Fighting the Korean War in pacifist Japan: Korean and Japanese leftist solidarity and American Cold War containment

Where does “pacifist” Japan fit within the history of the Korean War? Was Japan simply the beneficiary of the wartime boom – a case best exemplified by Japanese Prime Minister Yoshida Shigeru’s characterization of the Korean War as “a gift of the gods”? When North Korean troops crossed the thirty-eighth parallel and launched a full-scale attack against South Korea, the U.S. occupation in Japan quickly transformed the pacifist nation into the indispensable rear base of United Nations military intervention in the Korean War. The Japanese Communist Party and leftist groups organized by zainichi Koreans (Korean residents in Japan) launched an antiwar movement to stop Japan from producing and sending arms to UN forces in Korea. The U.S. occupation responded with determined efforts to contain every antiwar voice emerging from the streets of the pacifist country. By examining the political dynamics of zainichi Korean and Japanese leftist solidarity and U.S. countermeasures, this article shows how the Korean War was fought in pacifist Japan. It also illuminates how the practice of Cold War containment was mutually linked on the ground between occupied Japan and South Korea.     

PARALLEL LIVES: A Conversation between Hwang Suk-young and Bao Ninh Two Veterans of the Vietnam War

Translators' Preface: The dialogue below is a translation of a conversation between South Korean novelist Hwang Suk-young and Vietnamese novelist Bao Ninh, who met in Seoul on 4 June 2000. Held a few days before the historic summit meeting between South Korean President Kim Dae Jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang, the Hwang Suk-young/Bao Ninh meeting is probably the first such encounter between two major novelists of the Vietnam War from South Korea and Vietnam. The conversation first appeared in the South Korean weekly news journal Hangyoreh 21 on 22 June 2000. The translators would like to thank the editors of Hangyoreh 21 for their kind permission to reproduce the article here.     

What happened in Korea? Rethinking Korean history 1945–1953

Abstract

The Pueblo incident was a stunning reminder of the hysteria and racism associated with the word Korea in the U.S. In spite of Vietnam and the great changes that have taken place within American society, the U.S. government and the military had little trouble in resuscitating the spectre of “brainwashing” and torture. The most diabolical cunning was attributed to the Koreans, who had legally captured the Pueblo and its crew. But as though at the touch of a switch, the American media and much of the nation again began to call for blood as they had done in the years 1950 to 1953. It would be a mistake to underestimate the success of America's campaign of vilification against the Korean people and the Korean revolutionary movement. At times the phobia reaches absurd proportions.     

LIMITED WAR,UNLIMITED TARGETS

In the early days of the Korean War, the U.S. Air Force (USAF) had a policy of precision bombing military targets only. Policy-makers in Washington, D.C., formulated this policy to ensure the protection of Korean civilians and to increase the effectiveness of their air operations. Senior USAF officers in Korea, however, were unhappy about the limitations placed on them by Washington. In their strategic air operations against targets in North Korea USAF officers followed Washington's precision bombing policy, but they insisted that USAF bombers be permitted to use incendiary bombs against population centers in North Korea. China's entry into the war in November 1950 led to a drastic change in the precision bombing policy. On 5 November 1950, when the UN forces began suffering defeat after defeat in battles with the new enemy, General Douglas MacArthur designated cities and villages in North Korea as “main bombing targets” and permitted the use of incendiary bombs, which had been used in attacks against Japanese cities during World War II. From that point until the end of the war, the USAF regarded North Korean cities and villages as their crucial targets as political and military occasion demanded.     

US Foreign Policy and the Korean War

Abstract

Sometimes called the “Forgotten War” because Americans pay so little attention to it, the Korean War was nevertheless a pivotal event in US foreign policy. Three themes will be integrated into this article as it analyzes Korean War policy. First, the Korean War heightened the debates and divisions among US foreign policymakers. If Japan’s 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor helped to silence these divisions, then President Truman’s handling of North Korea’s 1950 invasion of South Korea helped resurrect them. Second, while foreign policy goals are generally assumed to drive the objectives of war in the classic Clausewitzian sense, the opposite frequently occurred in Korea as changes on the battlefield drove policy objectives of officials in Washington. Third, although the Americans, Chinese and Soviets all worked assiduously to keep the Korean War limited to the Korean Peninsula, the war had repercussions far beyond the Korean battlefield. Its ramifications were felt in Taiwan, Vietnam, Europe and in US defense expenditures as well.     

