By First of all, I appreciate all the e-mails I have been receiving from everyone sending me the latest Charles Hanley article. It is at the point now that I can tell a Hanley article must have been published just by the uptick in reader e-mail in my inbox. So thanks again.
It seems like every few months Associated Press writer Charles Hanley comes up with some article to milk his prior No Gun Ri fame, which he undeservedly won a Pulitzer Prize for in 2001. In May 2006 he wrote an article about the “discovery” of the Muccio Letter then a year later in April 2007 he wrote a nearly identical article. In May 2008 he had another article out that was co-authored by Jae-soon Chang, which ROK Drop readers may remember I have called out before for his poor and sensational journalism as well. This was followed up with yet another article a few months later nearly identical in content.
Anyway I found this latest article to be more typical Hanley writing with his typical use of theatrical words like “declassified” or formerly “secret” documents to make the reader believe he discovered something new in regards to the executions of political prisoners, suspected communists, & civilians in Korea:
Charles HanleyGovernment investigators digging into the grim hidden history of mass political executions in South Korea have confirmed that dozens of children were among many thousands shot by their own government early in the Korean War.
The investigative Truth and Reconciliation Commission has thus far verified more than two dozen mass killings of leftists and supposed sympathizers, among at least 100,000 people estimated to have been hastily shot and dumped into makeshift trenches, abandoned mines or the sea after communist North Korea invaded the south in June 1950.
The killings, details of which were buried in classified U.S. files for a half-century, were intended to keep southern leftists from aiding the invaders at a time when the rightist, U.S.-allied government was in danger of being overrun by communist forces. [Associated Press]
As I pointed out in my prior posting on this topic in response to his last article, the subject of political killings by the Rhee Syngman government is nothing new and well known. Hanley is simply playing his old game of making old news, new again. It has been well known for years that the ROK Army was responsible for executing thousands of political prisoners before and during the war. Of course the truth isn’t as simple as the South Korean government lining up and killing hapless political prisoners. In fact before the Korean War even started, South Korea was faced with a North Korean backed communist insurgency. The South Korean government led by autocratic President Syngman Rhee allowed the ROK military to brutally suppress the insurgency, which led to a number of communist guerrillas and civilians being killed. With the intermingling of guerrillas and civilians it is impossible to determine the real number of each that were killed.
To show how absurd Hanley’s claims of uncovering these exuections is I have a DVD of the execution of suspected communists and I didn’t even need to sift through declassified or formerly secret documents to find it like Hanley claims he had to do.
Something that I found particularly distasteful is that Hanley has to sensationalize the deaths of children in order to drum up interest in his article with a lead headline of “Children Executed in 1950 South Korean Killings”. If this isn’t professional atrocity mongering then I don’t know what is?
Later on in the article he sources his claims of the killing of children back to the Korean Truth & Reconcilliation Committee. As I have demonstrated before the Truth & Reconcilliation Committee is staffed with leftist scholars who have no interest in developing an accurate history of what happened during the Korean War. Notice in the article no mention is made on how many children were killed. Could this be because the forensic evidence they have found shows few children killed? This doesn’t stop the usual suspects from claiming the “US Sanctioned the Executions of Korean Children“.
Hanley also throws in this statistic from the Daejon Massacre:
The AP has reported that declassified U.S. military documents show U.S. Army officers took photos of the assembly line-style executions outside the central city of Daejeon, where the commission believes between 3,000 and 7,000 people were shot and dumped into mass graves in early July 1950.
