About Korea
As this Washington Post editorial notes, the 54-year old war is back in the news. Bush’s invocation of its name drew mockery and disgust as well as, in this case, recognition that what he is talking about is stabilizing the country, the region, the future. A position all reasonable parties in government are going to have to arrive at, and the great political challenge of Bush’s remaining time in office.
The scoffers look at Korea as a peaceful and civilized place and don’t think anything about it applies to Iraq. In some sense they are right. In three years of the intense combat period, there were nearly 34,000 Americans killed in action, more than 8,000 still counted as missing, and more than 2,000 in theater non-combat deaths. Iraq is a walk in the park by comparison. Combat officially ended in 1953, but I’ve found reference to another 800 or so deaths listed up to 1955, and since then, nearly 100 deaths as a result of hostile action on the DMZ as recently as 1994, and about 800 other deaths. The period of 1966-69 is sometimes called the “Second Korean War,” due to incidents such as the violent seizure of the Pueblo, the shooting down of an electronic surveillance plane, and numerous DMZ incidents that account for most of those deaths. The threat from North Korea, in the form of violent provocations, incursions, tunnel digging, seizure of Korean and Japanese nationals, and now the development of nuclear weapons, has never gone away.
So, who thinks we should have walked away from Korea?
Iraq could well be more violent in coming years than Korea was “post-war.” I doubt it will ever reach the intensity of the Korean war years, or the Vietnam War years, but there is a good likelihood, if we continue on the path we are on now, with military and political efforts at stabilization in Iraq, and without a U.S. political capitulation, that the violence will subside considerably. Can the Iraqis then turn themselves into an economic powerhouse like South Korea, and put large parts of the region to shame? I am not expecting it, but I’m willing to be surprised. One of the most heartening things to come out of Anbar was the following remark, last February, one of the first reports to suggest Anbar was turning. A lot of people seem to think the best thing that ever happened to Vietnam was us leaving. Not this guy:
“One thing Sheikh Sattar keeps saying is he wants al-Anbar to be like Germany and Japan and South Korea were after their respective wars, with a long-term American presence helping … put them back together,” MacFarland said. “The negative example he cites is Vietnam. He says, yeah, so, Vietnam beat the Americans, and what did it get them? You know, 30 years later, they’re still living in poverty.”
— Col. Sean B. MacFarland, 1st BCT, 1st AD
Surber: Penalty for early withdrawal.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 12:02 am on Monday, June 4, 2007
2 Responses to “About Korea”
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June 4th, 2007 at 2:24 am
Also to the point about Korea is that it took more than 30 years before one democratically elected government could follow another, peacefully.
June 4th, 2007 at 10:54 am
Web Reconnaissance for 06/04/2007
A short recon of whats out there that might draw your attention.