Park Geun-hye’s impeachment has brought nine years of conservative governance in Korea to a screeching halt. Now that there isn’t a single conservative candidate who has not been tainted by the Park Geun-hye/Choi Soon-sil scandal to one degree or another, it is all but guaranteed that the next president is going to come from the progressive Minjoo Party. And as I mentioned over the weekend, Moon Jae-in is now the man to beat.
Seeing how he was President Roh Moo-hyun’s former chief of staff, Moon is taking great pains to tell voters (and foreign observers) that he’s not anti-American. However, no matter how much Moon may wish to distance himself from his past, the Korean Left will have a much harder time of doing that. It wasn’t that long ago when Korean protesters were stomping on or burning American flags. Businesses blatantly refused to serve American customers and a good number of American citizens who lived in Korea at the time were assaulted and harassed on a daily basis. Many of them were forced to pretend to be Canadians to avoid harassment.
While the conservatives have been in charge, overt anti-Americanism practically disappeared. That is not to say that the conservatives were the only reason that anti-Americanism retreated. To be sure, there were other reasons as well. Today’s young Koreans’ nationalism is based on their identity as South Koreans, which is different from ten to fifteen years ago when minjok was the popular refrain. The KORUS FTA, which has also helped to deepen trade ties between the two countries, also helped to force back anti-Americanism. Ironically, the KORUS FTA was first initiated by President Roh Moo-hyun who once rhetorically asked “What’s wrong with being anti-American?”
However, it would be a mistake to think that Korea’s progressives have completely given up on viewing the United States as the enemy. When the first pieces of THAAD’s system arrived at Osan Air Base, the Minjoo Party’s chairperson, Choo Mi-ae falsely claimed that it was done in secret; that it was agreed upon by illegitimate political leaders who hoodwinked the Korean people. She went so far as to say that bringing in those components was a violation of Korea’s sovereignty.
On the other hand, the only thing that Choo Mi-ae has said about China’s bullying and (unofficial) sanctions against South Korea’s economy vis-a-vis the latter’s THAAD deployment was that it was “excessive.”
Choo Mi-ae, who doesn't even know how binoculars work, thinks her opinion on THAAD matters. Image Source
Especially with the boorish Donald Trump in the White House, the stage is set for anti-Americanism to return with a vengeance. Considering what we already know about Trump and the Korean Left, things could get ugly. When the Korean Left takes over the reins of power, they will have a responsibility to behave like adults. However, they are not in power yet. The ones who are in power and who are in the position to do anything to try to mitigate this are American Republicans. God help us all!
Deploying THAAD anti-missile batteries in South Korea has been contentious to say the least. There is a significant portion of the population that believes that it does more harm than good. After all, THAAD will not protect the 20 million or so people who live in Seoul (Seoul will be targeted by short-range rockets and artillery barrages and THAAD was never designed to counter those threats anyway). THAAD’s defensive capabilities are designed to better protect American military personnel and assets as well as the American mainland from long-range North Korean missiles.
The alliance between the United States and Korea is a mutual one. That means that Korea has to come to America’s aid as much as America has to come to Korea’s aid in the event of a military conflict that affects either nation. Especially at a time when “America First” rhetoric (never mind its historical roots) has permeated the American political landscape, it would be ill-advised for the Korean government to confirm what many American voters and government officials already falsely believe - that allies take and take and take but never give anything back.
However, THAAD has put Korea in China’s crosshairs. China’s unofficial sanctions have hurt Korean businesses. From Kpop stars to duty free shops to Lotte to practically any business that relies on the Chinese market, Korean businesses are hurting. A more thorough study would have to be conducted to deduce just how much China’s sanctions are costing Korea’s economy. But in politics, perception is oftentimes more than enough.
When the average Korean citizen feels he is worse off because of THAAD, which really doesn’t do much to protect Koreans, it would only be natural for more and more Koreans to question its benefits over time. The United States can nip this in the bud. President Trump ought to make a statement that the United States stands firmly with South Korea; that the United States would not sit idly by while China pushes around one of its most important allies. He should say publicly that his administration will look into ways to deepen trade ties between Seoul and Washington in order to alleviate the economic burden that THAAD has thrown onto Koreans’ collective shoulders.
