I absolutely despise the Chinese government, and yet I have trouble with the idea that even they would use the skin of executed prisoners to make cosmetics for export. Something doesn’t sound right about that, and the fact that it’s in The Guardian doesn’t help. And after all, the things we know to be true are already enough to turn your stomach. HT: The Kommentariat.

. . . to the 3,000 ROK Marines and friends who showed up to protect MacArthur’s statue in Incheon. Thank you for fighting the good fight, but please leave the hoglegs home next time (they were almost certainly prop guns). The neo-Stalinists–who had been looking forward to this day–stayed home, so there was no violence. It suggests that that radical left either feels that it’s overreached, or that the government intervened to keep them away. The mayor of Incheon weighed...

Korea-Iraq Update: On September 6, I blogged about what appeared to be a trial balloon statement from an Uri MP that Korea was considering a premature downsizing of its force of 3,600 troops in Iraq. Korea’s Iraq contingent is substantial on paper–the third-largest of any coalition partner–but is of little military value, remaining hidden away behind its barricades in the safest corner of Kurdistan. Today comes word that the Korean Ministry of National Defense intends to extend the mandate of...

The Daily Anxiety: Iran’s insane new “president” is offering to share nuclear technology with other Islamic nations. As I’ve said before, Iran and North Korea always seem to stage their provocations in tandem. I have no evidence of outright coordination, but at the very least, they seem to be watching each other’s moves as opportunities to refract world condemnation.

Kudos to the Chosun Ilbo for an outstanding response to the blood libel that General MacArthur gave his troops a green light to spend three days raping the women of Seoul. First up is an interview with James Zobel, the chief archivist at the MacArthur Memorial and Museum in Norfolk, Virginia. The view of someone so connected with MacArthur’s legacy will have to be buttressed by more neutral experts to take hold, but here, at least, is a newspaper trying...

Chosun Ilbo reports “few signs of progress . . . ,” and that the Chinese may even adjourn the talks early. And then? Since the last round of talks, the U.S. delegation has been saying, “After Christopher Hill, it’s John Bolton,” shorthand for referring the matter to the UN Security Council. Bolton is regarded as the most hawkish of the Bush administration’s neocons. As UN ambassador, he handles his country’s duties in the Security Council. He has described North Korean...

South Korea’s “Ally” Rating with the American people remains mostly unchanged since 2002, the first year in which Harris Surveys started collecting these numbers: The U.K. was America’s best friend in the eyes of respondents, with 76 percent designating it a close ally, while 18 percent saw it as friendly, and 1 percent with long memories considered it hostile. It was followed by Canada and Australia, which were seen as allies by 48 percent and 43 percent. Israel came fourth...

Ousted Hyundai Asan vice chairman Kim Yoon-Kyu is still offering to facilitate business deals in North Korea, and sounding like a bit of a corporate mutineer in the process. Background here.

For new readers, here’s my original post on the violent 9/11 anti-American protests in Incheon, by North Korean sympathizers who want to tear down a statue of General Douglas MacArthur. Today saw the first major coverage by major U.S. media. This L.A. Times piece by Barbara Demick, though an incomplete picture, was much better than nothing. First, what the article does say: On Sunday, more than 4,000 anti-MacArthur demonstrators armed with bamboo sticks clashed with an almost equal number of...

Everything you didn’t learn about Seoul Mayor and presidential aspirant Lee Myung-Bak in my piece on him last week is here at the L.A. Times, by Barbara Demick. Unlike me, she leaves out most of the dirt. Lee is right, of course, to say that Seoul is an ugly city and shouldn’t be, although I happen to be one of the billion or so people who would have preferred a different approach than paving over swathes of city–including some places...

REMINDER–LINK PROTEST AGAINST ROH MOO-HYUN TOMORROW TODAY IN NYC. I’m tempted to make a comparison to people who serve the cause of tyrants with sticks and firebombs . . . but I just did, and once is probably enough.

It’s hardly the strong leadership that protects liberal values from political violence, but it’s a start. From The Korea Times: In a meeting with Korean residents of New York, Roh, emphasizing the South Korea-U.S. alliance, said Gen. MacArthur is “part of our history” and added that it would be undesirable if it were not respected as such. “We should not manage the South Korea-U.S. relationship in such a way as to pull down the statue,” he said. “We should not...

Roh: Alliance Is Improving Steadily.

I did not know that sea lions could sink boats.

Al Qaeda has UAVs? That scares me.

The New York Times reports that the U.S. may begin withdrawing forces from Afghanistan by next spring, if we can cut through NATO balking (which we may if Schroeder gets Das Boot in Oktober). Because the military and political pressure on our forces in Afghanistan is sustainable, one presumes that U.S. and Afghan commanders are doing this because they believe that the Afghan forces are ready for it. Although I emphatically believe that an Iraq withdrawal is premature now, I’ll...

It’s all too obvious for the need for much analysis. From the Joongang Ilbo: South Korea’s chief negotiator, Song Min-soon, is normally loquacious and brimming with metaphors, but his comments to reporters before he began a round of bilateral meetings were uncharacteristically short. After a lunch meeting with the U.S. team, he said only, “I don’t have any reason to be pessimistic but we still have to build some ground to be optimistic.” Mr. Hill, standing near Mr. Song, said...