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Time to see Korea

It has been completely under the radar of Western media that there has just been a revolution in South Korea.




(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)

Nearly nine million people took to the streets of South Korea in the so-called candlelight revolution in the spring months 2017. They objected to the then President Park and her arrogant alliance with large capital and the military. In addition, the people of South Korea demand a new and softer line across North Korea, and they will stop deploying the US anti-missile weapon THAAD.

In addition, the situation in South Korea is that on the island of Jeju south of the country, the Americans have gained a new, huge naval base targeting all of East Asia. Spread across the country by the way are 83 other US military installations, targeting the north and towards China.

Anti-American. For people who don't know South Korea, it comes as a shock that a PEW Research report this year found that 70 percent of South Koreans fear the United States. And this was before the "Trump effect" came in. But anti-American attitudes in the population should come as no surprise. South Korean residents have not forgotten the massacres of tens of thousands led by US General MacArthur and dictator Syngman Ree as of late in 1948. The country has a large number of memorials, statues and museums abusing the population of the South, perpetrated by American soldiers and South Korean dictators over time.

The Mangwol-dong tomb in Gwangju province, for example, is the memorial of the uprising on May 18, 1980. This ended with the government forces massacring "communists" and mutilating their bodies in mass graves. Officially, 288 people died – many believe the fivefold is closer to the truth. At Mangwol-dong is also the tombstone of a hated politician – a slope at the entrance that everyone steps on. People trample and spit, but say little. For the fear of reprisals is deep, especially in the older part of the population.

The South Koreans' anger is also directed at the US military, which led the Seoul dictatorship regime. And now, in 2017, anti-American attitudes are popping up all over the country today, like from a pressure cooker where the lid comes loose.

New times. The candle revolution has brought Moon Jae-in to power, and new and more peaceful tones into the presidential palace. Moon will start a dialogue with North Korea and deploy a representative in North Korea's capital Pyongyang – for the first time since 1950. The United States' provocative military exercises in collaboration with the South Korean military facing the north also challenge South Korea's political.

In our 9 million South Koreans mobilized in the "candle revolution", but it was hardly mentioned in Norwegian media.

Newly appointed President Moon must tread carefully. For the roots of dictatorship and money power are deep and strong, and make democracy in the country fragile. The military has had considerable room for maneuver and has been largely led by the Pentagon since the outbreak of the war in 1950.

Scientists, media and politicians in our part of the world are starting to realize that Korea is more than "crazy and unpredictable" dictators in the north. Maybe they will eventually start taking this seriously?

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John Y. Jones
John Y. Jones
Cand. Philol, freelance journalist affiliated with MODERN TIMES

See the editor's blog on twitter/X

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