[KS] Correcting the Record

Norman Thorpe cor1882 at yahoo.com
Mon Oct 3 20:57:07 EDT 2016


 Prof. Don Baker has correctly pointed out themistaken description of the events leading up to the Kwangju massacre in May1980, in Brothers at War: The Unending Conflict in Korea, by Sheila Miyoshi Jager.
 It is incorrect to say, as a quote from thebook does, that Kwangju citizens who were angry about Kim Dae Jung’s arrest, “respondedby seizing arms from local police, turning the city into a fortress.” That falsely suggests that it was the citizens who first took up arms, therebygiving the government an excuse to turn its own guns against them. Thatcompletely distorts the dynamics of the uprising. In fact, it was the use ofguns and other weapons by paratroopers that caused citizens to rise up againstthem, and eventually acquire guns themselves which they turned against thesoldiers.
As paratroopers attacked unarmed citizens on the firstdays of Kwangju (May 18-21), – bludgeoning and stabbing them with bayonets –many citizens saw the unbridled use of force, told family members andneighbors, and generated a widespread uprising against the travesty of thenation’s army attacking the very citizens it was supposed to protect. When thetroops began firing into crowds of demonstrators on May 21, killing some andwounding many, that was the final straw, and the protestors stole guns fromarmories and turned them against the troops. That is very different from thebook’s description of citizens taking up guns first – allegedly because ofanger over Kim Dae Jung’s arrest.
Prof. Jager has said she will consider correcting heraccount if there is solid evidence. I would like to provide some.
 1.  I coveredKwangju as a staff reporter for the Wall Street Journal’s Asian edition – The AsianWall Street Journal – which was published in Hong Kong. When I arrived inKwangju on the afternoon of Wednesday, May 21, 1980, the city was in turmoil. Iwas wearing an armband that said “reporter,” and citizens immediately clusteredaround me, wanting to tell me about people being killed.  When I asked how I could confirm the deaths,they took me to a nearby medical clinic. Someone called the doctor. He took meupstairs and showed me a patient – a schoolboy with a bandaged leg. “It’s abullet wound,” the doctor told me. Then he added that three other patients haddied of bullet wounds in the clinic that afternoon. I learned that the fouryoung men had been shot near the Provincial Headquarters, where paratrooperswere shooting at demonstrators. The doctor said he also had treated a woman whohad been taken to a bigger hospital to get higher level care. He said she hadbeen stabbed by a bayonet. I asked about the three students’ bodies. He saidthe families had taken them. I told him I needed to confirm that deaths hadoccurred. He said I should go to Kwangju Christian Hospital, because it wasbigger and more casualties were being taken there.
When I arrived at Kwangju Christian Hospital, casualties alsowere arriving. I asked about deaths and was taken to a shed that held severalcorpses with what looked like bullet wounds. As I stood there, more corpsesarrived, including one with the head nearly all shot away. The hospital soon had63 wounded patients and 11 who had been killed, with more casualties arriving.
 Meanwhile, citizens had begun taking up arms. I had alreadyseen some brandishing long guns, and a loudspeaker strapped to a car wasannouncing that if people wanted guns, they were being distributed at a localpark. People were going to the park, getting guns, and I could hear shots asthey tried them out.
Citizens were ready to take up guns because the paratroopsin the Provincial Headquarters had been shooting at protestors, killing thedoctor’s schoolboy patients, and others. That shooting was still going on and citizenswere loading arms to fire back. To them this was a matter of great urgency andimmediacy. This wasn’t a matter of getting guns because they were mad about KimDae Jung’s arrest. That was three-day old news, which had been announced on May18.
All of this information, and much more from my seven daysof reporting in Kwangju was published at that time in The Asian Wall StreetJournal – mostly on Page One.
(If you search for these articles, please understand thatthey were published in the Asian Wall Street Journal daily edition distributedin Asia. That was different from a separate weekly tabloid printed in the U.S.with a similar name, which contained only brief versions of the Asian edition’soriginal stories.)
2.  For more informationabout who took up arms first, and when, I suggest referring to Kwangju Diary: Beyond Death,Beyond the Darkness of the Age, by LeeJae-eui, translated by Kap Su Seol and Nick Mamatas, published in 1999 at theUniversity of California, Los Angeles, as part of the UCLA Asian PacificMonograph Series.
This important book providesa day-by-day chronology of the events of Kwangju. I have used it as one of mytexts when teaching undergraduate courses about modern Korea because it is very readable and I believeit is very accurate. The events in the book closely match the events I observedin Kwangju or heard about from other people there.
In the book’s description of how Kwangjuunfolded, the author details in several gripping chapters the rising tide ofbrutality by paratroopers against Kwangju citizens, eventually culminating inthe paratroopers’ used of guns against unarmed civilians on May 21, whichgoaded the citizens into getting guns to shoot back. Author Lee details theactions by paratroopers which led to that backlash. He also details variouslocations where guns were obtained, and when – Wednesday, May 21 – three daysafter  Kim Dae Jung’s arrest wasannounced, but only hours after the army started shooting at citizens. Toincorrectly say the citizens took the extreme step of raising arms just becauseof Kim Dae Jung’s arrest demeans their motives.
Some disclosures:  I have provided photos I took in Kwangju to anumber of publications, including the cover photo for Kwangju Diary. I havetwice participated in hosted visits to Kwangju toshare and compare research, photographic images, and memories of the events of1980 with Korean scholars , other reporters, and  participants in the 1980 events.  I have led undergraduate field trips toKwangju about 10 times in as many years, introducing several hundred studentsto the tragedy of Kwangju.
After teaching and learningabout Kwangju for years, I don’t recall ever having heard before anyone suggest thatit was the citizens who took up arms first. That simply doesn’t make sense. Ifthey had, the resistance wouldn’t have had the widespread popular support itdid. It was the brutality of the paratroopers and the use of guns againstcitizens that galvanized people to take up arms.
Norman ThorpeRetired adjunct faculty,Whitworth University, Spokane, Washington state, USATeaching faculty,International Summer Session, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, SeoulSeoul-based staff reporterfor The Asian Wall Street Journal, 1978-1982
      From: Sheila Miyoshi Jager <sheila.jager at oberlin.edu>
 To: Korean Studies Discussion List <koreanstudies at koreanstudies.com> 
 Sent: Thursday, September 29, 2016 5:08 PM
 Subject: Re: [KS] Correcting the Record
   