David Marr's ‘Vietnamese anticolonialism’

Abstract

Because of its legendary resistance against the United States and its struggle for national salvation, Vietnam has entered into the consciousness of progressive mankind and has begun to attract the attention of foreign historians. In the United States, the war of aggression waged by the U.S. government has been costly in lives and property and has seriously weakened the country in all aspects, leading to the increasing opposition among the American people to the war. While protesting against the policy of the U.S. government of continuing and widening its aggression in Vietnam, for the purpose of defending America's honor and to fight for their democratic rights and economic livelihood, the American people from all walks of life have been building a friendly relationship with the Vietnamese people. Because of this reason, the American people would like to have a better understanding of the land and people of Vietnam, past and present. However, in the United States “the study of Vietnamese anti-colonial movements has been largely the preserve of the political scientist, the practicing journalist, and the intelligence specialist.” Since nearly all of these people have conducted their research according to strict political guidelines from the White House and the Pentagon, they have ignored the historical truth in an effort to justify present-day American neo-colonialism. Despite these limitations, Marr's Vietnamese Anticolonialism is one of the first historical studies published in the United States which makes a larger contribution to America's understanding of the Vietnamese struggle for freedom and independence, and thereby shows that the present U.S. war of aggression is doomed to failure.     

Introduction to the supplement

Abstract

Today the American press focuses on what might be called the domestic consequences of United States policy toward Korea. We read about the troop withdrawal issue, the unfolding Korea Lobby scandal, and, perhaps, Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA) activities within the U.S. The following supplement, however, reminds us of the far worse consequences of American and Korean policies for those who remain within Korea. It was the U.S. CIA which helped to set up the KCIA, thereby providing to the diffuse authoritarianism of the Rhee regime period (1948–1960) an organizational weapon which has kept Park in power through sixteen years of Korean dissent and upheaval: it is the south Korean people who continue to suffer the consequences. It was the Johnson and Nixon administrations which sanctioned what amounted to bribery, first to get the south Koreans to commit troops in the Vietnam War, and then to keep them there as Nixon and Kissinger prolonged the war. It was the Nixon administration which kept a conspicuous silence when Park in 1972 ripped up the old constitution, did away with even the fiction of procedural democracy, and instituted a frankly authoritarian regime.     

Political suicide among Korean youth

Abstract

A striking aspect of the South Korean political protest movement of the 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s was the frequent self-immolation of young Korean activists. This trend toward political suicide—politically motivated voluntary death—began with the laborer Chun Tae-il's suicide in 1970 and increased dramatically in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It is estimated that in the 1980s alone nearly one hundred young Koreans put an end to their lives as a form of antigovernment protest! This article explores why so many young people in Korea have chosen to take their own lives in this way.     

Cold War brotherhood contested: KATUSAs,slicky boys,American G.I.s,and the Status of Forces Agreement in post-armistice South Korea, 1954–1966

ABSTRACT

As the largest contingent of Americans in postwar South Korea, the G.I. best represented the United States’ Cold War objectives. Their deployment was an emblem of hard power containment, but the G.I. also embodied soft power integration, and through both, G.I.s helped to promote Pax Americana. This article focuses on the militarized masculinity of these ambassadors of America and their people-to-people diplomacy in South Korea between 1954 and 1966. These American G.I.s constructed their militarized masculinity vis-à-vis the Korean male Other, their “lesser” counterparts – the hapless houseboy, the inferior partner soldier, and the menacing slicky boy. At the same time, this liberal imperialism did not go uncontested. Violent imaginaries of the American G.I. from the borderlands were used by Koreans to demand a new bilateral framework – the Status of Forces Agreement in 1966 – to replace the outmoded wartime extraterritorial jurisdiction wielded by the American military after cessation of hostilities on the Korean peninsula in 1953. The militarized masculinity practiced in everyday encounters, thus, became the basis of a critique of American liberal imperialism in one of the United States closest Cold War “brother” nations.     

