The big controversy now in Korea has been the distortion of Korean history by the Chinese. The Korean government says they are willing to take tough measures to prevent the distortion of their history. However are they willing to back up the tough talk? I doubt it and China knows it. President Roh is not trusted by the American government so now he has no powerful friends to help back up any tough measures he may need to take to prevent the distortion of Korean history(Koguryo Controversy).

There was a great piece in the Chosun Ilbo on this. It is worth checking out. Now why is China doing this? First of all it solidifies their hold on Manchuria. In Manchuria there are many ethnic Koreans and in a post reunification scenario in the future possibly these Koreans will want their lands united with Korea. It would be very similiar to the Kurdish situation in Turkey. The portion of Turkey dominated by the Kurds wants to unify with Kurdistan in Iraq but the Turkish government conducts harsh crack downs to prevent this. The fight in Turkey goes on this week with Kurdish terrorists blamed for bomb explosions in Instanbul. The Chinese are just trying to prevent a scenario like this from occuring in the future. Another factor is that if the North Korean system is about to implode Kim Jong Il may just merge his country with China instead of South Korea claiming that North Korea, where the Kugoryo kingdom once ruled, was historically part of China. This would be a big face saving measure for him. I believe that as long as Kim Jong Il is alive he will never reunify with South Korea. What is in it for him? All he cares about is power, money, and having easy access to Russian drinky girls. Unifying with South Korea only guarantees him one of those three, if he doesn’t get thrown in jail to begin with for all the terrorists attacks he has orchestrated in the past. So that is why you will not see North Korea strongly condemning the Chinese.

So now the next thing I am wondering is why the hell this week my camp is surrounded by a crap load of South Korean policeman trying to protect it from Hongchonryun protestors who are pissed off at us US soldiers again for something. Why are they not protesting China? Hell Japan in the Tokyo National Musuem already changed their Kugoryo displays from Korean history to Chinese history. Go protest them, leave us alone. Why isn’t there candle light vigils every night at the Chinese embassy? If America tried to distort Korean history all hell would break loose but since it is the Chinese they get a pass because they may actually get pissed off and do something about it. The protestors know America is an easy target because we will not take any tough actions against Korea in response. At least maybe the Koreans are beginning to see that the rest of Northeast Asia looks down upon them and it is in their interest to remain in good terms with America and remain a global country and not become a regional one. It is going to be interesting to see how this plays out. I just do not see the Korean government having enough balls to do anything substantial about it though. But who knows maybe if enough of the Korean nationalism that has been concentrated on the US is shifted to the Chinese, maybe President Roh will have to do something. I guess only time will tell.

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