[KS] Re: Korea Always Invaded?!

[Yong-ho Choe]

The foreign invasions that Professor Park cited are the only external incursions Korea had suffered during the span of nearly 1200 years from AD 700 to, say, 1860.  How many countries in the world can claim as having enjoyed as much peace as Korea?


At 01:57 PM 7/20/2000 -1000, you wrote:
>
>I cannot agree more with Prof. Yong-ho Choe's observation.  This notion
>that Korea has always been invaded--that the nation sits on a strategic
>invasion path from the continent to Japan or from Japan to the
>continent--seems to be a myth kept alive especially by the Koreans
>themselves.  Yes, it is perhaps impossible to quantify just exactly how
>much warfare causes just exactly how much suffering, but my point here
>(and I think Prof. Choe would agree) is that the historical facts do not
>justify this victim complex.  To be sure, the list of large-scale foreign
>invasions is a long one: for the last millenium, we can list the Khitan
>Liao (late 10th-early 11th c.), Mongol (early to mid-13th c.), Red Turban
>(mid-14th c.), Japanese (late 16th c.), and Manchu (early 17th c.)
>invasions, not to mention other smaller-scale incursions.  But then,
>some of the peaceful intervals between the above invasions are
>extraordinarily long--most certainly the late Choson "Pax Koreana" between
>the Manchu invasion and the mid-nineteenth-century incursions by the
>French and the Americans.
>
>In the end, no one who would take a moment to put this Korean record in a
>world history perspective could assert that Korea has "always" been
>invaded or suffered from overly frequent invasions.  The cases of China,
>Persia, Egypt (w/o getting into the issue of did an "Egypt" exist as a
>distinct nation/cuture in the Medival period), Byzantium, Poland,
>Lithunia, Italy, and many others should dispell the notion that Korea
>historically has been a victim of unusually large number of foreign
>invasions.
>
>Any kind of a suggestion that Korea is a special case--for the good or the
>bad--must be made with utmost caution.  This victim complex has got to go,
>although I'm not in any way downplaying the enormous suffering the Koreans
>have suffered especially at the end of Choson and the first half of the
>20th century.
>
>Gene Park   
>
>-----
>Eugene Y. Park
>Assistant Professor of Korean History
>University of California, Irvine
>Department of History
>Krieger Hall Room 153
>Irvine, CA 92697-3275
>
>
>On Fri, 21 Jul 2000, John Woo wrote:
>
>> You seem to forget, at least, the mongoliann occupation for close to a 
>> century...
>> J.W. Woo
>> 
>> >From: Yong-ho Choe <choeyh at hawaii.edu>
>> >Reply-To: korean-studies at mailbase.ac.uk
>> >To: korean-studies at mailbase.ac.uk
>> >Subject: Re: Maehyang-ri
>> >Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 12:15:15 -1000
>> >
>> >I am very much bothered by this statement: "Granted, Koreans suffered 
>> >invasion after invasion by foreigners for centuries."
>> >
>> >That Korea had been a helpless victim of constant foreign invasions is an 
>> >unfortunate myth that has absolutely no historical basis.  Examine the 
>> >Korean history and try to see how many foreign invasions Korea had 
>> >suffered, and compare that with those experienced by other countries, such 
>> >as China.  Few countries on the Eurasian continent had enjoyed as much 
>> >peace as Korea up until the the latter half of the 19th century.  Only 
>> >after the late 19th century did Korea become a target of contending powers 
>> >for hegemonic control.  The unfortunte myth--Korea being a victime of 
>> >foreign invasions--must have started by the Westerners at this time, but it 
>> >is not founded on historical facts.  We, starting with those on this list, 
>> >should get rid of this myth once and for all from this time on.
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>
>
Yong-ho Choe, Professor
Department of History
University of Hawaii at Manoa
Honolulu, HI  96822

Tel: 808 956-6762
Fax: 808 956-9600
E-mail: choeyh at hawaii.edu



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