However, the only American official of any real importance to have said anything about China’s bullying of South Korea over THAAD is Senator John McCain. No one in the Trump administration is saying a word to support Korea! This is irresponsible and yet another indication of the Trump administration’s sheer incompetence. In less than sixty days, South Korea is going to have a new government that will be populated by people who have a long history of anti-Americanism. All they need is the right excuse to resurrect it. They’ll be able to say that they stood up to American bullies and helped to improve economic relations with China and they will likely get rewarded by voters.
President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson ought to be doing everything they can to try their best to avoid that more-than-plausible eventuality. And yet there is nothing but silence from Washington. Never mind that Trump can’t seem to keep quiet about anything else!
If the worst does come to pass and if future American historians ask who lost South Korea, they can look back at this moment now and know without a doubt that President Trump’s silence was where it all started!
In my latest column for NK News, I talked about how the ROK-US alliance could be severely strained due to the toxic mix of the Trump administration and any progressive-led future government in Seoul.
President Trump’s cabinet, while not yet fully formed, is being filled by hawks - particularly embodied by Mattis and Tillerson - and considering how sanctions were the go-to weapon of choice for the hawkish doves in the Obama administration, the hawkish hawks in the Trump administration may prefer to seek stronger means of persuading North Korea to change course.
Meanwhile, across the Pacific, when the progressives take over the Blue House after the next presidential election in South Korea (whenever that takes place!), and the next president WILL be a progressive, they will most likely have drastically different ideas about how to deal with North Korea.
Being the kind of man who is obsessed with appearing strong and respected, perhaps even feared, Trump is exactly the kind of person whom Sean Connery’s Captain Marko Ramius would have called “a buckaroo.” We are already seeing this with the kind of rhetoric that the Trump administration has employed toward China - that it would prevent China from taking over territory in the contested South China Sea as well as deny it access to the islands it has built there.
It remains to be seen if the heated political rhetoric between Washington and Beijing (for its part, Beijing has said that the United States would need to “declare war” to block China access to its islands) will develop into something more serious. Both are militarily powerful nations and the two largest economies of the world. But if that is the kind of rhetoric that the new government in Washington has chosen to use against China, then it would be safe to conclude that Kim Jong Un should not be sleeping well.
This will compel South Korea to rethink its threat perception. Should President Trump’s rhetoric and policies lead to a conflict on the Korean Peninsula, the South Korean people would pay the ultimate price. How South Korea chooses to act now that the powers-that-be in Washington has changed is anyone’s guess.
The first approach is to better accommodate Washington. For example, Moon Jae-in, perhaps being able to tell how the wind’s direction has changed, has reversed his stance toward THAAD deployment and has said that it would “go ahead under his administration.”
That being said, one of Moon Jae-in’s criticisms against Ban Ki-moon, his most serious challenger to South Korea’s presidency, is that “he’s too pro-U.S.”
Opposing the decision to deploy THAAD anti-missile batteries in South Korea could have devastating consequences for the alliance. Trump has said repeatedly that South Korea has been a free rider in its national defense. It is a false claim, but every passing day is showing that facts do not matter nearly as much as what Trump feels. As it is, South Korea should be walking on eggshells.
Reversing the decision to deploy THAAD would only exacerbate things. Another theme that Trump has harped on is that the United States “practically gets nothing” by helping to defend South Korea.
It is yet another factually bereft statement but the fact remains that the ROK-US alliance is, indeed, a mutual defense treaty. Whether or not THAAD anti-missile batteries can actually help to defend South Korea, at this point, is a secondary matter. As far as Washington is concerned, it is convinced that THAAD anti-missile batteries can and will defend the United States from North Korean long-range missiles. If Seoul is unwilling to aid Washington defend itself from North Korea, then Trump would have been proven right - that the United States really does get “nothing” from defending South Korea.
It is unclear how the Trump administration would react if the next South Korean government decided to pursue détente with North Korea. Whether or not it is a horrible idea (it most certainly is), Seoul will need to better gauge the new government to better understand how Trump would react. But unilaterally deciding to cancel the joint plan to deploy THAAD in Korea would guarantee to elicit a less than cordial response from Washington.
As of this writing, Moon Jae-in is the only progressive presidential contender who has reversed his previous opposition to THAAD.