First of all I would like to see the forensic evidence to prove up to 7,000 people were executed by the ROK military in Daejon. I say this because Hanley has a history of making up body count numbers that the forensic evidence does not support. I also find it interesting that Hanley makes no mention of the North Korean massacre of both civilian and POWs in Taejon:
After capturing Taejon in the summer of 1950, the North Korean Home Affairs Department jammed the city prison with suspected anti-Communists—soldiers, officials, business and professional men. Beginning Sept. 23, 1950, several groups, numbering from 100 to 200 each, were taken from the cells each night. The prisoners, hands tied behind their backs, were herded into line beside open trenches and shot. As U.N. forces threatened the city, the Communists resorted to more expedient methods, dumped bodies into makeshift trenches. Others were sealed into caves or jammed down wells (see NEWS IN PICTURES). Estimated casualties: from 5,000 to 7,500, including 42 U.S. soldiers. Said the Army’s report: “For murderous barbarism, the Taejon massacre will be recorded in the annals of history along with the rape of Nanking, the Warsaw ghetto and other similar mass exterminations . . . Those responsible . . . must be brought to judgment before the tribunal of civilized peoples.” [TIME Magazine - 1953]
Also any bodies the Truth & Reconcilliation Committee find in Taejon that they claimed were killed by the ROK military because of the type of bullet used, remember that the North Koreans used American M1 rifles to execute their prisoners with:
On September 27, 1950, approximately 60 American prisoners who had been confined in Taejon prison were taken into the prison yard in groups of 14, with their hands wired together. These men were forced to sit hunched in hastily dug ditches and then were shot by North Korean troops at point blank range, with American M-1 rifles, using armor-piercing ammunition. Of the 2 seriously wounded survivors, only 1 lived to recount the gruesome details. Unnumbered civilians estimated at between 5,000 and 7,000, as well as soldiers of the Republic of Korea, were also slaughtered at Taejon between September 23 and September 27, 1950 [FN11 - Pt. 1, pp. 15-25]. [Korean War Educator]
So once again, I want Hanley and company to prove their claim that up to 7,000 civilians were executed by the ROK military in Taejon. The facts are there is no way they can prove their claim and yet are throwing that number around as if it is an accurate number, which it is not.
Here is quite possibly the most dishonest paragraph in this entire hit piece:
Other once-secret files show that a U.S. Army lieutenant colonel reported giving approval to the killing of 3,500 political prisoners by a South Korean army unit he was advising in Busan, if the North Koreans approached that southern port city, formerly spelled Pusan.
Lieutenant Colonel Emmerich on the left.
Hanley makes it seem like this lieutenant colonel ordered 3,500 people to be executed. In fact no one was executed which Hanley conveniently left out. The lieutenant colonel in question is LTC Rollins Emmerich who in fact delayed a ROK Army commander from executing his prisoners:
Emmerich was told by a subordinate that a South Korean regimental commander, determined to keep Busan’s political prisoners from joining the enemy, planned “to execute some 3500 suspected peace time Communists, locked up in the local prison,” according to the declassified 78-page narrative, first uncovered by the newspaper Busan Ilbo at the U.S. National Archives.
Emmerich wrote that he summoned the Korean, Col. Kim Chong-won, and told him the enemy would not reach Busan in a few days as Kim feared, and that “atrocities could not be condoned.”
But the American then indicated conditional acceptance of the plan.
“Colonel Kim promised not to execute the prisoners until the situation became more critical,” wrote Emmerich, who died in 1986. “Colonel Kim was told that if the enemy did arrive to the outskirts of (Busan) he would be permitted to open the gates of the prison and shoot the prisoners with machine guns.”
How do we not know that LTC Emmerich wasn’t using a stall tactic to stop the executions? If so it worked brilliantly since the prisoners in Busan were not executed. Emmerich should be getting a medal and not be slimed as some kind of war criminal by the likes of Charles Hanley. It is a shame that the US does not have stronger defamation laws for Emmerich’s family to go after Hanley with because I’m sure they have to be outraged by Hanley’s sensationalist journalism.
Interestingly enough this week Hanley’s main source for his articles the Korean Truth & Reconciliation Committee were implicated along with the Korean NIS and MBC for trying to pressure one of the most prominent North Korean defectors Kim Hyun-hee to change her story in regards to the North Korean involvement in the KAL 858 bombing that killed 115 people for political reasons. Kim even said that the T&R Committee reminded her of show trials in North Korea:
Nor did the truth commissions formed by the Roh administration leave Kim alone. The NIS’ in-house panel attempted to question Kim in 2005, and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission made a similar attempt in 2007, only to be rebuffed. Kim says subjecting a case already tried three times by the judiciary to a fourth and fifth trial by these commissions reminded her of the show trials in North Korea.
The secret service conducted an in-depth investigation of Kim in the wake of the 1987 bombing and subsequently protected and monitored her, but in a bid to please the Roh administration, it acted as though it had no idea what was what. That is the shameful legacy of the fad for digging up past wrongs that swept the nation under the Roh administration.
We should urgently find out whether Kim is telling the truth. Is it true that the NIS, which has a massive state budget, and the truth commissions that sprang up like so many mushrooms on the soft bed of taxpayers’ money, leaned heavily on this poor woman to please the government? Whatever the truth of the matter, the three networks that stirred up this whole sorry business must admit the truth and apologize. [Chosun Ilbo]
Hanley has a record of sourcing articles from North Korean and communist sources and now he is sourcing articles from a committee that reminds people of being operated like a North Korean show trial. This is the quality of AP journalism now adays.
