Here is a great editorial in the Chosun Ilbo about the need for Korea’s government to look towards the future instead of the past:

Yet today, only two of the Northeast Asian nations that were not so long ago vying to emerge from their historic backwater are competing at the center of world history. China is bracing itself to provide a counterbalance to the U.S., and Japan envisages a policy of reining in China’s regional hegemony in alliance with America. The U.S., meanwhile, has embraced Japan to employ a dual strategy of restraining and cooperating with China.

It only took a few years for that to happen. “I will not be concerned at other men’s not knowing me,” says Confucius. “I will be concerned at my own want of ability.” And it has been Korea’s want of ability that in the last few years has made it drop out of the future-bound race among the three Northeast Asian neighbors, where one led one moment and another the next, and retreated into the past. It is our leaders we have to thank for this, with their insistence that we can only have a future if we right the wrongs of the past, and their refusal to brook any debate whether that is true.

I feel this country is hungry for some leadership and I hope the next presidential election provides it. The leftists pursuit of rewriting the past without focusing on the future of the country may very well cause Korea to forever be in the past as the rest of Asia passes this country by.

Here is a New Year’s message I received via e-mail from the US Embassy.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________

My family and I would like to take this opportunity to wish all of you
here in the Republic of Korea a Happy New Year.

In 2005 we said good-bye to Ambassador Christopher Hill, as he returned
to Washington to serve as Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian
and Pacific Affairs and lead our delegation to the Six-Party Talks on
the North Korean nuclear issue. In October we welcomed to Seoul
Ambassador Alexander Vershbow, a career member of the Foreign Service with
extensive experience in East-West relations and non-proliferation.
President Roh’s visit to the United States, President Bush’s visit to the
Republic of Korea for APEC and bilateral talks, and visits by the
Secretaries of State and Defense illustrate the strength of the U.S.-Korea
alliance and its importance to both countries.

For the coming new year, the American Citizen Services Unit renews its
commitment to process applications for passports and reports of birth,
as well as requests for other services, as quickly as possible. We are
proud that we have reduced processing time for passports to an average
of seven business days – much faster than passport applications are
processed state-side.

This past year we worked, and will continue to work, with U.S. Forces
Korea to refine our plans for a noncombatant evacuation operation, which
we all hope never to have to execute. In 2006, we expect that even
more Americans will register their stay in Korea with the Embassy. We
wish you a pleasant stay in Korea, whether as a long-term resident or a
short-term visitor, and urge you to check our website periodically for
the latest information about matters that may be of interest to you while
in Korea.

Again, my family and I, and everyone in the Consular Section, wish you
a happy, healthy and safe New Year and best wishes for 2006.

Sincerely,

Michael D. Kirby
Consul General
United States Embassy Seoul

Japanese Shogun Hideyoshi; the man responsible for the 1592 invasion of Korea.

Prior to 1592 the Japanese warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi had continued his predecessor Oda Nobunaga’s dream of uniting all of the Japanese islands under one Shogun. With the consolidation of all the Japanese islands under the rule of Hideyoshi, he became hungry for more military conquests, plus he had to keep his men busy or in a long line of prior Japanese conspiracies they could turn on and dispose of him as well.

So in 1592 Hideyoshi set off to conquer China by first of all subjugating the kingdom of Chosun. China was considered the standard bearer of culture at the time and a Japanese defeat of the Chinese would prove the superiority of the Japanese people over the cultured Chinese who had long considered the Japanese a nation of pirates. The Korean Chosun kingdom was a fractured society with a backward fuedal Yangban class that was expected not to put up much of an organized resistance. In fact the Japanese demanded that the Koreans allow them access through their country to attack China. The Koreans had long respected the Chinese and the Korean court did not take the threat of invasion by the Japanese seriously because they had long been considered nothing more than barbarian pirates. However, Korea was looked at by the Japanese as a afterthought to the eventual conquest of China while the Koreans looked with indifference to the Japanese threats due to their perceived superiority over the Japanese barbarians. This indifference would cost the Koreans hundreds of thousands of lives due to a military and citizenry unprepared for the invasion.