There is a second, and possibly tempting, alternative. Instead of better accommodating the United States, South Korea could choose to return to hedging its alliance with the United States and its economic partnership with China. China is South Korea’s largest trade partner. And China’s bullying and economic sanctions (in all but name) against South Korea for its decision to deploy THAAD anti-missile batteries has been bruising South Korea’s businesses.
By hurting everyone from K-pop stars to duty free shops to bidet manufacturers and air purifier manufacturers, Beijing is hoping that South Korean voters and businesses will apply pressure on their government and force them to change their position on THAAD. It is a solid plan. Hitting people in their wallets where it hurts most is one of the best ways to convince anyone to change.
However, canceling the decision to deploy THAAD, as mentioned earlier, has serious costs associated with it. At the very least, it would create a severe frost in the ROK-US alliance. At most, South Korea would allow itself to be bullied by China to have its sovereignty chipped away by North Korea.
It is important to point out, however, that that is not the same thing as saying that the alliance itself would be ended. The alliance is almost 70 years old. There are far too many entrenched interests in the civilian and military sectors that depend on the alliance for their livelihoods. Something incredibly dramatic needs to take place for an alliance to be terminated. And it is not clear if deciding to reverse course on THAAD is dramatic enough for the alliance to be terminated.
In order to compensate South Korea for its rift with the United States, China would need to offer South Korea certain guarantees. At the very least, China would need to guarantee a resumption of unimpeded trade and improved diplomatic relations. However, South Korea should not get its hopes up and imagine that Beijing would also offer to lean more heavily on North Korea, much less pave the way for reunification. China is satisfied with the status quo vis-à-vis the division of the Korean Peninsula. It will do nothing of the sort to destabilize the North Korean regime.
If South Korea manages to restore diplomatic and trade relations with China and manages to remain a US ally - albeit a marginalized one - the South Korean government, in its most optimistic moments, might be able to imagine itself as the go-to diplomatic broker between the United States and China as both countries appear to be headed toward some level of conflict.
However, this middle-of-the-road approach is probably the worst thing that South Korea could do. South Korea is already paying for it now. To one degree or another, South Korea has taken this approach whenever it could. It resisted being roped into the US missile defense shield program since George W. Bush was the US president. It refused to condemn North Korea for its human rights abuses during its two progressive administrations. It still continues to malign Japan whenever it can and refuses to participate in military exercises that involves Japan.
That is why South Korea is not high on President Trump’s list of priorities in Asia. While ambassadors to Japan and China have been appointed, America’s embassy in South Korea remains without an ambassador, which is made all the more pointed considering how much Koreans respected Ambassador Mark Lippert. If Korea attempts to be a coy or difficult ally whenever it fits its interests, then there is no reason to believe that other countries will not treat Korea in the same way.
The same goes for China. Much noise was made when President Park Geun-hye was seated so close to Premier Xi Jinping during China’s military parade in 2015 to commemorate the end of the Second World War. Everyone in both Beijing and Seoul sang each others’ praises and it was assumed that both countries were about to grow closer. Chinese netizens loved the fact that Park Geun-hye could speak Mandarin!
But at the end of the day, no one in Beijing forgot that South Korea is a US ally. When the North Koreans tested a nuclear weapon only a few months after the parade, Xi Jinping refused to answer the phone when Park Geun-hye decided to call in that favor to put North Korea in its place. When South Korea decided to finally agree to Washington’s calls to install THAAD anti-missile batteries when it became clear that Chinese help was not coming, China showed its true colors and revealed that it sees South Korea as nothing more than another small country that should simply do as it commands.
There is an old saying about how a hunter who chases two rabbits will eventually catch neither. South Korea will need to either fully commit itself to the alliance with the United States or it will need to borrow a page from Rodrigo Duterte and spurn Washington and fully embrace China as its diplomatic, military, and trade partner. It cannot do both. Neither Washington nor Beijing will ever allow South Korea to have its cake and eat it, too.
There are costs and benefits associated with each. But it will need to choose. Failure to choose will guarantee that South Korea forever remains marginalized and will only be able to nostalgically recall its eight years under the sun during the Obama administration as “the good ol’ days.”
Earlier today, I officially became a columnist at NK News and had my first column published. You can view it here.
