Sunday Freedom Park Showdown
Anti-American hate groups are holding a protest Sunday demanding the removal of the General MacArthur statue located in Freedom Park in Inchon. This park has been the scene of prior protests for and against the statue and looks to be a battle ground again this weekend:
Civic groups calling for the removal of the statue will rally at 3 p.m. Sunday to demand an end “to 60 years of U.S. occupation and the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Korea.” Organizers have notified the authorities of some 3,000 participants, but the groups’ membership is nearer 10,000. The groups reportedly chose Sunday, Sept. 11, because it coincides with the anniversary of terrorist attacks on New York in 2001.
It is just sickening to me that these protesters would use September 11th as a date to push their anti-American agenda. I hope the US media picks up on this. This story is slowly gaining steam in the US media and may be the reason why the anti-US group leader has been brought in by the police for questioning. The Korean government may now be fearing the backlash not of the US government, but of the US consumer if these protests make waves in the US media. Could you imagine the reaction of the American public if the US media broadcast the vile garbage coming from these people on the anniversary of September 11th? I doubt to many people would be buying a Hyundai after that and the Korean government knows it.
Some other Koreans know it to but they are not defending the statue because of Hyundai sales but because they believe in General MacArthur and America:
Defenders of the statue will demonstrate from 1 p.m. that same day, with about 200 people expected to take part. The Hwanghae Province Residents Association, one of the groups involved, changed the venue from the park to nearby Inseong Girls’ High School at the suggestion of police, who are concerned about a possible clash. But it said the groups could move on to Freedom Park depending on the situation. A spokesman from the group said one of the anti-MacArthur groups, “is even talking about forming an advance team and trying to pull the statue down with chains and ropes… We can’t just stand by and watch.â€
They won’t be able to pull that statue down because there are riot police protecting the statue around the clock. However, it is still sad that riot police should have to protect this statue to begin with. No matter what the US public’s feelings towards the French may be, you will never see Americans demanding that the Statue of Liberty be torn down.
BTW, did you see this?
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/news/200509/200509090010.html
I’ve been putting this message out today on my blog and other site and at the USFK forums.
This could be very ugly and the kick off to a period of ugliness. I think the violent protests of May and July were the pre-season, but they are ready for war with this 9/11 protest.
I got this feeling before I saw the article you quoted. I was looking around a bunch of the anti-US websites, and I noticed they have been pooling their effort lately and some of the sites that haven’t been doing much for a long time are picking up and putting out pretty much the same message, and they are all pointing to Inchon Freedom Park and 9/11.
Take a look here. http://www.youthkorea.org.
Before you can get to the main site, you are taken to an entrance portal that several of the sites are using. It has a quality flash media production about all of this. Over at http://www.koreasojourner.blog-city.com I translated —- well, gave an idea — of what about half of the video is saying. It is a strong drum beat of emotion and then it goes into a pep rally call of civic action and then tells everybody to come fight for freedom at the park on 9/11.
There are a lot of things lining up right now —–
The heart of it is the Pyongtaek issue, but the civic leaders have chosen the symbol of the MacArthur statue as the way to rally more Koreans.
They are beating the drums of MacArthur landing in Inchon, and thwarting unification, in sept, and they are connecting it to the 60th anniversary of USFK coming to Korea, and the 60th year is a very big thing in Korea (along with the first 100 days after birth and the 1st birthday), and then 9/11.
See this site http://www.geocities.com/korea911memory to see how the civic groups used kids songs and images and other things to use the 9/11 terrorist attacks as a means to stoke Korean pride by smashing at the US through a sign of its weakness and hurt……
And they are using it again for this call to protest….
We could be in for a rough patch right now….
Again, I think it is the Pyongtaek base issue that is the real reason they are trying to get as many average Koreans to join in as they can. It must be time to buy the land and/or move people off it to expand the base.
It has been pretty clear, I think, that the usual civic groups have started putting more effort, money, and energy into organizing the protests and getting their sites remodelled a little and ready for propaganda action.
I guess I can put it this way —– the network chatter has been picking up significantly — and it could very well be a sign of some big things to come.
If you are a soldier, for the next few weeks, be careful around public transportation places like train and subway stations and on the trains.
And pay more attention when you go to the bars and other areas off base where GIs frequently gather….
…..it isn’t unusual during the times when the civic groups are trying to drum up active participation by average Koreans for the Korean police to warn USFK of a plot to stage an incident with soldiers to film and get on the internet…..