The views of the Japanese were initially proven true as the 150,000 soldiers in the Japanese military raced from one victory after another over the ineffective Korean military in what would become known in Korea as the Imjimgaeran War. One Japanese victory in the city of Sangju turned the defenders of that city into Korea’s version of the Alamo, however the Korean people still didn’t have a Davy Crockett to rally behind like the Texans did after the Alamo. That was until Admiral Yi Sun-shin came onto the scene.

Admiral Yi had received a request for military assistance from Admiral Won Kyun of Pusan who commanded all the naval forces of Kyongsang province in southwestern Korea. Yi was initially reluctant to come to Won’s aid because he had only 24 ships and the turtle boats were not yet complete. After confering with his fellow Cholla commanders, Yi decided to come to Won’s aid despite the shortage of boats and no official orders from Seoul to assist Won.

Though Yi would be greatly outnumbered by the Japanese Navy he felt he would still have a chance to defeat them due to the number of advantages he did enjoy. He and his men were extremely familiar with the many islands, bays, and tides that make up the southern coast of the Korean peninsula. Plus the local Korean population would prove to be a great asset in gathering military intelligence on the Japanese forces. Finally the Korean ships were much stronger than Japanese ships. The Korean boats were large and extremely sturdy and featured large cannons that gave Korean ships an advantage in naval firepower.

One of the heavy cannons that gave Admiral Yi’s navy superior firepower over the invading Japanese naval forces.

An ironic fact about the Japanese military is that for being an island nation they had poor naval power to compliment their superior army. Admiral Yi understood this and felt that for Korea to successfully defeat the Japanese he would need to destroy the Japanese navy which would prevent the Japanese from resupplying their army on the Korean mainland.

In June of 1592 Admiral Yi would begin to implement his strategy by winning his first naval battle at the port of Okpo located on Geoje-do island. Before the battle Admiral Yi had been able to increase his naval force to a total of 91 ships by recruiting fishing vessels to sail with his 24 warships. Admiral Yi’s fleet ambushed 50 Japanese boats that had been raiding the city of Okpo. In the initial battle Yi’s fleet destroyed 26 of the Japanese ships without any Korean losses. Over the next two days of battle Yi would sink 18 more Japanese ships without any friendly losses. This victory was only a prelude of greater victories to come led by Admiral Yi’s legendary “turtle boats”.

Prior Posting:  The Beginning of the Legend of Yi Sun-shin

Next Posting: The Rise of a Korean National Hero

Does anyone think North Korea would issue a New Year’s message wishing for peace and happiness for the upcoming New Year? Of course not.  Instead North Korea released a New Year’s message threatening war and demanding the withdrawal of US troops from South Korea:

North Korea on Sunday issued a New Year’s message demanding the withdrawal of U.S. troops from South Korea. The New Year’s message didn’t mention a word about the nuclear standoff with the United States.

“The entire nation should firmly defend peace and security on the Korean Peninsula by turning out in the Struggle to resolutely foil the U.S. attempt to launch another war. We must remove the root cause of war completely from this land by launching a nationwide campaign for driving out the U.S. troops,” said a joint editorial by North Korea’s Rodong Sinmun and two other major state-run newspapers.

Yawn….. More rhetoric. This makes me wonder if this proclamation is in coordination with the communist anti-USFK groups protesting the USFK redeployment to Camp Humphreys? Anyway North Korea’s proclamation is interesting because the majority of the US soldiers here would love to go home.

The Washington Post is reporting that sales for Korean kimchi have risen by 20% due to the Avian Flu scare:

Ho Jin Lee, president of Kim Chee Pride Inc. of Maspeth, N.Y., which supplies kimchi on the East Coast, said sales jumped 20 percent this year.
A sudden new joie d’epice in the American diet?
Try avian flu.

Which presents a potentially difficult choice given the work of Kang Sa-Ouk of Seoul National University, who took 13 chickens infected with avian flu virus and a couple of other diseases, fed them kimchi juice and found that 11 of the birds recovered.

After the stem cell scandal from Seoul National University does anyone trust what a scientist from Korea especially another scientist from Seoul National University has to say? I was suspicious of this “scientific study” when it first came out and now after the Dr. Hwang fiasco I am even more suspicious. Since it has to deal with kimchi I doubt there will be anyone in Korea willing to investigate this and start the 2006 kimchi scandal. Kimchi is one thing you don’t mess with in Korea, no matter how outrageous this study may be.

