Maritime security has been a top issue in Northeast Asia recently. The sinking of the South Korean ship, the Cheonan, was a major agenda item at the annual summit that South Korean conducted with Japan and China on Jeju Island last month. Jeju Island is important for another reason. The South Korean government is planning to build a naval base there.
The 1980 citizens’ uprising in Kwangju marked not only the beginnings of a steady struggle towards democracy, but also the growth of anti-American sentiment in South Korea. Six weeks following the assassination of dictator Park Chung Hee on October 26, 1979, a group of army commanders led by Lt. General Chun Doo Hwan, the chief of military intelligence, took control of the military and were clearly intent on seizing total power. Peaceful anti-government protestors, mainly comprised of students and workers, openly opposed Chun through street demonstrations and direct appeals to the United States. Publically, the Carter administration criticized the authoritarian policies of the South Korean government and championed international human rights. In practice, the actual decisions made by Carter’s administration reveal a different story.
Instead of a torpedo, was the Cheonan sinking the result of grounding, a collision, or friendly fire?
Last week marked the 30th anniversary of the Kwangju Citizens’ Uprising in South Korea, a pivotal event that inspired the Korean democratic movement through its ultimate victory in the late 1980s. In Kwangju, where hundreds died in the uprising, the event was marked by solemn remembrances and the presence of political leaders from both left and right, including representatives of President Lee Myung-bak, South Korea’s most conservative leader in over a decade. But the event drew hardly a passing glance in the United States, which is South Korea’s closest ally.
It was probably North Korea behind the sinking of the South Korean ship. But we still need to respond with a hand and not a fist.
The Republic of Korea has rapidly increased its defense budget in recent years. Last year’s spending of 26.6 trillion won represents a twofold increase from ten years ago. Now the Ministry of National Defense projects an annual average increase of 7.6 percent to 53.3 trillion won by 2020, another doubling over the next decade. South Korea, notably, raised its defense spending at a higher rate than North Korea at a time when Seoul was taking a more conciliatory policy of engagement. While the Roh Moo-hyun administration increased defense spending ostensibly in response to its policy goal to build a more autonomous military, the U.S.-Korea alliance motivated and shaped South Korea’s military transformation. This article examines the degree to which external threats, domestic interests, and the alliance have affected the South’s military spending and transformation.
Social workers are fond of saying that they must start where their clients are. This basic principle of social work is not theoretical. It comes from decades of practice. Simply telling people what they should do rarely translates into their actually doing “the right thing.” So instead, social workers have turned the tables by beginning not with the desired endpoint, as determined by the social work profession, but with the client’s articulated fears and concerns.
In the blockbuster 2000 film JSA, two South Korean soldiers accidentally find themselves on the North Korean side of the Joint Security Area, at the border between the two countries. They meet their North Korean counterparts. But instead of fighting, the four soldiers become friends and arrange several midnight get-togethers. At the height of their secret fraternization, one of the South Korean soldiers brings over several Choco Pies, cookies with marshmallow covered in chocolate that are wildly popular in South Korea.
Since the formation of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) to come to terms with the legacy of apartheid and colonialism, Commissions have sprung up in many countries that have sought to come to terms with painful legacies of colonialism, war, and internal strife. Nations with international and domestic traumas as diverse as Chile and Argentina, East Timor, and Sierra Leone have established TRCs.
North Korea fired hundreds of artillery shells into waters near the disputed western sea border with the South last week, and the South Korean military returned warning shots, heightening the already high tension on the peninsula. The rising tension came amidst recent signals from Pyongyang that it wanted to negotiate a peace treaty to formally end the Korean War. If peace negotiations began, Pyongyang could return to the Six Party Talks on ending its nuclear programs.