In the recent back and forth between pundits over how to get the Six Party Talks back on track and over the pros and cons of President Park Geun-hye’s recent speech in Dresden, the problem of developing a long-term vision for the security of a unified Korea that involves the military has been overlooked. Hoping to address this critical point, The Arirang Institute and the Asia Institute held a seminar on April 9 at the University of North Korean Studies, bringing together leading experts, including current military commanders, for an honest discussion of the larger implications of reunification for the region.
Daniel Pinkston, renowned North Korea expert and current deputy project director for Northeast Asia at the International Crisis Group, opened the discussion with the topic of conditions for integrating North Korea into the larger regional security architecture. Pinkston stressed that the biggest barrier is simply the uncooperative behavior of North Koreans. He suggested that there is an unfortunate tendency for Pyongyang officials to project their own paranoia on the rest of the world, thereby blocking new avenues for dialog. Pinkston suggested that there is tremendous potential for cooperative approaches to security that would bring North Korea back into the region in a serious manner, but stressed that deterrence will still be necessary as long as the North continues is provocations.
Tak Sung-han, the head of North Korean research at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, drew attention to the misunderstanding of the North Korean nuclear weapons programs found among analysts outside of Korea. He described how the current program for economic growth in Pyongyang, the “Byungjin” policy, combines the development of nuclear weapons and economic advancement as part of one program. North Koreans have been told by their government, Tak explained, that such weapons can be developed without any additional burdens to the economy. Therefore, unlike pundits in the international community who think North Korea must make a choice between either the economy or the military, many Pyongyang bureaucrats assume that the two must advance together. “Nuclear weapons,” Dr. Tak explained, “are not just a means to get some foreign currency, but a goal that is part of a comprehensive developmental strategy.”
Dr. Emanuel Pastreich, director of the Asia Institute, suggested that the primary problem is that we have become so accustomed to North Korea as the central issue in security for the region that we are blind to profound shifts such as the development of drones or the encroachment of deserts and other forms of climate change that are transforming the equation. Pastreich noted that because North Korea “serves as the bad boy and the explicit threat, Pyongyang has become the keystone in an imbricated security architecture that assures stability in Northeast Asia. To start hacking away at the foundations of such architecture, even if the intentions are good, is perceived as risky business.”
Michael Lammbrau, Seoul Bureau Representative of the Arirang Institute, spoke about the power of social networks and how it is not enough to merely connect with each other online, through Facebook and Twitter, but rather that individuals and groups must actually connect in person in order to build trust, understanding, and a sense of shared sacrifice between diverse groups of individuals on controversial topics.
Left to right: Rev. Joseph Park; Michael Lammbrau, Arirang Institute; Emanuel Pastreich, Asia Institute; General Chun In-Bum, ROK Army; Bryan Port, USFK; Tak Sung-Han, Korea Institute for Defense Analyses; Daniel Pinkston, International Crisis Group.
Several Chinese friends have asked me write about the issue of islands, specifically the Diaoyutai Islands that have come to completely dominate the discussions of Chinese if one asks about Japan. They asked me to write about the Diaoyutai Islands because they felt that I can be objective. In a sense I am objective as a speaker, but perhaps I am not objective in the sense that they imagine.
As an American, I can say a few words about islands. Let us talk about the Hawaii Islands that the United States made a territory in 1893. They were made a territory, and eventually a state, after an illegal coup staged to overthrow the independent government of Hawaii under Queen Liliʻuokalani. More importantly, we know that the land occupied by the United States today, almost all of it possessed by people who came from Europe, once belonged to native people, the Navaho, the Cherokee, the Sioux and many other tribes whose names have been forgotten. Their land was taken away from them in the most unethical manner. It was taken by theft, through broken treaties, and in many cases through wanton murder and thievery.
And today, where do we stand? Many Americans have forgotten that history. And Chinese are not all that interested either in how the United States was built. Such cruelty is not new in human history, and expansionism is found in many so-called “advanced countries.” But I doubt that such behavior is something uniquely American, or Japanese. It is part of the cruelty of human nature and is manifested in the countries that, for domestic reasons choose military and economic expansion. Without such expansion, Europe and the United States could not have become so prosperous, nor could Japan.
The Asia Institute and the Arirang Institute teamed up for a seminar on the larger security implications of a possible reunion of the Korean Peninsula with a group of military experts on April 9, 2014. The discussion involved two active duty military officers and three experts international relations. In his opening remarks, Emanuel Pastreich, director of the Asia Institute, tried to set the tone and identify underlying security issues behind the current standoff on the Peninsula as a means of moving forward towards reunification.
“Security Implications of Korean Reunification”
Hosted by the Asia Institute and the Arirang Institute
April 9, 2014
University of North Korean Studies (북한대학원)
Opening Statement
Emanuel Pastreich
April 9, 2014
The introduction to the Chinese novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms (“Samgukji” in Korean) starts with this simple summary of history: “every country which is divided for a long time will inevitably be reunited. Every country which is united for a long time will inevitably be divided.” There is certain inevitability to reunification that stems from geopolitics, although the time scale cannot be easily predicted. This state reminds us of tectonic shifts: we know that the geomorphic changes underground take millennia, but that the earthquakes which take place at the end take only a few seconds and are unpredictable.
The U.S. security complex is up in arms about cyberhackers and foreign terrorists targeting America’s vulnerable infrastructure. Think tank reports have highlighted the chinks in homeland security represented by unsecured ports, dams, and power plants. We’ve been bombarded by stories about outdated software that is subject to hacking and the vulnerability of our communities to bioterrorism. Reports such as the Heritage Foundation’s “Microbes and Mass Casualties: Defending America Against Bioterrorism” describe a United States that could be brought to its knees by its adversaries unless significant investments are made in “hardening” these targets.