THE DEVELOPMENT OF A DEATH CULT IN 1930s JAPAN AND THE DECISION TO DROP THE ATOM BOMB

In the 1930s Japan developed a death cult which had a profound effect on the conduct of the Japanese armed forces in the Pacific War, 1941–1945. As a result of government directed propaganda campaign after the overthrow of the Shogunate in 1868, the ruling military cliques restored an Imperial system of government which placed Emperor Meiji as the Godhead central to the constitution and spiritual life of the Japanese nation. A bastardised Bushido cult emerged. It combined with a Social-Darwinist belief in Japan's manifest destiny to dominate Asia. The result was a murderous brutality that became synonymous with Japanese treatment of prisoners of war and conquered civilians. Japan's death cult was equally driven by a belief in self-sacrifice characterised by suicidal Banzai charges and kamikaze attacks. The result was kill ratios of Japanese troops in the Pacific War that were unique in the history of warfare. Even Japanese civilians were expected to sacrifice their lives in equal measure in the defence of the homeland. It was for this reason that American war planners came to the shocking estimate that as many as 900,000 Allied troops could die in the conquest of mainland Japan – Operation DOWNFALL. Contrary to the view of numbers of revisionist historians in the post-war period, who have variously argued that the atom bombs were used to prevent Soviet entry into the war against Japan, Francis Pike, author of Hirohito's War, The Pacific War, 1941 – 1945 [Bloomsbury 2015] reaffirms that the nuclear weapon was used for one purpose alone – to bring the war to a speedy end and to save the lives of American troops.     

冷战与韩国一心会

二战后朝鲜半岛成为冷战的前沿阵地,美国为了执行冷战反共的战略,需要韩国有一个强大的政府和稳定的政局。美国还帮助韩国实现了军事现代化,极大地提高了军队的社会政治地位,栽培扶植了一批韩国新军人。这些军人以全斗焕等韩国陆军士官学校的毕业生为代表,建立秘密军事集团＂一心会＂。这支新军部集团在冷战的背景下迅速壮大,抓住朴正熙遇刺事件的时机,通过一次次政变夺取军权、政权,打击社会民主力量,最终从冷战的工具成为韩国的统治者。当冷战缓和、终结,民主力量壮大的时候,韩国威权统治也就到了终点。     

South Korea's search for an independent foreign policy

South Korea's independent foreign policy should be understood as a growing self-reliant attitude in the process of managing foreign affairs, and not as a strict policy target that must be achieved within a single term of a specific government. In theory, an instrumental approach, rather than an ideological adherence, toward the alliance system with the US is relevant for South Korea. Most importantly of all, the Korean dream of independent foreign policy will be hard to realize until Koreans abandon the dependent mind-set in terms of national security and foreign policy.     

The Liberals and Vietnam1

How did the Menzies Governments of the early to mid 1960s arrive at the position of sending Australian troops to Vietnam? During the 1950s, Menzies, and especially his External Affairs Minister Richard Casey, developed an appreciation of the strategic significance of Indochina, but struggled to view the conflict in Vietnam in ways other than through Cold War lenses. By the 1960s too, Britain's capacity to demonstrate a lead for Australia in foreign policy for the region was diminishing with its power, and the Menzies Governments were mindful of the need to support an American preparedness to intervene in Southeast Asia against communist‐led forces. This logic became more compelling in the face of Indonesia's “Confrontation” with Malaysia from 1963. As a result, the Liberals were not reluctant to support US military intervention in the region, in Vietnam.     

Imperialism and Asia: A brief introduction to the literature

Abstract

From 1910 (formally, de facto earlier) until 1945 Korea was under extremely harsh occupation by Japan. During this period, when every component of Korean culture was cruelly suppressed, Korean women suffered specific oppression. Very large numbers of Korean women were forcibly driven into prostitution, both in Korea itself and throughout the Japanese empire. Many were forced into prostitution for Japanese troops in appalling conditions, often in the front lines, and many were killed in the trenches. Within general Japanese sexism, there was a specificity to the attempt to degrade and exploit Korean women. Certain aspects of contemporary Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) official culture must be understood as attempts to combat the legacy of this colonial past. The emphasis on “purity”—for women—which is articulated by both men and women in the DPRK is justified officially by reference to both the Japanese colonial past and the contemporary degradation of women in South Korea, which is usually attributed mainly to US and Japanese influences, such as sex tourism.     