I am quite proud of it and I hope that you all give it a read. The following is an excerpt from the original column at NK News.
Therefore, the only way to make sure that the North Koreans stop abducting people is to make sure that whatever gains they make are more troublesome than they are worth.
But what more can the international community do? After all, North Korea is already one of the most heavily sanctioned, if not the most heavily sanctioned, nations in the world.
It is quite obvious that sanctions alone will not do. Sanctions must also be complemented with the idea that it is immoral for anyone in the free world to engage in any type of undertaking with North Korea; even cultural exchanges. And that is precisely because such engagements necessarily imply that North Korea is a peaceful and civilized country – the two things that North Korea is absolutely not.
As
though the title wasn't enough to pique my curiosity, the cover of
the book showed a picture of what looks like a typical North Korean
propaganda poster – communist revolutionaries looking proudly
toward their bright future. However, instead of being represented by
a picture of Kim Il-sung or his son or his grandson, the bright
future is represented by the Sign of the Dollar.
I
had never heard of either the book or the author, Felix Abt, a Swiss
national who was appointed by ABB
as its director for North Korea, before. As soon as I saw the book,
I knew that I had to read it.
I
expected to read about bureaucratic red tape, the effects of
sanctions, the “culture shock” of introducing capitalism to a
citizenry that has known nothing but the Kim Dynasty's juche,
and the slow but sure growth of capitalism in North Korea. I
expected to get enlightenment. What I got was disappointment.
The
book is only 317 pages long. It should not take more than a couple
of days to finish reading such a book. It took me three weeks; and
what a painful three weeks it was as I had to figuratively flog
myself to finally finish it.
In
the first opening pages of the book, he mentions the 2010 sinking of
the ROKS Cheonan.
Despite the mountains of evidence that points to North Korea's
involvement in the sinking of the corvette (here,
here, here,
here,
and here),
Abt openly doubts North Korea's involvement
because
“a prominent Korean seismologist and and an Israeli geologist
suggested, based on an analysis of seismic and acoustic waves, that
the ship probably hit a South Korean mine.”
A
bitter taste in my mouth began to form before I even
began the first chapter. However, he then immediately says that “all
of it plays into a bigger picture of geopolitical bullying.”
The
last time I checked, it was the North Koreans who were firing
artillery, rockets, missiles, kidnapping foreign citizens, and
threatening war against its
neighbors.
The
book is not without its merits. There were the bits of information
that I had hoped for and expected. However, out of the book's 317
pages, relevant information could not have been printed on more than
twenty to thirty pages. The rest of it was utter rubbish.
Abt
seems to find
it funny as he acknowledges that others have called him North
Korea's “useful idiot.” But what he does not seem to know is that
he
also seems to have gone fully native after he had lived in North
Korea for so long. By that, I mean
that Abt seems to have fully adopted the North Korean method of being
as erratically contradictory
as often as possible.
For
example, Abt insists that North Koreans are not at all brainwashed.
In fact, he compares North Korean propaganda to advertisements that
people see in other countries. Specifically, he says “the world
businesses engage in another form of propaganda: advertising. The
only difference is that it advances a cause of consumerism rather
than politics.” To hammer home the point, he also rhetorically
asks if Americans “get brainwashed by cravings for McDonald's and
Starbucks seeing their logos smothered all over the country.”
Never
mind that McDonald's and Starbucks are merely corporations that do
not have the ability to arrest or gun down those who do not like
their products. But as far as Abt is concerned, they are both
morally equivalent.
But
I was willing to let it go. Perhaps we did have it all wrong about
the North Koreans being brainwashed. After all, he lived in North
Korea for seven years. Wouldn't he know better? However, even
before I could acclimate myself to believing what he said, he
contradicts himself by saying that the
patriotic songs that North Koreans sing are not about their love for
their country, but rather their love for their leaders. In fact,
North Korea's supposedly most popular melody is a catchy tune about
how North Koreans cannot exist without “General” Kim Jong-il who
has “extraordinary talents and virtues.”
But
it's just a song with a catchy tune. Who cares about that? It's
true. One song does not brainwash an entire country. But then Abt
later says that North Koreans “would jump into torrential floods at
the risk of their lives to save portraits of Kim Il-sung.”
