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October 11, 2007

Summit Perceptions

So what will be the enduring  effect of the meeting between Roh Moo Hyun and Kim Jong Il?  I could speculate, but others have already done that.  Simply read the divergent brands and ask yourself:  who is better informed and grounded in reality:  a semi-random sampling of ordinary  North Koreans, or a New York Times reporter?  (Big hint:  it’s Norimitsu Oniishi, who is almost always over his head when he strays beyond culture and fluff stories).   I’ll just observe that...

Categories Appeasement/Inside NK/Korean Politics
September 24, 2007

Some USFK Stats and History

A few days ago, a reader asked me how much the presence of the USFK cost American taxpayers.  This is a research project I’ve taken on before, only to be confronted by few answers from credible sources.  You’re about to see what I mean here. Writing for the Nautilus Institute, Selig Harrison claimed in 2001 that the annual cost was $42 billion per year.   Another Nautilus alum,  Doug Bandow, claimed in his recent Korea book  that withdrawing from the...

Categories An Alliance?/History/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Military
September 13, 2007

What the Bush Administration Really Thinks About ‘The Spat’

Commenter Michael Sheehan dropped a link to a must-read by former senior NSC advisor Michael Green, on Roh’s bumbling open-air negotiation with President Bush last week. Green also thinks that Roh knew what he was doing, that he did it for domestic political reasons, and that he set his own goals back in the process. In other words, typical Roh: Watching the exchange later on YouTube.com, I felt great sympathy for my former national security colleagues in both countries, since...

Categories An Alliance?/Diplomacy/U.S. & Korea
September 7, 2007

The Death of an Alliance, Part 67

[Update: As I had figured, only video really does it justice. Just watch the body language and Bush’s expression. And for that matter, Roh’s. Roh certainly has used his presidency to perfect a sublime aura of idiocy. It’s hard for me to imagine that South Korean voters will be impressed if their media ever decide to cover this story. There definitely isn’t much love in that room. Click the image. Update 1 continued below, with an AP report that does...

Categories An Alliance?/Korean Politics/U.S. & Korea
September 1, 2007

Ransom Is Material Support for Terror

[Updated, edited, and bumped, 9/1]   With friends like these …. Thanks to the weakness of the South Korean government, it’s a great day to be a terrorist.  I second what other Korea bloggers are saying about the Taliban’s victory over South Korea.  The Nomad:   “[W]hen Canada criticises you for being soft on terrorism, you’re in big trouble.”  Andy Jackson quotes the Taliban thusly: “We will do the same thing with the other allies in Afghanistan, because we found this...

Categories An Alliance?/Terrorism/Iraq
August 15, 2007

God Has a Veto

[Update 8/18:   Called it:  “The two Koreas on Saturday agreed to reschedule the inter-Korean summit slated for late August in Pyongyang to Oct. 2-4 after North Korea requested a delay because of its extensive flood damage, the presidential office Cheong Wa Dae said.”]   Would Kim Jong Il host a summit in Pyongyang if he couldn’t make a propaganda spectacle of the visit?  Yesterday, I relayed the latest reports of serious flooding North Korea that have reportedly killed hundreds...

Categories Appeasement/Famine & Food Aid/Korean Politics
August 6, 2007

Pew: Anti-Americanism Declined in South Korea (But Read the Fine Print)

According to this year’s Pew Global attitudes report, anti-Americanism has declined significantly in South Korea, from 46% favorable in 2003 to 58% favorable last year. Pew says that the “U.S. image has improved dramatically” there, and while this result suggests a significant and positive change, Pew’s enthusiasm is overstated, because Pew is comparing two extremes that may overstate the actual situation. Pew’s first point of comparison is 2003, when anti-Americanism was at its fevered peak, when no South Korean politician...

Categories Anti-Americanism
August 3, 2007

Newsweek: Seoul Paid Ransom to Fake Kidnappers

First, a few updates.  A representative for the hostages’ families has rejected invitations  from radical groups to turn this into the next anti-American election year  issue: The families of the Korean hostages spoke out against a movement to hold the U.S. responsible for the unresolved crisis, saying anti-American demonstrations could put the hostages’ lives at greater risk. The families turned down an offer by some anti-American organizations to stage a candlelight rally. Lee Jeong-hoon, a representative of the families, said...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Appeasement/Korean Politics/Terrorism/Iraq
August 2, 2007

Double Extortion

Yesterday’s report that a hostage  rescue operation was underway in Afghanistan turned out to be premature, but spin operations in Seoul  are sharply accelerating.  In a South Korean election year, it couldn’t be more predicatable that its unpopular  and desperate leftist government, far-left “civic” groups, and certain media are looking for a way to make the  Taliban’s  kidnapping and murder of 23 Korean hostages  America’s fault.  It remains to be seen whether the greater  South Korean public will buy this....