Prof. Baker raises two valid points:
-       An ethical question about historical truth or fact; and,

-       Particular points of contention over how a book covered aspects of Kwangju 1980 and Cheju 1948 as means to provide examples on the first point.
 The first, and most important point, about the ethics of handling historical truth/fact, is an easy one. Truth and fact should ALWAYS trump untruth and falsehood. This requires the scrupulous handling of primary sources. The challenge, however, as every historian is aware, is determining what constitutes truth and fact. Historical truth is not only elusive, but may never be attainable.  This is one of the reasons why historians will never be out of a job, because of the endless challenges and revisions of historical "truth and fact."  History is subject to the whims of human passion, emotion, biases, and who knows what other obstacles we have to elucidating and identifying the ultimate truth and fact.  Even names, dates and locations, which should have ultimate truths, can be and have been disputed, more often than not.  As many of us have seen, experienced, and studied, history often serves a political master, whether mobilized from the outside or self-imposed by the convictions of the individual historian. There is no historical truth, only historical consensus. Prof. Baker refers to "historical records" and "what people in Kwangju told me" as definitive proof of a certain historical truth and fact.  We see from Don Kirk’s post, also based eye witness a different historical truth that directly challenges Prof. Baker’s hence beautifully demonstrating the fragility and capriciousness of “historical truth.”  Neither “historical records” or eye witness accounts source are free from distortions.  Only the accumulation of a greater number of corroborating evidence can weigh historical interpretation toward a certain truth and fact.  But, as in the sciences, it is only a temporary state, truth until proven otherwise by new evidence. Turning now to the specific issues of historical truth or correcting "a serious misreading of the historical record" as Prof. Baker puts it, let me start by confessing that the book he is referring to, which he very graciously withheld from naming, is my Brothers at War: The Unending Conflict in Korea (Norton 2013 in the U.S. and Profile 2013 in the UK), which, for those unfamiliar, is a narrative history of the North-South confrontation and competition from 1945 to early 2013.  It has been widely praised as one of the most complete and balanced account of the situation in Korea.  It was featured in the 2013 National Book Festival and selected as one of the best books on Asia in 2013 by Foreign Affairs.  I strove very hard to produce an even handed account that minimized judgment and show the good, the bad, and the ugly of the tragedy and triumph of post World War II Korean history.  This was especially important to me because of the highly charged partisanship that exists in modern Korean historiography.  I am gratified that the vast number of readers appreciated my non-partisan approach. It is for this reason that I am disappointed that Prof. Baker chose to highlight two narrow extracts of my book that implies a partisan historical perspective.  Subscribers not familiar with my book may draw the conclusion that I am an apologist for Chun's violent crackdown at Kwangju, and that I may be justifying the horrific put down of the Cheju uprising because it was instigated by thousands of mainland leftists.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  This is readily apparent if those selections are read in the context in which they were written and the larger narrative I convey.  I've written nothing to justify the inhuman cruelty and violence afflicted on people in both incidents. Let's suppose that by stating that Kwangju citizens took up arms first and then Chun responded to it by surrounding the city with the army (pp. 417-419) that I "misread the historical record" although Don Kirk agrees with this sequence.  I do not justify the cruel and violent army crackdown because the citizens took up arms first.  