He
then mentions that “around 40 percent of elementary school classes
are on the childhood of Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il” and that North
Koreans are “taught from an early age to be proud of being Koreans
rather than coming from a “less fortunate” race such as the
Japanese.” And during art festivals for schoolchildren, kindergartners make drawings titled “Let's cut the throat of US
imperialism!”
According
to Abt, North Koreans are so the-opposite-of-brainwashed that a
senior party cadre asked rhetorically why North Koreans should have
statistics about suicide. After all, “Our people are among the
happiest on earth,” the senior party cadre supposedly claimed.
It
is a sentiment that Abt seems to share as he adds, “Astoundingly, I
never came across people (North Koreans) who would have criticized or
even challenged the system, nor did I meet expatriates who had heard
about such cases.” Because your average North Korean, who has learned his whole life to be careful of what he says in front of even those that he loves and trusts, would then outwardly speak ill of the regime to a foreigner?
I
suppose Abt thinks that people ought to have their minds so broken
that they would become unwitting assassins a la “The Manchurian Candidate”
for Abt to consider someone to have become brainwashed.
Another
glaring contradiction in his book was about the way Christians are
treated in the country. He says:
“A true Christian believer in
today's North Korea would be branded as a traitor of the worst kind.
During the century before the DPRK was founded, white American
Protestants from the Bible belt promoted Christianity as the religion
of a superior foreign race, making it today antithetical to the
revolution.”
However,
a few pages later, he says:
“Despite stereotypes that North Korea
overwhelmingly represses the Christian religion, the government
usually doesn't see the Lord as a serious threat to its earthly
system. I once asked a senior security official if they did not feel
threatened by Moon's Unification Church, active in North Korea in the
hospitality and car manufacturing industries. He answered quite
candidly: “Well, you know, it's a cat-and-mouse game.” It's a
never-ending contest that the North Koreans will make sure the other
side can never win.”
So
which is it? Are North Korean Christians branded as traitors or does
the North Korean regime not see Christianity as a threat? As I said,
just like the regime itself, Abt appears to have embraced its
dual-personality disorder.
At least Jim Carrey tried to be funny Image Source
The
part where Abt appears to have accepted North Korean propaganda as
his own is when he complains on numerous occasions about the havoc
that international sanctions have had on North Korea's economy. He
mentions that if it just weren't for the sanctions, the North Koreans
would have access to state-of-the-art technology that they so richly
deserve.
However,
he never once mentions why North Korea is the most heavily sanctioned
nation in the world. He mentions North Korea's nuclear tests in
passing, but never once stops to ponder that the North Korean
leadership has no one to blame for the sanctions that have been
placed on it but itself.
The
only thing that he said that seemed to make any sense was how
ineffective the sanctions were. He claimed that, too often,
sanctions do not hurt criminals or government officials, but rather
ordinary citizens.
So
what does he say when sanctions are finally fine-tuned so that it will only
specifically hurt the North Korean leadership? He says:
“In
July 2012, the UN Security Council released a report on sanctions,
according to the AP news agency, which wrote: “No violations
involving nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons or ballistic
missiles were mentioned in the 74-page report to the Security Council
committee monitoring sanctions, published Friday.” On the other
hand, the document highlighted North Korea's responsibility for
illegally imported luxury goods including tobacco, bottles of sake,
secondhand pianos, and several secondhand Mercedes Benz cars. It is
stunning that these would be considered serious crimes which the
Security Council had to urgently address.”
So now that the Security Council has gotten it right, he thinks it's a waste of time. How very convenient.
However,
the most outrageous thing that he claims in the book is about the human rights violations in that country, which the world is
finally paying
some attention to.
Abt
admits that anywhere between 120,000 to 200,000 people are being held
in prison camps, but then brushes it all aside by saying that that
figure “represents less than 1 per cent of the total population.”
He further acts as a North Korea-apologist by comparing that figure
to American incarceration rates, because America is “home to the highest
documented percentage of prison inmates in the world.” Like as
though the conditions of imprisoned Americans could be compared to
the North Korean practice of imprisoning three generations of an
entire family in gulags for the “political crimes” of one person!
“While I clearly
disavow any human rights abuses in North Korea and anywhere else in
the world, I'm a businessman who has never visited any gulag or
prison. I am not a human rights expert.”
