[KS] Re: Still Invaded Economically and Culturally

[kushibo]

Martin Hart-Landsberg wrote:
> Facts #3 and #4 (see below) seem more opinion than fact.  The U.S.
> dominates the region's politics more than Japan, China, or Russia.  It is
> the strongest military power and has had the most direct influence over
> past South Korean political developments.  It is far from some distant,
> neutral party.  Therefore, it is not an obvious fact to me that a unified
> Korea would want to maintain any close formal alliance with the U.S. (as
> opposed to peaceful relations) much less encourage or desire a continuing
> U.S. military presence.

Hasn't every president of Korea, both democratic and otherwise, including
current president and long-time democracy advocate Kim Daejung, stated the
importance of a continued US military presence for stability, even *after*
reunification? My point being, this is hardly the opinion of self-serving
Americans. One can look back over the last 100 or 150 years and easily infer
stagnancy under Chinese domination, brutality under Japanese occupation, and
stability with eventual flourishing of both democracy and the economy while
under a ROK-US alliance. That's not to say that the US military presence
caused the said flourishing of democracy and strengthening of the economy,
but it did lead to enough stability to allow those things to evolve. The
Philippine Senate in the 1990s demonstrated what US rhetoric long had been:
the ROK has the right and the ability to sever the US-ROK military alliance
and end the US military presence anytime they want, which tends to support
the idea that USFK is here because Korea wants them. And North Korea is not
their only threat.

K U S H I B O


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