Categories An Alliance?/Anti-Americanism/Terrorism/Iraq
July 31, 2007

Ransom Is Not a Countermeasure

The Taliban have now murdered a second South Korean hostage.  I don’t know what I can say about the Taliban that I haven’t already said, other than that the odds are good they can be tracked down for their trials and whatever appropriately miserable  fate awaits them in Pol-e-Charki Prison.  There have been a lot of stories recently  reporting that  dozens of their fighters have been killed.  Stories like this may or may not indicate a more significant trend.  Insurgencies...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Korean Politics/Terrorism/Iraq
July 30, 2007

A Basket of Ants

It’s not an uncommon event for  South Korean political parties to split and re-unite during election years, and as you may recall,  Kim  Dae Jung’s Millenium Democratic Party looked hopelessly split this time five years ago (before it successfully capitalized on anti-Americanism to  eke out  a narrow win).  It’s anyone’s guess what this hopelessly confusing picture will look like next week, so instead of wasting time on analysis that will be meaningless tomorrow, here’s a brief chronology of what’s happening:...

Categories Korean Politics
July 28, 2007

Not Ready

I have resigned myself to a Lee Myung Bak presidency in Korea, something I can do without much difficulty because (a) there will be much amusement, hilarity, scandal, and great blog material,  and  (b) because I’m not South Korean [Update:   or North Korean].  Superficially, Lee is the furthest “right” of the major candidates, and while  South Korea’s idea of “right” may  not be my thing, it’s  the linear opposite of South Korea’s idea of  “left,” which I unreservedly  despise.  Concepts...

Categories Korean Politics/Terrorism/Iraq/U.S. Politics
July 26, 2007

South Korea: No Worse Friend, No Better Enemy

By now you’ve heard that the Taliban have murdered their first Korean hostage, and so Korea has now wheeled as one  in spontaneous rage at the Taliban, as though they’d  issued postage stamps with images of  Tokdo, right?  Well, not exactly.  There are many things I could say about the reactions of Roh Moo Hyun, his government, and his country’s media, but Robert Kohler has pretty much already said those things, and a few others.  Two lessons bears repeating:  first,...

Categories Anti-Americanism/Korean Society/Religion/Terrorism/Iraq
July 22, 2007

What I’m Reading: Andrei Lankov, ‘North of the DMZ’

Back in the 1980s, one of my Russian friends who was then in her early 20s, worked as an interpreter at a joint venture between North Korea and the Soviet Union. She was by no means a prude herself …, but she was somewhat shocked by the amount of sexual banter which her female North Korean colleagues engaged in. For the entire summer when the girls were on their own, they tried to learn as much as possible about the...

Categories Books & Films/Deprogramming/Korean Society
July 20, 2007

Taliban Kidnap 18 South Koreans in Afghanistan

They were members of a church group, and readers may recall other church groups  from South Korea have also ventured into some very dangerous places. Taliban gunmen abducted at least 18 members of a South Korean church group in southern Afghanistan, and a purported spokesman for the Islamic militia said Friday it will question them about their activities in Afghanistan before deciding their fate. The Koreans were seized Thursday in Ghazni province as they were traveling by bus from Kabul...

Categories Korean Society/Religion
July 14, 2007

If Jack Pritchard Doesn’t Believe Jack Pritchard, Why Should We?

Jack Pritchard probably comes to his role as South Korea’s  main policy mouthpiece honestly,  through a shared  belief that the next ten years of unrequited aid really will change North Korea into a peaceful, bucolic, union-free garment  district.  Pritchard is President of the Korea Economic  Institute, which  works  Washington’s Korea-watching and policy-making crowds through its regular sponsorship of social and academic dinner  events.  I’ve been to a few myself, and though I seldom agree with  what I hear there,  the...

Categories Media Criticism/Six-Party Talks/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Politics/Washington Views/WMD
July 5, 2007

The FTA and ‘Fortress Korea’

It can be disturbing to find so much to agree with in the writings of someone who doesn’t share your outlook on the bigger picture. I generally favor the lowering of trade barriers and oppose the protection of domestic industries from the competition of a fair and open market. Note the key caveat in that last sentence, for defining “fair and open” is where the devil is. I suspect Alan Tomlinson defines it more narrowly than I do, and that...

Categories NK Economics/U.S. & Korea/U.S. Politics