2017: A Murderous History of Korea

Umgang mit Geschichte

Bruce Cumings
A Murderous History of Korea
London Review of Books, 18 May 2017
https://www.lrb.co.uk/v39/n10/bruce-cumings/a-murderous-history-of-korea

Der 18. Mai erinnert seit 1980 an das Massaker der südkoreanischen Armee an der Bevölkerung von Kwangju.
Just zu diesem Tag wurde von der LRB ein Auszug aus dem neuesten Buch des großen Korea-Kenners, Bruce Cumings, veröffentlicht. LRB hat uns erlaubt, einen Link zu diesem Atikel zu setzen. Darum hier nur zwei kurze Auszüge aus diesem großartigen Buch.

"... North Korea celebrated the 85th anniversary of the foundation of the Korean People’s Army on 25 April, amid round-the-clock television coverage of parades in Pyongyang and enormous global tension. No journalist seemed interested in asking why it was the 85th anniversary when the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea was only founded in 1948. What was really being celebrated was the beginning of the Korean guerrilla struggle against the Japanese in northeast China, officially dated to 25 April 1932. After Japan annexed Korea in 1910, many Koreans fled across the border, among them the parents of Kim Ilsung, but it wasn’t until Japan established its puppet state of Manchukuo in March 1932 that the independence movement turned to armed resistance.
....
Since the very beginning, American policy has cycled through a menu of options to try and control the DPRK: sanctions, in place since 1950, with no evidence of positive results; nonrecognition, in place since 1948, again with no positive results; regime change, attempted late in 1950 when US forces invaded the North, only to end up in a war with China; and direct talks, the only method that has ever worked, which produced an eight-year freeze – between 1994 and 2002 – on all the North’s plutonium facilities, and nearly succeeded in retiring their missiles. On 1 May, Donald Trump told Bloomberg News: ‘If it would be appropriate for me to meet with [Kim Jongun], I would absolutely; I would be honoured to do it.’ There’s no telling whether this was serious, or just another Trump attempt to grab headlines. But whatever else he might be, he is unquestionably a maverick, the first president since 1945 not beholden to the Beltway. Maybe he can sit down with Mr Kim and save the planet."

Download pdf





Geschichtsinterpretationen