Posted on 07/12/2011 6:56:03 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
South Korea has joined the only other two countries in the world that have dropped the name of the forthcoming film Captain America and replaced it with the subtitle, The First Avenger. The other two countries are Russia and Ukraine. According to the New York Times, “Although that country [South Korea] is one of Hollywood’s top-performing territories, resentment about the continued presence of the United States military runs deep.”
For years now I have intended to write a column about the most glaring case of international ingratitude of which I am aware. The Captain America story has finally pushed me over the edge.
For decades, there have been anti–U.S. demonstrations in South Korea. And each time I wonder the same thing: Do these people have any idea what that living hell known as North Korea is like? Do these people understand that the United States is the reason they are so free and prosperous, completely unlike their fellow Koreans who had the horrible luck not to be liberated by America? Do these people know how many Americans died to enable them to be free?
Whenever I confront someone who claims that America’s wars abroad were fought for economic gain or to extend its alleged imperialist empire, I ask the person about the Korean War: What imperialist or economic reasons were there to fight in that country?
The answer I most often receive is, “Frankly I don’t know too much about the Korean War.” And it’s a good thing for the critics of America’s wars that they don’t know much about the Korean War. If they did, they would either experience cognitive dissonance or have to severely modify their position on America.
Just five years after a war-weary America celebrated the end of World War II, Americans were asked to fight the successor evil to Nazism — Communism — in Korea, a country most Americans could not identify on a map. In an earlier version of what happened in Vietnam, the Soviet Union and China backed a Communist attempt to take over the southern half of the Korean peninsula — the northern half had been Communist since the end of World War II — and install a Stalinist tyranny over the non-Communist southern half.
Over 36,000 Americans died in America’s successful attempt to keep South Korea from becoming Communist. And another 92,000 were wounded.
So, forgive me for the contempt I feel for South Koreans who demonstrate against the United States and for the two-thirds of South Koreans who, according to a 2002 Gallup-Korea poll, view the United States unfavorably. Whenever I see those anti-American demonstrators or read such polls, all I can think about are the tens of thousands of Americans who died so that South Koreans would not live in the Communist hell their fellow Koreans live in.
Younger South Koreans want American troops to leave their country? Do these young people not know that on planet earth no other country suffers the mass enslavement, mass incarceration, mass death, or the deadening of the mind and soul that North Koreans endure because of the psychopaths who run that country?
And if they do know all this about North Korea, how do they explain why South Korea is so different?
Here is a suggestion: The South Korean government should conduct a national plebiscite on whether America should withdraw its troops from that country. Before the South Korean people vote, the United States should make it clear that if it withdraws its troops and North Korea later invades the south, we will send no troops to die again for South Korea; but we will vote to condemn North Korea’s aggression at the U.N.
If a majority of the South Korean people want us to leave, we should.
The beauty of such a plebiscite is that if a majority of the South Korean people wants American troops out, we have no moral obligation to stay there. And if a majority wants us to stay, the South Korean Left and other ingrates in that country should shut up.
I have been to South Korea and I live in a community with many Koreans. I have always admired their industriousness, work ethic, and strong families. But South Korea is surely the most ungrateful country in the world. And that is all the more remarkable — because it is also the luckiest.
— Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist.
“And we’re borrowing the money from them to do it.”
Excellent point. Total madness.
MacAuthor could not believe that he had been order to defend South Korea, he was dumb founded by the change in policy. There were zero plans for the defense of South Korea. Now tasked with defending the south he did what any good commander would, he threatened the flank of the enemy by visiting the nationalist Chinese on Taiwan and made it known that on Taiwan there was an army ready willing and capable of invading mainland China. This threat was taken seriously by the Chicoms, tying up many of their troops for the purpose of defending against a possible invasion. Until that is, the genius Truman ordered the 7th fleet to patrol the Taiwan straights to ensure Shan Ki Sheck (sp?) did not invade China. Guess where all those troops that had been tied down went once Truman secured the enemies flank for them? Truman was an idiot.
“We are in S.K. not for the Koreans but for the Japanesse. Defense of Japan starts in S.K.”
Oh, I see. And then, by extension, can we say, “Defense of the US starts in Japan”?
And “Defense of the US starts in Germany”?
And “Defense of the US starts throughout the whole frickin’ world, especially our former enemies and Third World hell-holes”?
These people can pay for mercenaries if they can’t protect themselves. Free rides from the US taxpayers, ultimately to build the wealth and power of the military-industrial-complex and the globalists.
