Donga Ilbo Interview: David Straub

Straub, a State Department expert on Korea and Japan who has been a member of our six-party negotiating team, will spend an unspecified amount of time at an unspecified university — the report seems to have been mangled by an editor —  doing the heroic work of openly questioning Korea’s historical mythology:

“I would like to teach historical issues such as Katsura-Taft Secret Agreement (a secret treaty between Japan and the U.S. The U.S. recognized Japanese control of the Korean peninsula while Japan recognized U.S. rule over the Philippines.), the Korean War, the U.S.-Korea Mutual Defense Treaty, and the establishment of diplomatic relations between Korea and Japan. Those issues show complicated and dynamic relations between these countries. I will ask students to get rid of their self-centered mindset and see the ties between Korean and the U.S. in a comprehensive point of view.

It would be easy to close this post with a snarky “good luck,” but it takes a pair — and some terrific scholarship — to do this, and that’s probably why we’ve done far too little of it over the last two decades.  I suppose not many people of Straub’s talent and ability are available.  Maybe he can give a lock of his hair to Dr. Hwang.  Better:  maybe he can  splice it with some genes from John Bolton’s mustache.

Read the whole thing.