The Joong Ang Ilbo is reporting that the Blue House actually knew about the stem cell fraud back in November:

President Roh Moo-hyun addressed the emerging controversy over allegations of unethical practices by MBC on the Blue House Web site on Nov. 27, even before the network had aired the program. He made no mention of any doubts about Dr. Hwang’s research, not surprisingly because the doubts had only been communicated to a junior official the day before.

But on Dec. 5, one day after the YTN television network reported details of alleged PD Notebook threats to researchers in the course of gathering their information, Mr. Roh was quoted as saying in a meeting with his senior aides that he hoped “problems regarding verification of Dr. Hwang’s achievements could be put to rest at this point.” The science minister, Oh Myung, told reporters on Dec. 8 that those with doubts should blame Science, adding that talks of verification of Dr. Hwang’s research should no longer be brought up “for the sake of Korea’s science.”

How in the world can Korea’s science minister blame Science Magazine for Dr. Hwang’s fraud? Then he says that the allegations shouldn’t be brought up anymore? He sounds like someone more interested in a cover up than actually determining the truth.

In other stem cell news apparently about 1/2 of the Korean population wants Dr. Hwang to go back to work at Seoul National University and continue his stem cell work:

Nearly half of South Korean people still support disgraced cloning scientist Hwang Woo-suk, who is accused of fabricating his research on tailor-made cells featured by the U.S. journal Science in 2005, a recent survey showed.
The survey conducted by The Korea Times on Dec. 27-28 last year found that 45.6 percent of respondents said it is desirable to give the former professor at Seoul National University (SNU) “one more chance’’ for his cloning work.

More than 70 percent of those surveyed were also skeptical about the government’s support for the World Stem Cell Hub at SNU, initiated by the cloning expert last October, without Hwang’s involvement, the poll suggested.

About 95 percent of respondents want the government itself to continue its financial support for the stem cell research rather than redirect the support to a private or scholar level.

As past experience has taught me, I don’t put to much credence in polls conducted in Korea. So take these results with a grain of salt, but it does tell us that there is still a sizable number of Koreans willing to overlook Hwang’s past trangression in hopes of future success. Hwang has actually played this whole crisis towards Korean nationalism very well and in the end he may still walk away with a job and research money some where. I don’t think SNU would take him back, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he resurfaces somewhere else to carry on his experiments when he still has a large amount of public backing.

Here is a great editorial look at one of North Korea’s favorite useful idiots, South Korean Unification Minister Chung Dong-young’s term in office:

Since Mr. Chung took office, Pyongyang has refused to talk with Seoul using such pretexts as South Korea’s refusal to pay tribute to the former North Korean leader Kim Il Sung and the South Korean government’s admission of North Korean refugees into the country. Mr. Chung had on several occasions made comments seemingly calculated to appease the North Koreans, suggesting at one point that Seoul did not understand how important these affairs were to the North Koreans.

While he said he sympathized with the long-term prisoners charged with espionage for the North based on humanitarian grounds, Mr. Chung was distant when it came to the matter of South Korean abductees or prisoners of war still held captive in the North. While he vowed to stand firm against both North Korea and the United States for the sake of our national interests, he only picked bones with his U.S. counterparts.

Such policies of Mr. Chung deepened the internal strife within the South and aggravated the tension between Seoul and Washington. North Korea, in particular, took advantage of this all-tolerant attitude of ours and took economic gifts from us while encouraging strife within our society. Even in their New Year’s editorial, North Korean newspapers called for the formation of a coalition against the conservatives in South Korean society and for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the Korean Peninsula.

As long as our government continues this all-tolerant attitude that Mr. Chung practiced, there will be no substantial progress in inter-Korean relations and only strife within South Korean society.

Amen.

One name or statue that new comers to Korea will undoubtedly encounter is of Korea’s most famous historical figures, Admiral Yi-Sun-shin. Most Koreans will just tell you that he was a famous admiral that defeated the Japanese navy many centuries ago with his “turtle boats” thus saving the country from Japanese domination. This achievement has given Admiral Yi a mythical status in today’s Korean society that is comparable to the mythical status given to George Washington in the United States. Like George Washington everyone knows the legendary achievements of Admiral Yi, but very few know the man himself.

I hope through this series of posts on Admiral Yi, I will be able to shed some light on the achievements of Admiral Yi, his rise, fall, and rise again, which is much more interesting and heroic than the casual observer would think. Plus the history of Yi Sun-shin also displays interesting insights into even today’s Korean society.