The ROK would rather that not happen, so maintains the US alliance to give whatever megalomaniac running the North reason to reconsider launching the attack. The US troops (about 28,000) are there not for their military value but as an earnest of US intent.
For which the ROK pays the US 1.65 billion USD annually. That's the ROK pays the US.
But I'll just point out before you do that a militarized Germany or a militarized Japan might not be in the best interests of the USA (or the world for that matter). We have troops in both as much to insure they do not militarize as much as we do for defense.
that have dropped the name of the forthcoming film Captain
Korea and replaced it with the subtitle,
The First Japanese-Occupied Peninsula Avenger.
Visited Seoul about 12 years ago. Saw several very large handwritten screeds pasted graffiti-like onto signs, lots of verbiage in Korean. Asked my host what it meant? “Yankee go home.”
Unfortunately, MacArthur was an egomaniac who was really vague on how the US Constitution works. It is not an Army general’s job to make strategic foreign policy decisions that might get the US into war with another country. Whether the decisions he made might have been more appropriate is quite beside the point.
MacArthur lucked out at Inchon and then failed miserably in the North.
It makes us the world’s dumbest mercenaries.
Dumb and dumber. All the downside risk (trip wire) with not an ounce of common gratitude.
Back during Desert Shield/Storm, it was said that the Saudi princes referred to the US military as “our white slaves.”
I wonder what the Koreans call us behind our backs.
When our military is under such budget pressure, departure from South Korea should be an easy line item. Ungrateful the the South Koreans are. Let them defend themselves.
More’s the pity you overlooked the subject of the piece; ingratitude. When the SK government went out for bids on new jet fighters and actually considered the French Mirage, I knew they’d forgotten what we did on their behalf.
“For which the ROK pays the US 1.65 billion USD annually. That’s the ROK pays the US. “
Mind providing a source for that $1.65 billion?
Nobody in the Truman administration cared one bit about Japan or the far east as witnessed by the communique that took South Korea out of the area of US influence. The US (and now USSR) had the bomb and war was a thing of the past, unthinkable in the atomic age. MacArthur was the defacto ruler of Japan and had been for many years. He had been making "strategic foreign policy decisions" that D.C. rubber stamped for a long time.
MacArthur had his faults but they were minor compared with the gross incompetence of the Truman Administration. Why was a 72 year old general still on active service in the first place?
These days most of us bemoan PC generals and not figthing wars to win them. All this started with Truman, Korea and MacArthur. Before that we used to have generals that spoke thier mind and fought to win.
1.68 trillion won item under expenditure.
Where its a matter of overwhelming local sentiment I don't think US policy has much of a choice.
According to various sources the entire amount they pay is a little under $700 million, which doesn’t cover our costs.
China eventually wants to make nice with South Korea and become partners in the new “Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere”. Both China and South Korea wish the North would go away...but both know the flood of refugees from the North would pour over both borders and create a huge burden on both countries....so ultimately both will have to work together to solve the “North Korea Problem”, once the Pyongyang Regime collapses, which is inevitable.
MacArthur's army and especially navy commanders were unanimous that Inchon was an extremely risky endeavor, mainly because of the huge tides. He overrode them and the effort succeeded, but its success was in the opinion of most experts a matter of luck, which is why I say he lucked out there. Had a few items fallen the other way, Inchon could easily have been a disaster and then it would have been foolish and reckless rather than "a brilliant battle plan."
Out-flanking amphibious attacks do not always succeed brilliantly. Witness Anzio.
MacArthur then ignored numerous indications the Chinese were massing for an attack across the Yalu, probably because the reports interfered with his plans for a triumphal progress.
MacArthur was an odd duck. His WWII record is not unanimously considered brilliant. Given his overwhelming numerical and logistical superiority over the enemy, it's hard to see how he could have avoided winning.
He was certainly brave and smart, but he was equally certainly a raging egomaniac.
Some day I suspect we may all live to see millions die to a nuclear attack by Red China, then we will see how “passe” fighting communism has become.
Until then you can kiss your prosperity bye because with out strong economic/ military allies in Asia and Europe, our standard of living will be far worse.
Sorry, retreating from this World would be outrageously poor judgment. Sure, who needs Japan?
Retreating from subsidizing the defense of other countries is not the same as retreating from economic alliance.
Our trade arrangements with Korea and Japan are not dependent upon our military cooperation with them.
In no way do I underestimate the Chinese threat in the long term, however. I’m just unconvinced that our forces in Japan and South Korea act as much of a deterrent.
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