Instead, I focused on what really mattered from Kwangju, how "the magnitude of state violence and the complete devastation of democratic forces and processes after the Kwangju uprising" ironically pushed forward grass roots forces toward a democratizing path for South Korea (p. 419).  This discussion of Kwangju must be seen in the even larger narrative of where it fits in the chapter discussing the end of the Park Chung Hee era and still larger narrative of the Local War. Admittedly, my discussion of the Kwangju incident in two pages was too truncated.  For example, I did not mention the paratroopers who were sent in to brutally attack students protesting the closure of Chonnam University on the morning of 18 Maythat was, according to “historical records” the spark that led the city to take up arms, which in turn resulted in regime forces surrounding and bloodily retaking the city.  I did not think this detail critical to a narrative that clearly identifies the Chun regime as the side that perpetrated the attack.  The sequence of events of whether citizens took up arms and then the regime reacted or vice versa does not change the unjustified and unmitigated violence meted out by the regime forces.  What mattered was the profound impact of that violence on the historical path that South Korea followed afterwards. Prof. Baker did contact me about this issue.  This is an important issue, but certainly not at the level of who started the June 25, 1950 conflict, a comparison to which Don Kirk characterizes as, I think correctly, “hyperbolic and distracting.”  However, what is factually wrong must be corrected and Prof. Baker has promised to provide the evidence, more definitive than simply his words based on unspecified “historical records” and witness accounts, for my consideration.  I will change my narrative if it is warranted. Turning to the second specific issue he raised, on the Cheju uprising of spring 1948, I admit to a misquote of the source and thank Prof. Baker for pointing it out although his posting on Korean Studies forum is the first time he raised it.  The quote in my book was, It [the Cheju rebellion] had received substantial outside help.  Colonel Rothwell Brown, an American advisor, reported that the SKWP had infiltrated 'over six thousand agitators and organizers' from the mainland and, with the islanders, established cells in most towns and villages."....32 (p. 49) Endnote 32 states: John Merrill, Korea: The Peninsular Origins of the War (University of Delaware Press, 1989), p. 67; Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, vol. 2: The Roaring of the Cataract, 1947-1950 (Princeton University Press, 1990), p. 254. Most of the paragraph in question in my book came from Cumings including this quote that I misquoted, Interrogators [working for Colonel Rothwell Brown] also found evidence that the SKWP had infiltrated 'not over six trained agitators and organizers' from the mainland..." Clearly I was wrong and gave a false impression of a huge mainland SKWP presence in Cheju.  Don Kirk’s instinct was right.  It is unimaginable that the SKWP could have infiltrated 6,000 agents.  However, this does not change the interpretive thrust of this section that the Cheju uprising had close links and support from the SKWP network, on the mainland and on Cheju as the Merrill source discusses.  The origin of the Cheju uprising definitely had local roots, but it seems SKWP organizational support played an important part. I will correct this mistake in the next edition. My book undoubtedly has many areas for improvement and correction including the incorporation of new developments in modern Korean historiography.  I will be the last one to say I had complete mastery of such long and complicated history.  Mistakes, omissions and untenable distortions were inevitable.  But they were never intentional. I thank Prof. Baker for raising such an important ethical question and an opportunity to discuss my book and helping it get closer to history's elusive truth. Sincerely,Sheila Miyoshi Jager

   
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://koreanstudies.com/pipermail/koreanstudies_koreanstudies.com/attachments/20161004/97441afb/attachment.html>


More information about the Koreanstudies mailing list