusty narrow roads, all to the background sound of evening prayer echoing along stucco bullet-ridden walls. However, this particular event did not occur in Lebanon, Iran, or the Middle East, but in affluent uptown Seoul in September 2002. "

atimes.com/atimes/Korea/EA09Dg01.html

this shit pisses me off to no end.

36

[quote=“imyourbiggestfan”]4) At the same time, most Koreans know that they need the US troops, that they rely on them for security and that the south could not have developed so fast without their presence.

  1. the South Koreans are #$@%&ing annoying. They like to complain about the US and stage anti-US rallies. Some hotheads will attack US servicemen and get into bar brawls with US civilians, etc. But they would turn white at the thought of US troops pulling out immediately.[/quote]

Precisely. The South Koreans can either have the US Army, or the North Korean army, it’s up to them. And they know it well.

Kinda like immature teenagers rebelling against their parents… they can be pretty nasty, but they know they are f$#@ed if on their own and without their parents.

37

iybf, you are entering into some kind of weird multilevel analysis of it. the situtaion is much simpler than you make it.

  1. WE DIED so that they would not have to be north korea. 37,000 americans are currently risking death to preserve that situation, and the poor koreans have the downside of tolerating that.

  2. 53% percent–that is not a word game–have a negative outlook of us.

  3. if you do not belive that–look on your tv screen if you have eyes or read the newspaper if you can. you will see that the korean people are or tolerate ungrateful bastards and are rapidly deserving less and less help from us.

  4. our interest in the country is barely limited to saving them from themselves.

  5. doing so is making us look like a bunch of schmucks.

38

Yes. Ungrateful sods. I agree.

But a similar % want the US troops to stay and of those that would like to see them leave, most want that to happen after reunification. A somewhat inconsistent view. Yes. They want the whole cake shop and to eat it, too.

Errr… I am fully aware of the situation in South Korea. And, yes, I agree that their actions do not qualify them as either grateful or deserving. They are, generalising here, immature, irrational, petulant, hot-headed, proud, unsophisticated, and nationalistic. Not my favourite people to invite round to dinner.

Cannot agree. US interests in the region are served by having troops stationed at the most dangerous flashpoint. These interests - Japan, China, Taiwan, South Korea… have been explained in this thread.

Cannot agree. Doing so is making America look like a responsible guarantor of regional stability. Sucky job. That’s why I am personally happy that it is the US that is doing it, not the Chinese, the French, and certainly not the South Koreans!

39

[Sucky job. That’s why I am personally happy that it is the US that is doing it, not the Chinese, the French, and certainly not the South Koreans![/quote]

Yeah, certainly not the French…their tanks have 1 gear forward and 5 for reverse.

40

[quote=“Flipper”]"An American soldier was detained by an angry mob, forced to watch an anti-American demonstration at which he was photographed, videotaped, and forced to make a public statement demanding justice from the United States. He was then taken to another location to apologize to the co-chairman of an anti-American organization …

this shit pisses me off to no end.[/quote]

This happened a few months ago, in protest against the killing of two teenagers.

And you tell only half the story - its worse than you think.

Basically, there were two versions of the story.

One, in the Korean press (korean and English language) which was headlined something like: “GI Assaults Prominent Lawmaker” said that three GIs had assaulted this prominent lawmaker on a subway train. The GIs were then handed over to the police by the lawmaker and his “associates.”

The second, from Reuters was more detailed: the lawmaker and dozens of others were handing out leaflets in Korean to protest the teenagers deaths. They tried to give one to the GIs, who waved it away, explaining that they could not read korean and did not know what it was about. Suddenly, an angry mob of “associates” descended on them. the GIs tried to defend themselves and hit the “lawmaker” (I think he deserves the apostrophes) on the nose. The GIs (who were dressed in civilian clothes by the way) decided to get out of the situation by getting off the train at the next stop. The mob followed. Took one of them and led him (I think blindfold) to a stadium where a protest rally was taking place. There, the events you describe took place. The GI was then handed over to the police WHO TOOK NO ACTION.

(Its part of my job to keep tabs on what happens in South Korea - I wish I had the original Korean press reports and reuters to contrast - you may find the local one archived in the Korea Herald. I think I have reasonably faithfully depicted the difference in the reports)

So, Flipper, does that not make your blood boil even more?

I post this to underline the fact that I am no apologist for the South Koreans. I still think US troops should stay to protect the US’s own interests.