The Korean Wave 2006 - Korean Cultural Service

The New York Times, Friday, August 11, 2006
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Here There Be Monsters
By AIDAN FOSTER-CARTER
LEEDS, ENGLAND
Knowing what to be scared of is, sadly, a skill we all need.
But South Koreans seem a bit confused about this, judging
from what’s making waves in Seoul right now.
First, the real world. Last week, the semiofficial Yonhap
news agency raised the alarm about a new report on
North Korea’s missile threat compiled by a researcher at a
foreign ministry think tank called the Institute of Foreign
Affairs and National Security. According to the author,
Yun Deok-min, the July 4 missile tests that caused an
international furor were just part of a major expansion of
Kim Jong-il’s capacity to menace his neighbors. All along
its east coast, the report noted, North Korea is building
underground missile bases and silos.
As the geography suggests, the main target is Japan, including
American military bases there. Mr. Yun claimed
that some 200 Rodong missiles (with a range of up to
1,300 miles, enough to reach anywhere in Japan) and
50 SSN-6 missiles (range of up to 2,500 miles) are already
in place. Two new bases under construction in the
northeastern part of the country are thought to be for
the Taepodong-2, a long-range intercontinental ballistic
missile, which in theory could reach Alaska (although the
July 4 test was, fortunately, pretty much a flop).
Lest South Koreans feel left out, the Dear Leader has
not forgotten them. The report indicated that about 600
short-range Scud missiles are based just 30 miles north of
the paradoxically named demilitarized zone and aimed at
all of South Korea’s strategic targets and industrial complexes.
That’s on top of 11,200 artillery pieces, some
apparently outfitted with chemical shells, ever ready to
pulverize greater Seoul and its 20 million inhabitants.
So are South Koreans scared of the menace to the north?
Nope. It’s summer, and they are going to the movies in droves
– to scare themselves about something quite different.
“Guimul” (“The Host”) is a monster movie, and a monster
hit, drawing a record audience of 6 million – equivalent
to one in eight South Koreans – in its first 11 days. It’s
about a child-snatching mutant that rears up into Seoul
out of the Han River, spawned by toxic fluid carelessly discharged
from – guess where – an American military base.
Harmless fiction? Not quite. The director, Bong Joon-ho,
says he based it on an incident in 2000 when a mortician
with the United States military was arrested over a discharge
of formaldehyde. Though the incident was regrettable,
the uproar it created was out of proportion. There
was no lasting pollution, much less any monsters.
But the theme rumbles on. The United States is returning
59 military bases to South Korea, which has complained
that many have unacceptable soil pollution (Washington
says it’s being held to an unfair standard). The allies have
been wrangling for two years about who will clean up.
Now environmental groups and anti-American partisans
are milking “Guimul” for political gain, and the minister
of the environment, Lee Chi-beom, says he is worried
that the sentiments spurred by the movie could make it
harder to reach any agreement on the bases.
There are echoes here of a 2002 case in which a United
States military truck killed two schoolgirls on a narrow
country road. The driver’s acquittal by a court-martial led
to weeks of protests and were a major factor in the election
of President Roh Moo-hyun, who let it be known
that he would not “kowtow” to Washington.
While the accident was a tragedy, one had to wonder
why it could incite so many South Koreans to take to
the streets while the daily death toll of North Korean
children from famine and conditions in Mr. Kim’s gulags
sparked no such protests.
To an outsider, South Koreans seem to have a double
standard in terms of threat perceptions. Having been fed
propaganda for years by military regimes that painted
North Korea as an evil monster poised to devour them,
they now seem to dismiss even factual claims as cold war
scare stories.
Many of them see North Korea as a slightly delinquent
brother who needs to be cajoled into better manners.
China, too, is viewed more positively than it is by most
of its other neighbors. By contrast, American motives
tend to be suspect, and wicked Japan can do nothing
right. (The Roh administration’s first reaction to the
North’s missile tests was not to condemn Mr. Kim but to
criticize Japan for making “such a fuss.”)
It’s not self-evident, to say the least, that this perceived hierarchy
of threats is in South Korea’s true national interest.
Without reviving the old knee-jerk demonization of
North Korea, South Koreans might at least be given pause
by the foreign ministry report that says the regime “has
made all-out efforts to bolster asymmetrical strengths at a
time when millions of its people have died of hunger.”
I suppose we shouldn’t begrudge either South Koreans’
yearning for national reconciliation or their summer
thrills. But maybe theycould think a little more deeply
about where the real monsters are.
Aidan Foster-Carter is an honorary senior research fellow on Korea
at Leeds University.
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Copyright © 2006 by The New York Times Co. Reprinted with permission.