So why is Hanley now releasing a string of nearly similar articles all sourced by the Korean Truth & Reconciliation Committee? Well it is because the Lee Myung-bak government is trying to do away with the committee:
The plan for merging and abolishing past history truth commissions, professed by the Lee Myung-bak administration since the time of Lee’s presidential transition committee, is showing signs of being realized. Bills for the amendment of 15 related laws, submitted to the National Assembly on November 20 by the Grand National Party’s Shin Ji-ho and 13 other Assembly members, form a framework for combining the functions of the 14 history truth commissions currently operating into the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Republic of Korea. [Hankyoreh]
This committee is hoping that another No Gun Ri type of issue could ensure the continued existence of the committee and are using Hanley to try and realize this goal. Unfortunately for them Hanley has been so discredited over the years few big media outlets take him seriously anymore.
Bottom line is that the ROK military authorities and Syngman Rhee found themselves in desperate circumstances and implemented desperate measures to include executing an undetermined number of innocent civilians intermingled with actual communist guerrillas who were themselves responsible for the killing of their own unknown number of civilians.
The US government treated this as an internal ROK issue in the early weeks of the war but eventually worked towards getting the Rhee government to stop the retribution killings of suspected communists:
The problem of dealing with Koreans charged with collaboration with the North Korean Communists during the occupation of South Korea is being closely studied here at the temporary capital as preparations get under way for the return to Seoul as soon as that city will be liberated. [New York Times - 1950]
Another interesting fact that Hanley some how does not bother to mention.
I have said this before and I will say it again. The issue of civilians killed during the Korean War is a very real one that unfortunately people with biases are using to advance their own agendas that are aided by sensational media reports from people like Charles Hanley.
The Truth & Reconciliation Committee in theory is a very good idea that I support, but it is the people that are leading it that is the problem. The T&R should be a committee dedicated to creating an accurate history of the war. I have already demonstrated this current group of people are not interested in doing so.
Since the Korean War was a UN action maybe a joint UN research team from countries heavily involved in the Korean War could investigate the claims? This would be better then the Charles Hanley’s of the world being left to write a revisionist history of the Korean War.
Bottom line though is that veterans and civilians deserve an accurate accounting of what happened during the war which Charles Hanley, Jae Soon-jang, and the T&R Committee are currently not interested in doing which is just another continuing tragedy of the war.
4:43 am on December 9th, 2008 1
[...] sure to check out GI Korea’s excellent article regarding the Korean War executions. It has been coming up in the news every now and again, and he [...]
6:40 am on December 9th, 2008 2
I’ve been reading more and more about atrocities we (the USA) committed in World War II.
It’s one thing for us to come to terms with such realities with a heavy heart, especially when the accounts are done by actual American Servicemen rather than revisionist historians and leftists.
Furthermore, when a nation with such a record of historical distortion as Korea brings such accusations, they don’t hold much water.
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8:02 am on December 9th, 2008 3
I hate to name call but this guy Hanley is an idiot!! I dont know any other way to articulate that fact except to say that he’s an idiot. The way he sensationalize little tidbits of old news to make it sound as if he just unearthed some sort of old cover up is crazy. All his claims and info in his article is common knowledge even to the most novice of Korean War buffs…This kind of journalism totally irks the heck out of me..Its MBC news “mad cow” type jornalism and there is no place for it any sort of elevated discourse.
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6:57 pm on December 9th, 2008 4
Hanley falls into the same catagory as Peter Arnet, Dan Rather, and a number of other “journalists” who have made careers out of dishonest reporting.
Hanley struck gold with his “No Gun Ri” story winning a Pulitzer, even after he had been informed his ’star witness’ had never been near ‘No Gun Ri’. He hid the fact and reported anyway and got his ‘Pulitzer’.
He achieved a following and probobly has become a mini celebrity as well. His character will keep his lies going as long as he has the following and celebrity.
But he is not a journalist to be taken seriously.
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11:27 pm on December 9th, 2008 5
What does it say about the AP that they keep the guy and keep running his stuff – the same stuff?
Hanley might just be an idiot and/or a-hole, but the AP is more than willing to keep promoting him via their platform. That bothers me more than a hack journalist.
It is just dishonest. It shows how much the AP and contemporary journalism likes to tell lies — how it prefers the narrative to the truth.
Any editor – any low level fact-checker – could take 15 minutes looking through news archives to find this stuff.