Seeing
how he admits that he is not a human rights expert, one would think
that he would remain silent about this topic from here on out.
However, he does not.
To
be specific, Abt has some choice words about North Korean defectors
who speak ill of North Korean human rights violations. He claims
that “as 70 percent of them (North
Korean defectors) remain jobless in South Korea, they can make a
living by selling dubious information.”
There
are approximately 27,000
North Korean defectors currently living in South Korea. And
there are thousands more who live elsewhere around the world. You
would think that if there was, indeed, a conspiracy among North Korean
defectors to sell a grand lie, it would be a matter of time before that
lie was punctured. But such logic seems to escape Abt.
Abt
also adds that “the intelligence services, academics, book authors,
journalists, and human rights and political activists who interview
these defectors almost ceaselessly after their arrival in South Korea
have an impact on their narrative, too. Those who know the North
Korean refugee resettlement process in South Korea are aware of how
easily individual accounts evolve over time from mild accounts of
hunger or seeking economic opportunities to romantic tales of escape
against all odds.”
To
add the cherry to his insult against North Korean defectors and their
testimony, he adds that “while it is a serious issue, North Korea's
foes are equally guilty of using rights rhetoric as a political tool
to further isolate and corner the regime.”
Like
as though the regime did not isolate and corner itself for decades
with its jucheand
songunpolicies.
In
a different but related issue, Abt also says that throughout his
seven years in North Korea, he had never seen a single starving
person. To be specific, he claims, “In the mid-2000s, I did not
come across starving people, though I did see scores of thin Koreans
who looked malnourished.”
I
suppose that it's possible that Abt had never seen this
young woman or others like her (see here, here, and here). But do they not exist because
he had never seen them? In his mind, it seems to be so.
And
what does Abt have to say about those videos of North Koreans who are
foraging for food? They're not starving! He claims that foraging
for food is a traditional pastime. To be specific, he says:
“What
many outside North Korea generally ignore is that the much-quoted
“foraging for food” is an age-old North and South Korean
tradition, a result of the absence of arable land in the North to
grow crops. For centuries, Koreans from all over the peninsula have
consumed wild mushrooms and edibles – long before the foundation of
the DPRK – and they still love to eat them.”
Of course. That must be why so many South Koreans also go out to forage for food everyday. Oh right. They don't.
But
just so that Abt makes it clear that there is hunger in North Korea
and that the North Korean government is doing its best to “take
care of its people,” Abt says “Amazingly, Kim Jong-il was, unlike
other Asian leaders, highly enthusiastic about potatoes and soybeans
and gave them a role in agricultural development.”
Abt
never mentions that it is likely that other Asian leaders were not
enthusiastic about potatoes or soybeans for their own countries'
agricultural development because they did not have to be.
There
are far too many other contradictions that he writes, as well as far
too many statements that cannot be taken as anything other than the
defense of the North Korean dictatorship. In fact, I dog-eared all
the pages that I felt contained such statements. If I mentioned
every single instance of this, however, I would have to scan and
upload the entire book!
Despite Abt's insistence that he is apolitical, this book is essentially a political book more than anything else; and it is excruciatingly awful. In Abt's narrative, North Korea is not evil
in the slightest bit. In fact, there are plenty of other evil
regimes in the world, which, therefore, naturally, exonerates North
Korea of all its sins. And if it has sinned, Abt never saw any of
it! He's just a businessman, for heaven's sake! Nobody is
either good or bad. Never mind reality! Truly “A Capitalist in
North Korea” can be called enlightening only by devaluing the
term.
Throughout
this entire book, it is amazing how Abt manages to sustain an oozy,
cynical tone, which is the book's most striking feature. Its sheer
stupidity is disgusting and without reprieve. Its sense of morality
is non-existent. From almost any page of the book, I could hear a
hollow, ghostly voice droning on repeatedly “There is no good or
evil – it just is.”
Well,
I saw evil in the pages of this book. And I saw that evil was
impotent, irrational, stupid, vain, and blind.
If
anyone chooses to fork over their hard-earned money for this book, I will
certainly not try to dissuade them. After all, who knows how to best
spend their own money than the individuals themselves? However, if
there is anyone who still wishes to purchase this book, might I suggest a cheaper and more practical
brand of toilet paper? Charmin, perhaps?