Yi Sun-shin much like his future Japanese rival Toyotomi Hideyoshi, was born into a humble family on April 28, 1545 to a family of minor scholars in Seoul. His family would move to Ansan, Gyeongi Province south of Seoul. In Ansan he would marry at the age of 19 and began to study the military arts a year later. Yi applied for the military academy in 1572 but failed because he broke his leg during a horsemanship examination. Yi tried again in 1577 and passed the exam this time and enters the military for the first time at the age of 32.

Yi began his military career with an assignment in the remote North Korean frontier with China. In 1579 he moved to a position in Chungcheong province and then received his first naval position in Cholla province in 1580. In all of his positions Yi was considered a talented leader, administrator, and had a strong sense of honor. However, during the Korean Chosun era, honor was not something that got you advancement in the corrupt, class driven political system. Jealous officers eventually forced Yi out of his naval post in Cholla-do and he was once again sent to the remote mountainous frontier with China to guard against barbarian invasions.

In 1583, the North Korean Hamgyong province that Yi and his men guarded was invaded by barbarians from Manchuria led by the bandit Mu Pai-nai. Mu was a notorious “Oranckay” (barbarian) who had led many successful raids from Manchuria into Chosun Korea. Yi was able to get Mu to come out into an open battlefield to fight Yi and his men. Yi’s forces crushed the barbarian invaders and Yi received his first level of fame, but he never attempted to capitalize on it. In fact he ended up resigning his post and returned home to Ansan after his father died. However, the fame he earned defeating Mu caused many of his contemporaries to be jealous of his success.

Yi was a student of the Chinese strategist Sun Tzu who advocated cunning and discipline in war. Pictures of Yi always feature him with a stern and disciplined face because of this.

Yi remained out of the military for three years observing the mandatory three year mourning period of the time. He returned to the military in 1586 to a post once again in North Korea’s Hamgyong province where he once again earned prestige for defeating barbarian invaders. However, the jealous commander of Hamgyong province Yi Il arrested Yi Sun-shin after his victories over the barbarians. Yi Il accuses Yi Sun-shin of desertion during battle and tortures him to try and get him to admit to to false crimes. Yi Sun-shin even though under torture never admits to the offenses. The King later releases Yi from prison and dismisses him from his officer posting; Yi is instead made a common soldier and forced to work his way back up the ranks. In 1588 Yi Sun-shin returns home to Ansan and is out of the military.

However, a year later a childhood friend of Yi Sun-shin, Yu Song-nyong became prime minister of Korea and he brought Yi back into the military and Yi worked for him in Seoul. In 1591 Yu had Yi appointed fleet admiral of Eastern Cholla province in southeastern Korea. Yi is based in the city of Yoesu and it is this time frame that he begins the construction of the first “turtle boats” that would win him so much fame in Korea. Yi originally had the “turtle boats” constructed in order to combat frequent pirate attacks from Japan. However, the “turtle boats” a year later in 1592 would have more than just pirates to worry about as the Hideyoshi invasion of the peninsula was about to begin.

Next Posting: Prelude to War

Happy New Year from Jeongdongin Beach, South Korea

The Chosun Ilbo is running an article listing their top stories of 2005. Here they are with my comments of course:

1. The Hwang Woo-suk Debacle – (Definitely the biggest story for Korea this year.)

2. North Korea Admits to Nuclear Arms; Six-Party Talks Resume – (Yawn)

3. Killing Spree at Guard Post – (Big wake up call for the ROK Army and the government)

4. Sixth Consecutive World Cup Qualification – (No mention of the coaching change?)

5. The Secret-Service Bugging Scandal – (Korea’s own wiretapping scandal.)

6. Constitutional Court Rules for Administrative City – (Residents in Jonju are being relocated for national security reasons and no one is complaining, USFK relocates to Pyoengtaek for national security reasons and the activist groups come out in force to protest.)

7. The Cheonggye Stream Restored – (May seem like a small thing in western country, but a big deal here.)

8. Three Divisive Laws – (I think the melee in the legislature made more news than the laws themselves.)

9. Stock Prices Hit the Roof – (Yet everyone is pessimistic about the economy.)

10. The Ruling Party in Crisis – (Thank God!)