Any the AP staff could randomly pick up the handful of books written about the Korean War or modern Korean history and find this stuff.
The only conclusion you can come to is — the AP doesn’t care about journalism but prefers telling certain stories — stories with a certain political agenda attached.
““declassified” or formerly “secret” documents”
I’m thinking of using these terms as tags for every blog post I do in order to drive up site traffic and lend credibility to any BS I have to say at the moment…
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9:36 am on December 10th, 2008 6
“What does it say about the AP that they keep the guy and keep running his stuff – the same stuff?”
That’s a really good question USinKorea. So excellent in fact that it begs an even better one: What does it say about soldiers and expats that keep attempting to spin, mitigate, or even downright whitewash what are well documented crimes committed by America?
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10:51 am on December 10th, 2008 7
What did you say exactly?
You’re really trying to turn this on us?
Can you show me some evidence of the “whitewash” “spin” “mitigation” of documented crimes? Of America?
Try to say something when you say something.
I could find evidence in GI Korea’s post where he is “mitigating” massacres in South Korea during the Korean War…
…but…can you tell me where he is wrong.
Specifically, you could start drawing the line to the significant involvement of America is documented crimes then where the whitewash is.
GI Korea and K-bloggers aren’t bringing up Korean War era massacres every 6-12 months and saying we’ve discovered something new and have something concrete to say….
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11:01 am on December 10th, 2008 8
Here we go….
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11:31 am on December 10th, 2008 9
Yes, unfortunately Mark “Here we go” indeed.
As is typically the case whenever another one of these historical issues arise, it’s usually a drill in attempting to salvage a particular narrative of America’s role in post-1945 Korean history. The narrative goes something like this: 1)America is the shining beacon of liberty, freedom, and hope. 2) And because of all the above, it is inconceivable that America acted in or can act in morally compromised manners. Ego because of factors one and two, America’s role in Korea was that of a messianic savior.
Any attempts to complicate this narrative are seen as conniving revisionism. Frankly, adherents to this line of thinking are more akin to religious cult members rather than individuals attempting serious inquiry over serious matters.
As for specific examples of US atrocities in Korea, I really suggest you read Bruce Cumings’ treatment of the South’s brief occupation of the North (an occupation whose actions were clearly countenanced by US forces), the bombing campaign by US forces against the North, and finally the actions of Gen. Hodge.
Oh and please don’t dish out some cheap response about how I’m relying on your bete-noir Bruce Cumings. Unless you can show that his use of documents or methodology is seriously flawed in addressing the above examples I enumerated for you about US actions in Korea then don’t waste your time. Lord knows you do enough of that already.
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11:49 am on December 10th, 2008 10
“Bottom line is that the ROK military authorities and Syngman Rhee found themselves in desperate circumstances and implemented desperate measures to include executing an undetermined number of innocent civilians intermingled with actual communist guerrillas who were themselves responsible for the killing of their own unknown number of civilians.”
The question then arises why was the ROK military and Pres. Rhee put in such dire circumstances? Frankly, GI doesn’t provide many convincing explanations as to why an insurgency erupted. I’m sure he’ll say that it was Communists from the North doing all the string pulling.
Fact is the “communist” insurgency that erupted can in large part be traced to the reactionary policies that US occupation forces implemented in South Korea. From reinstalling colonial era bureaucrats and police officials to stifling attempts at land reform, it was American policies that set the stage for discontentment and it would be Americans and ROK forces that would have to reap what the sowed. More often than not in a bloody and cruel fashion.
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1:12 pm on December 10th, 2008 11
Right. Poke with a stick then act like you don’t.
“That’s a really good question USinKorea. So excellent in fact that it begs an even better one”
Pure chaff meant to do nothing but poke. Then, as noted, nothing else comes – but another poke at the end. Not really a comment at all.
Then we get the usual high horse: “Yes, unfortunately Mark “Here we go” indeed.”
You’re so cute…
Then you jump to the strawmen arguments you fail to back up. Broad generalizations that, in fact, most readers here who’ve been around for any significant length of time know are NOT what is usually expressed by GI Korea or myself or Kalani or most of the regular commentors. Again, you’re just poking with no substance.
And yes, when you pull out Cumings as your backer, people are going to poke back, especially in this decade.
But throwing him out is better than addressing what has actually been written in the post and on this site.
