Yongsan Fire Pics

Thanks to readers who responded to my request for more info on the Yongsan fire last week.  That fire destroyed three buildings on Yongsan or the adjacent Korean Service Corps compound.  Worse, it severely burned  three Korean workers.  One was  burned on 60% of his body and had to be put on a respirator. 

Reader “Dan,” presumably a soldier, was living near the scene and ran out to take photographs.  He responded to my request for photos; you can see the rest here.  Many thanks to Dan  for sending, and for serving.  Thank God neither he nor any of his comrades were hurt, because it certainly appears that that was the idea. 

The cause of the fire isn’t firmly established, according to the papers.  They suggest, perhaps hopefully,  that it could have been an electrical fire.  The explanation that is the most specific and consistent with other available information, however,  is that a Korean woman, apparently deranged,  set the fire to “punish” America for its “terrorism.”   I suppose it’s pointless to invoke irony against  the insane by pointing out that her own violence against innocents is arguably terrorism, so I’ll take aim against Souh Korea’s prevailing political culture instead.  How  different was this act of violence from other equally hateful, violent acts — the stabbing murder of  Major David Berry,  the attempt to do the same to  Lieutenant Colonel Steven Boylan, the kidnapping  of Private John Murphy,  or any of these incidents?  With the exception of the murder of Major Berry, a husband and father of five, those other acts were done by “sane” people with malice aforethought.

It’s understandable that combat zones might not be safe places for soldiers; that’s an occupational hazard we confront based on our best calculation of our vital interests.   A nation  that’s wealthy, at peace, and which calls itself our ally, however,  ought to  be a safe place for our soldiers.  Our soldiers ought to be able to go out alone, or stay out all night without worries, as we did when I first arrived in 1998.  There shouldn’t have to be “civil disturbance” warning signs at the gates to our Army posts.  Yet we can’t, there are, and Korea isn’t a safe place for them, and is arguably becoming less safe as the years pass.  Worse, Korea’s  government is actually contributing to that hateful climate  through its tacit and active expressions of approval  for the violence, and most commonly by handing out ham-sandwich punishments to those who attack our soldiers.

The  Korean government will not  use the rule of law to protect our soldiers from violence.  It refuses to speak  out clearly against hate  that’s on  open display nationwide.  Recently,  the Counselor to its embassy, Kim Eun-Sok,  politely told  me that  he knows about it and won’t do a damned thing about it.  Too “sensitive,” he  explained (meaning, in fact, that his government has  made the calculated determination that Americans either don’t know or don’t care).   Then, in the next breath, its embassy tries to convince the American people that Korean anti-Americanism is the stuff of myth, despite the existence of a mountain of empiricial evidence to the contrary. 

There is a word for men like this.  They’re known as liars. 

No, the Korean government can’t stop every insane person from endangering the lives of our soldiers, but it certainly can speak out forcefully against hatred against them, and is absolutely obliged to punish violence against them to the fullest extent of the law.  A good first step would be for President Roh or Comrade Chung to visit the injured Korean workers to denounce this kind of hatred.  In an ordinary civilized society, it would already have happened.