Occurrence at Nog Ŭn-ri Bridge: An Inquiry into the History and Memory of a Civil War

This inquiry begins with the American Civil War and then moves into an investigation of history and memory in the context of the Korean War, using the alleged massacre of Korean civilians in the vicinity of Nog?n village (Y?ngdong country) as a focal point. The article describes the progressive political background of Y?ngdong county and argues that revelations about the Nog?n-ri massacre must be seen against the backdrop of leftist activity and guerrilla warfare in an area that was long known as the “red county.” Finding themselves facing “essentially a guerrilla war [fought] over rugged territory,” the American military forces responded by creating a free-fire zone. The author links these free-fire operations with U.S. actions during the war in Vietnam and then explores how and why the U.S. government (with the complicity of the mainstream media) has buried stories about the murder of civilians and he weighs U.S. responsibility for these atrocities.     

The Vietnam Women's Movement for the Right to Live: a non-communist opposition movement to the American war in Vietnam

This article examines the political and diplomatic struggles in urban South Vietnam from the perspective of women in the Vietnamese Women’s Movement for the Right to Live (WRL) during the Vietnam War. This movement was a timely response to the American war of aggression, which had destroyed the fabric of South Vietnamese society and drastically diminished women’s position within it by 1970. Under the leadership of Mrs. Ngô Bá Thành, the WRL fought for peace and women’s liberation through political action and shrewd diplomacy. Unlike female guerrilla fighters, the WRL maintained political autonomy and neutrality throughout the conflict. As a result, it was violently repressed by the Saigon government and quickly disbanded after the communist victory in 1975. Nevertheless, studying these politically sophisticated women’s anti-war efforts is crucial to understanding the symbiotic yet destructive relationship between Third World women and American imperialism during the twentieth century. It also helps dismantle essentialist assumptions about Asian women as inherently submissive and politically naïve. The WRL is a sterling example of Vietnamese women’s ingenuity in their dual struggle for national liberation and gender equality.     

Security,Nationalism and Popular Culture: Screening South Korea’s Uneasy Identity in the Early 2000s

By examining the cultural representations of the South Korean notion of the Self/Other in relation to its major traditional enemy — North Korea — this article aims to capture a picture of South Korea’s discursive economy of the North, and to problematise the South Korean identities implicated in that economy in the early 2000s. To achieve these aims, this article focuses on representations of a successful popular South Korean film which was released in 2000, just a few months after the first inter-Korean summit: Joint Security Area JSA. By analytically reading JSA, it is revealed that, in South Korea, the traditional discursive practices based on the Cold War thinking have been eroded. For the South, the North is part of the Self (Korean-ness; love for the North as the same nation) and, at the same time, is an Other (South Korean-ness; contempt for the North as an inferior state). Related to this, South Korea appears to be the uneasy Self without a firm Other in between Korean-ness and South Korean-ness.     

New Perceptions of the Vietnam War: Essays on the War,the South Vietnamese Experience,the Diaspora and the Continuing Impact

New Perceptions of the Vietnam War: Essays on the War, the South Vietnamese Experience, the Diaspora and the Continuing Impact. Edited by Nathalie Huynh Chau Nguyen (Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, 2015), pp.vi + 262. £27.69 (pb).     

U.S.-VIETNAM RELATIONS IN THE TRUMP ERA

This paper seeks to examine U.S.-Vietnam relations under the Trump administration. It will concentrate on the political, economic and security dimensions of the relationship. It will demonstrate that the Trump administration's policy towards Vietnam has many elements of Obama's policy towards Vietnam. Though President Trump has focused on the trade deficit with Vietnam, the Trump administration has worked closely with the Vietnamese government to intensify the partnership with Vietnam. It should be noted that in the context of China's growing assertiveness in the South China Sea, Hanoi and Washington see that it is in their mutual interests to advance their security cooperation. The last two years have witnessed the increasing partnership between Vietnam and the United States.