I recommend people read Cumings’ North Korea: Another Country to see his BS once he fully dropped the mask. He goes into detail about how atrocious the bombings were against the North. Into how poor little Kim Jong-Il was frightened into a manic state by watching US bombers do trial runs for dropping an atomic bomb. Poor North Korea. If only they had had an air force of their own to use, if only they could have dropped napalm all over the South, well, that would have been war – and a war for unification at that – just part of Korea’s civil war – which the US interfered in.
And for Cumings, like with Hanley and the sort, if a US soldiers is anywhere in the chain of command of a Korean officer – or within 20 miles of a massacre – it is a US planned and executed affair or pretty much just the same.
You’ll have to refresh my memory some more on Hodge. What are your and Cumings claims?
But —- just so we can keep this clear — the whole point of the post was that Hanley is doing nothing more than re-hashing old news.
None of us are saying anything new.
These points have been debated ad nauseum. They have been debated since the events themselves were taking place.
The AP continues to use its position to pump out a few articles a year by this man — re-stating history as if it were news – leading uninformed readers to believe the AP has produced a scoop that redefines the past – when all it is doing is taking a position on side of the debate.
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1:21 pm on December 10th, 2008 12
As readers will know, as Mark apparently does, I don’t like letting broadside pot shots stand idle. Some K-bloggers disagree with this. They’d prefer people just let them stand.
To me, that is like a Hanley. He gets to say what he wants thanks to the AP, regardless of how dishonest in practice, and readers who don’t know any better are left to chance in ever finding out the other side of the story.
So, some commentor makes ridiculous strawmen arguments about what I or some other in the K-blogsphere I’ve read for years have to say on things, and long-time readers will know it is BS, but what about more recent readers or one-timers who happen to surf onto a post?
But, I’m willing to adapt. I think from now on, I’ll just limit myself mainly to a simple one line comment or something noting a comment is a chaff filled strawman argument (often failing even to address the point of a post) regular readers will easily recognize…..
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1:28 pm on December 10th, 2008 13
“But —- just so we can keep this clear — the whole point of the post was that Hanley is doing nothing more than re-hashing old news.”
This is interesting. If all these claims are indeed “old news”, why not attempt to seriously incorporate them into your assessments of past historical events. Why be so reactionary and immediately brand anybody who dares air contradictory views “dishonest” or “conniving”?
And yes, I also recommend you limit you comments to a simple one line comment. After all, it would suit nicely with your truncated intellectual abilities. Lord knows how many traps you set for yourself with every sentence you punch out.
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1:40 pm on December 10th, 2008 14
“I recommend people read Cumings’ North Korea: Another Country to see his BS once he fully dropped the mask. He goes into detail about how atrocious the bombings were against the North. Into how poor little Kim Jong-Il was frightened into a manic state by watching US bombers do trial runs for dropping an atomic bomb. Poor North Korea. If only they had had an air force of their own to use, if only they could have dropped napalm all over the South, well, that would have been war – and a war for unification at that – just part of Korea’s civil war – which the US interfered in.”
This quote is rather telling. So by attempting to depict US actions against North Korea Cumings has “dropped the mask”? Tell me, after dropping his dastardly disguise what was revealed to you USinKorea? Let me guess, probably that Cumings is an unreconstructed North Korea apologist.
Well, if this is the standard then perhaps an esteemed historian such as Niall Ferguson is an apologist for Nazi Germany when he says in his book “The War of the World” that the US bombing campaigns were as equally criminal. Perhaps someone like Richard Minear is a right-wing revisionist for calling Hiroshima and Nagasaki “nuclear holocaust(s)”.
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1:59 pm on December 10th, 2008 15
Elias, I won’t read Bruce Cumings because his wife went to North Korean school in Japan, and being married to a Korean myself, I know how they can knead the weak-minded dough into Corean bread.
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2:03 pm on December 10th, 2008 16
#13 It is Hanley (and the AP through Hanley) who keeps writing articles claiming to have uncovered something new and disturbing.
That is patently false and misleading – and by this time – misleading on purpose. Somebody at the AP staff has surely heard from someone that this stuff was in the newspapers at the time and has been in books (and as GI Korea points out DVDs) for a long time.
Nobody here was making much of a moral or legalistic argument about atrocities during the war until you threw out your patently false strawman.
The point is jounalistic ethics.
You have done nothing but cloud the issue with pokes and tangents away from the theme.
2nd paragraph – yes. You hit the nail on the head there. And I’m confident the vast majority of readers, even those leaning toward your side, will come away from that book thinking the same thing. At least Origins of the Korean War attempted (largely successfully) to be an academic study.
As for the last part – I came back over to provide a link to a re-posted blog entry where I quote some from NK: Another Country.
