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“How could any good Korean dare question him?” As little as the stem cell / Dr. Hwang story interested me, the exposure and chastening of blind Korean nationalism does interest me.

“Our society has been overwhelmed with the principle of focusing on outcome instead of procedure, and we forgot that ends cannot justify the means,” Chung
Un Chan, president of Seoul National University, where most of Hwang’s work was
conducted, said in an apology to the nation Wednesday. “Most of us, in the name
of national interests, exaggerated Dr. Hwang’s research to make it an aspiration
of the nation.”

Let’s hope some of the lessons stick. And yes, I do think that there are lessons there for the South’s policy toward North Korea. By the time of the 2002 World Cup, the goal of unification-at-any-price had consumed South Korean society, and appeasement of the North Korean regime was seen as the only way to achieve that goal. By then, no moral sacrifice was to great to interfere with the spirit of the moment.