But the greatest dangers for the United States do not lurk in terrorist cells in the mountains surrounding Kandahar that are planning on assaults on American targets. Rather, our vulnerabilities are homegrown. The United States plays host to thousands of nuclear weapons, toxic chemical dumps, radioactive waste storage facilities, complex pipelines and refineries, offshore oil rigs, and many other potentially dangerous facilities that require constant maintenance and highly trained and motivated experts to keep them running safely.
The United States currently lacks safety protocols and effective inspection regimes for the dangerous materials it has amassed over the last 60 years. We don’t have enough inspectors and regulators to engage in the work of assessing the safety and security of ports, bridges, pipelines, power plants, and railways. The rapid decline in the financial, educational, and institutional infrastructure of the United States represents the greatest threat to the safety of Americans today.
One fascinating aspect of Seoul culture is the vitality of the big stage musical. Seoulites are fascinated with musicals and see an attraction in them unlike most other cities. Many are imported from Broadway, but there are many homegrown versions as well. Here is a small selection of posters that I recently photographed.
Facebook has become a critical platform for international exchange that allows people around the world to seek out peers with similar interests and to begin serious exchanges with them about how to create a better world. Although Facebook is a for-profit organization that treats its users as potential advertisers and uses personal information gathered from postings as a private commodity for sale to third parties, nevertheless Facebook is still the best means to reach out to a broad audience and to develop a global audience.
Facebook was not intended for serious intellectual and political exchange. At present, you cannot easily seek out other people with common interests (or by region) using a search on Facebook and you cannot systematically store the materials that you send or receive through Facebook for easy reference. Information posted is designed to essentially disappear within a few days. In addition, there is no way for third parties to develop original apps to run on Facebook that would allow users to expand its functionality or customize their pages. There are many ways that those actually using Facebook can carry out the innovations necessary to make it a meaningful means of sharing information.
My colleague at Kyung Hee University Ed Reed related to me a scene he witnessed at Incheon International Airport recently. A man of African descent was waiting at immigration in the line clearly marked as “for Koreans.” Three people came up to him in turn and told him to please move to the line for “aliens” to the right. The man was clearly upset by the constant attention, but stood his ground. And then, when he actually reached the immigration officer he revealed that he was in fact a Korean citizen.
Cases like this in Korea are frequent. The number of non-ethnic Koreans with Korean citizenship is increasing rapidly, more rapidly than the thinking of most Koreans can evolve to imagine a multiethnic country.
For that reason it is hard for Koreans to come up with an inspiring long-term vision for what a multicultural Korea would be like – but that is exactly what we need to do right now.
The term “multicultural” (damunhwa) has been misunderstood in Korea to apply exclusively to the families formed by Korean men who marry non-Korean women from Southeast Asia and China. Although such families must be integrated as part of a future Korean culture, they do not represent true multiculturalism.
The challenge of multiculturalism is one of creating an overarching culture for Korea that can then absorb and integrate other cultures. The base culture for a multicultural Korea must be broad enough and tolerant enough to embrace (and transform) not only foreigners but also Koreans, such as overseas Koreans, adoptees and North Koreans.
One mistake we see frequently is that Koreans assume that a multicultural,
필자의 경희대 동료인 에드 리드 교수는 얼마 전 인천공항에서 목격한 광경을 들려주었다. 한 흑인이 출입국 심사장의 ‘한국인’ 심사대 줄에 서서 기다리고 있었다. 친절하게도 세 명의 한국인이 차례로 그에게 다가가 곁에 있는 ‘외국인’ 전용 창구 쪽에 줄을 서라고 일러주었다고 한다. 무척 언짢은 듯했으나 완강히 버티고 서있었다. 이윽고 그가 출입국 심사를 받을 차례가 왔다. 알고 보니 그 ‘흑인’은 대한민국 국적을 가진 어엿한 한국인이었다.
한국에서 ‘다문화’는 보통 동남아나 중국 출신의 외국인 아내와 한국 남성이 이룬 가정만을 지칭하는 용어로 그릇되게 통용되고 있다. 물론 이들 또한 한국 문화의 일원으로 받아들여야 한다. 그러나 이들 가정만 다문화라고 하는 건 분명 어폐가 있다. 한국 사회에서 다문화는 타 문화를 흡수하고 통합할 수 있는 포용적인 문화를 만드는 것을 의미해야만 한다. 다문화의 기반은 외국인들을 수용하고 변화시키는 것뿐 아니라 해외 동포, 입양아 심지어 북한 동포들까지도 끌어안는 포용적인 문명이어야 한다.
국제화가 성공하려면 원래 있던 전통을 현대 사람의 눈으로 재해석하는 과정이 있어야 한다. 전통적인 가치 체계, 철학, 문학에 깊이 뿌리내리지 않으면 안 된다. 한국 문화가 싱가포르나 홍콩과 전혀 차이가 없다면 한국이라는 국가에 대해 자부심과 사랑을 느껴야 할 이유가 있겠는가.
다문화 한국 사회는 이곳을 조국으로 여기게 된 모든 귀화 외국인들을 품을 수 있어야 한다. 또한 그들을 공동체의 일원으로 화합시킬 기초는 바로 한국 고유의 문화여야만 한다. 외래 ‘선진국’의 문화를 받아들여 한국 사회에서 꽃피우게 하는 것보다 한국의 토착 문화를 보편적인 것으로 만드는 게 훨씬 타당성 있는 이야기다.