It happens that that repost also mentions revisionist history done on allied bombings in WWII in Europe and Japan.
http://usinkorea.org/blogupdates/2008/12/10/cumings-burning-memories-iv/
The magazine commentary ran a series of articles on a rash of books on the subject of bombing during WWII that would be worth googling.
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2:28 pm on December 10th, 2008 17
Mark-There’s no possible way that Meredith Woo-Cumings was educated at North Korean schools in Japan. Her father was a member of the ROK’s diplomatic corps. I find it hard to believe that he or the South Korean gov’t would have allowed such a thing. Read through this link:
http://www.virginia.edu/uvatoday/newsRelease.php?id=5013
Not even a mention of her being educated in North Korean schools. As for not wanting to read the Cumings book, it doesn’t surprise me. Given the utterly ignorant statement you made it’s probably way above your head anyways.
USinKorea-I thought you were going to keep it brief? Oh well, consistency in statement and action was never a strong suit of yours anyways.
Hanley writes the stories he does in order to reach out to a broader American audience that probably doesn’t care or want to know about what the United States did in Korea. That’s why his works appear in major American publications. Having all these incidents buried in obscure publications and documentaries that consumers rarely peruse does no good for the general publics awareness. Bringing something to light that the public-at-large wasn’t previously aware is the exact opposite of your “irresponsible journalism”.
Second, as for those who read Cumings’ treatment of the US bombing campaign against the North, I don’t believe that reasonable people will came away with the conclusion that you did. That’s because not that many people filter everything about the North through exacting, myopic ideological standards that you do. Simply attempting to show nuance and complexity to a given narrative is nowhere near the realm of apolegetics. If anything its responsible inquiry.
Finally, I don’t think that I’ve done any clouding of the issue. Simply because I’m not towing the sort of self-comforting tropes you tell yourself hardly makes me some sort of troll or gadfly.
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2:47 pm on December 10th, 2008 18
Obscure publications like – history books on the Korean War?
So, Hanely’s dishonest sensationalizing is OK because he has to do that to get people interested in the topic (as well as to grab instant credibility)?
So, I’m the one with a myopic view based on a total pro-US ideology while Cumings is just arguing for nuanced complexity.
Horseshit.
I’ve reposted most of the notes I put up on NK: Another Country.
And I am again very confident 95%+ of the readers who take a look at the book will understand exactly where Cumings and Canetti are coming from.
Lastly, your style is typical of a certain type: Throw up a short pot shot that contains a strawman and insults while avoiding the central theme of what you are attacking.
Then when pressed, go off on all sorts of tangents with more strawmen and insults.
Often, you can never get the person to focus on the main theme, but at least you did in this last comment.
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3:02 pm on December 10th, 2008 19
Listen, the sort of things that Hanley talks about clearly are in history books and documentaries. I think though that what’s different about his works is that he is unearthing specific gov’t documents and memorandums that show the US gov’t was clearly aware of the actions ROK as well as US forces were engaging in. In other words, he’s making the memories of the events more granular and specific.
So no, it’s nowhere near dishonest to provide actual material from the archives that flesh out better events that have been chronicled elsewhere. Let me ask, if some enterprising journalist came out and wrote about never before seen German gov’t documents pertaining to the Holocaust does that make him a dishonest journalist for “rehashing” events that everybody is well aware of?
Finally, I did have the unfortunate experience of reading your puerile observations on Cumings’ treatment of the US bombing campaign against North Korea. All I can say is that I guess some like their history well-done (you) while some like it a little more rare (me).
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3:26 pm on December 10th, 2008 20
Your ignorance of North Koreans in the South Korean government has just lost any iota of credibility you ever had here. Of course it wouldn’t be mentioned in the press, and of course her father was in the diplomatic corps.
I pardon you. Good day.
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3:35 pm on December 10th, 2008 21
Mark-
So the University of Virginia is in cahoots with this whole thing? When she was appointed to a gov’t position by Clinton, how is it that this glaring aspect was so cavalierly overlooked?
Again, educated yourself by perusing the link.
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4:41 pm on December 10th, 2008 22
Half of Clinton’s cabinet would not have received security clearances if it weren’t for political pressure, so the fact that he appointed her to a govt. position proves nothing in regard to her past history.
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4:57 pm on December 10th, 2008 23
Fine, if this is what a critical mass of commentators truly believes then it is not my place to try and dislodge such asinine conclusions from such confused minds.
Never mind that none of you have provided any sort of writings or comments that explicitly indicates that Woo-Cumings harbors unalloyed love and attachment to North Korea.
The late historian Richard Hostadter once exposited on the “paranoid style in American politics”. The work was written almost half a decade ago. It’s ironic, yet also a testament to his intellectual abilities, that a bunch of rubes such as “Mark” and “Rob” would give Hofstadter’s work much salience for the present day.
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5:02 pm on December 10th, 2008 24
I’m curious; are our conclusions asinine and confused simply because we don’t agree with you?
Rube? No need to resort to name calling.
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5:22 pm on December 10th, 2008 25
No, they’re asinine and confused because-like I said before-you provide absolutely no concrete evidence to prove your contention that Woo-Cumings is some sort of Manchurian candidate. To reiterate again, where are the writing or statements that would belie any of my arguments let alone advance yours?
And please, don’t give me some fecal laced history lesson explaining North Korean infiltration into South Korean society. One, I’m well aware of it. Two, you haven’t-and most likely won’t be able to prove-that Woo-Cumings had any associations with such entities.
As for calling you a rube, I call it the way I see it. If it thinks like a rube and talks like a rube, what is one to conclude? Moreover, there’s no shame in being a rube. The world is a big and diverse place. Room enough for everybody. But too bad for you, there isn’t room among the reasonable minded of this big and diverse world for a rube such as yourself.
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5:24 pm on December 10th, 2008 26
I must apologize though. It’s clear that I’ve dominated this thread for too long. Consider my part in this tale through.
I’ll be back at another date and time to puncture other cherished shibboleths that individuals held dear on this blog.
Good night and good luck (sort of).
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5:46 pm on December 10th, 2008 27
Elias Canetti = Silly Sally?
But too bad for you, there isn’t room among the reasonable minded of this big and diverse world for a rube such as yourself.
Again, why the personal attacks? Please, get over yourself. From your drivel above, I could equally, and most assuredly correctly, assume that you are a card-carrying member of the elitist academia troupe who all to often look down upon us commoners as if our opinions don’t count.
You used the fact that Clinton appointed Mrs. Cummings to a government position to support your argument that she didn’t attend North Korean school in Japan. I simply pointed out that half of Clinton’s cabinet would not have received security clearances if it hadn’t been for political pressure.
And for the record, this pretty much sums up what I think about Cummings, the Mr. version:
Like every useful idiot before him, Professor Cumings is much impressed by free child-care and kindergartens, much more so than by gulags and famines. There is no Potemkin village so transparently a fraud that he would not be taken in by it. Such matters as collective family responsibility, whereby entire families are severely punished for the political dissent of one of its members, do not impinge on his imagination – a faculty with which he is not much blessed.
While Cumings admits that the personality cult of Kim Il-Sung (who, though dead for 10 years, is still President For Eternity) is absurd, he attributes its extravagance entirely to the Confucian strain in Korean life, thus displaying a complete and startling ignorance of Communist iconography. Is he not aware that almost every Communist dictator was, according to the paintings of him, followed by an eager amanuensis capturing for posterity his on-the-spot guidance to farmers about how best to harvest potatoes, and to car mechanics about how best to change the spark plugs? The pictures of multi-racial crowds stretching their arms in the direction of the Great Leader as the only hope of Mankind are not unique to North Korea.
It is true that North Korea is the ne plus ultra of this vile and inglorious tradition, and that Confucianism might have been an added ingredient, but to overlook the part that Communism itself played, as Professor Cumings does, and blame mainly the Americans, is preposterous.
I feel a little sorry for Professor Cumings. He has spent his life studying the language, culture and history of a nation that not so long ago was disregarded and ignored, if not despised. Despite his erudition, however, he will, in the long run, be regarded as a buffoon. His works on North Korea will be seen in the same light as those of the Webbs on the Soviet Union. They knew everything about the Soviet Union except the truth.
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7:40 pm on December 10th, 2008 28
I come back from work and see Elias the sock puppet and name caller is back. Elias keeps using different computers at his university but I have added yet another one to the moderation que.
Mark all I have read about Meredith Woo-Cumings is that she attended an “international school” in Tokyo, which begs the question, what was the name of the international school?
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7:40 pm on December 10th, 2008 29
You guys gotta admit…that was a slick way to hijack a thread. I thought the thread was about Hanley, somehow it turned into Cummings and Woo. LOL
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8:22 pm on December 10th, 2008 30
And I took the bait – hook, line and sinker! lol
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10:33 pm on December 10th, 2008 31
#19 “Listen, the sort…”
That paragraph is a fine addition to the discussion – and I actually mean that with no sarcasm. That is a discussion, not a stir of the pot for no good reason or load of insults…
On the points made, news is about what is new and needs to be known. Regardless of that, Hanley and the AP are dishonest in this train of stories, because they work to give the reader the impression that — they discovered something earth-shaking. Something never heard of before – worse: something long suppressed.
When it isn’t. GI Korea has done a pretty good job over time showing and explaining the dishonesty.
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12:01 am on December 11th, 2008 32
In all honesty, there should be nothing earth-shattering about atrocities committed in a war. All wars have had their fair share, and they’re committed by both sides. I’m not saying that they should be overlooked or swept under the rug either, but simply that war is hell, and men do strange things when confronted with the possibility of dying. If atrocities happened, I’m all for bringing them to light, but they should be put into their proper context.
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8:09 am on December 11th, 2008 33
“On the points made, news is about what is new and needs to be known. Regardless of that, Hanley and the AP are dishonest in this train of stories, because they work to give the reader the impression that — they discovered something earth-shaking. Something never heard of before – worse: something long suppressed.”
Let’s mull over again the choice of words here: “earth-shaking”; “long suppressed”. In regards to the events themselves within the records, no there not all that “earth-shaking”. But when you think about the events in Korea, I find it hard to believe that most Americans even know about or care to know about such events. In other words there not public memory. American atrocities in WWII and Vietnam are pretty well known. Korea? It’s called the “forgotten war” for a reason. I think thats what Hanley’s trying to do with his stories.
Furthermore, I think the fact that he’s utilizing gov’t and official documents to flesh out his stories is rather telling. Yes there are secondary source material as well as journalistic accounts from that time. But never before has anybody gone and corroborated those events with primary sources. And when you consider this with how long it took for these documents to see the light of day, I’d say that’s a pretty significant finding that is definitely newsworthy.
On CNN they recently did a segment about newly released Nixon White House tapes. In airing a story about that was CNN trying to rehash Watergate? When scholars were going to the former USSR’s archives to pore through documents about the Stalin and Krushchev era to corroborate assumptions and theories are they attempting to rehash what everybody already knows?
Check out this Ann Applebaum piece to get a gist of what I’m trying to convey:
http://www.slate.com/id/2204549/
I think that GI is missing the point when he criticizes Hanley. As he’s shown, there is indeed a record of atrocities committed in Korea by ROK and US forces. However, when was the last time they were found in GOVERNMENT FILES open to the public? It’s not the crime itself, it’s the paper trail.
As for me “hijacking” this thread by bringing up the subject of Woo-Cumings, all I can say is that it’s bullshit. I brought up BRUCE Cumings and in their maladroit way “Mark” and “Rob” said something inane about his wife that was begging for a shoot down.
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5:34 pm on December 11th, 2008 34
Elias, is English your second language? You seem to have a problem differentiating between there, they’re and their.
Signed,
Rob the rube…
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5:57 pm on December 11th, 2008 35
No Rob, English is not my second language. I’ve gone through and re-read my comments and all I could find was two small instance of the mistake you highlighted.
However, this is a pretty pathetic form of bean counting if you ask me. Something tells me that you read through my comments and couldn’t find any real argument to make so you went ahead and picked the most obvious choice: faulting me on some technicality.
Pretty rube-ish behavior if you ask me. From your sign-off, however, it’s clear that your coming to accept your intellectual malady. That’s a good thing. Acknowledgment is the first step towards a cure my dear rube.
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6:19 pm on December 11th, 2008 36
You’re actually kind of funny Elias, and I’m glad that you’re taking the time to amuse me. I have nothing else to do, so thanks!
You act as though this is the first time someone has delved into the national archives and dug up a story. Please…
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12:24 am on December 18th, 2008 37
I think what most people do not recognize is most asains do not regard human life as being valuable. If you look at history throughout China, Japan and Korea you will find they all are guilty of mass killings for no good reason. When American troops found soldiers murdered with hands tied behind their back it made the killing of North Koreans and civilians suspected of being spies simple to execute. The Chinese Army had no regard for their own troops, I saw them attack our troops with a mass of troops, many with no weapon.When you get down to it, who attacked whom to start the war? Korean War Vet 1963
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10:55 am on January 5th, 2009 38
[...] [Found on Google, Yahoo! Search] 5. Rehashing Korean War Executions, Again, … sure to check out GI Korea’s excellent article regarding the Korean War executions. It has been [...]