THE U.S. MILITARY IN SK in Abrams’ ‘Immovable Object: NK’s 70 Years at War with American Power’

 Ch 11 THE U.S. MILITARY IN SOUTH KOREA

in A. B. Abrams’ ‘Immovable Object: North Korea’s 70 Years at War with American Power’

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"Liberation": Imposing American Military Rule and Abol­ishing the People's Republic

Critical to understanding the nature of the relationship between North Korea and the United States—the resistance state and the imperial hegemon—is an understanding of the parallel but opposite relationship which exists between South Korea and the United States—the client state and its former ruler. An assessment of the history and nature of the U.S.-ROK relationship reveals much regarding both American intentions to­wards the Korean nation as a whole, and the fate Pyongyang has ardently sought to avoid for three quarters of a century.

Paving the way for the first landing of U.S. forces in Korea, American military aircraft dropped three thousand leaflets over southern Korea for four consecutive days starting on September 1, 1945 by order of General Douglas MacArthur. Addressed "To the People of Korea," they an­nounced:

The armed forces of the United States will soon arrive in Korea for the purpose of receiving the surrender of the Japanese forces, enforc­ing the terms of surrender, and insuring the orderly administration and rehabilitation of the country. These missions will be carried out with a firm hand, but with a hand that will be guided by a nation whose long heritage of democracy has fostered kindly feeling for peo­ples less fortunate. How well and how rapidly these tasks are carried

out will depend on the Koreans themselvesj

A more threatening second proclamation was issued in the same way on September 7, carrying a personal address from General MacArthur, who identified himself as "Commander-in-Chief, United States Army Forces, Pacific." It proclaimed:

Any Person Who:

Violates the provision of the Instrument of Surrender, or any pro­clamation, order or directive given under the authority of the Com­mander-in-Chief, United States Army Forces, Pacific, or does any act to the prejudice of good order or the life, safety or security of the per­sons or property of the United States or its Allies, or does any act calculated to disturb public peace and order, or prevent the adminis­tration of justice, or wilfully does any act hostile to the Allied forces, shall upon conviction by a military Occupation Court, suffer death or

such other punishment as the Court may determine.

Whether the Koreans would be killed or punished depended on how well they abided by the will of their new master. In imposing its military rule, the United States expected total obedience. At this time, however, the Korean population was already governing itself through elected offi­cials and committees under the People's Republic of Korea, which made the imposition of foreign military rule without consultation of the Kore­ans themselves appear more like an invasion to assert foreign interests than an attempt to restore order. The way this was imposed raised a number of questions regarding the consistency of the military's rhetoric—with the persona of the benevolent liberator expressed in the first set of leaflets contrasting with that of an invader imposing its will indicated in the second. Could America claim to "liberate" southern

than as an involuntary colony of Japan.10 It was notable that during the war, Korean comfort women forced to serve the Japanese Imperial Army

overseas had been targeted for rape by American soldiers just as Japa‑

nese women were—there was no distinction made between them.11 Per­ceptions of the Japanese Empire as one which would "combine most of

the Asiatic peoples against the whites"12 had a key influence on percep­tions of Asian populations, stimulating greater animosity towards

thern.13 This only grew as Korean resistance and the Korean People's Republic were depicted as affiliates of global communism—which even

before Japan's subjugation had begun to replace the Empire of the Sun in Western propaganda as the new great adversary of both America and

the wider Western world.14

The office of General Hodge had observed regarding the occupation

period: "Americans are ignorant of Korean customs, show no appre­ciation of Korean art or culture, and openly ridicule the idea that there

can be any good in anything Korean."15 Staff sergeant Robert H. Moyer, who served in southern Korea, stated: "Before the war, Koreans consid‑

ered us as another occupier of their county. And after the elections in 1948, we were only permitted off post in groups of 3 or more, for safety

reasons. They disliked us."16 Indeed, even many of those South Koreans considered Americanized before the war, those who "went to school in

the USA, smoked USA cigarettes, spoke American," appeared to loathe the U.S. occupation and would go on to side with the Korean People's

Army in the Korean War.17

South Koreans' ill feeling towards Americans came not only from the forceful abolition of their republic, sustainment of the Japanese imperial

system and protection of collaborators from what was widely seen to be the people's justice, but also from American soldiers' abusive treatment

of Korean civilians, Perceptions and treatment of Koreans remained rela­tively consistent both during the occupation period and in the following decades. The U.S. Eighth Army reported in 1951 regarding the apparently sadistic pleasure personnel took in tormenting the Korean people that soldiers: "take a perverse delight in frightening civilians" and using force

to "drive the Koreans off roads and into ditches."18 U.S. personnel were known to regularly commit violent, humiliating and abusive acts against

regular South Korean civilians who had worked for them.19 As one U.S. Marine stated, effectively summarising what appeared to be the predom‑

inant attitude among Americans in Korea: "They're just a bunch of

gooks. Who cares about the feelings of people like that?"2 Historian Lloyd Lewis wrote regarding the indoctrination American personnel re‑

ceived before being sent to war in East Asia: "soldiers in all branches of the armed services recount receiving the same indoctrination, that the

enemy is Oriental and inferior."21 The population in southern Korea and those in other East Asian states hosting American forces were forced to

bear the brunt of this.

An American survey carried out in the 1960s in South Korea and West Germany showed how the attitudes of U.S. personnel towards pop­ulations in countries where they were deployed influenced how they were perceived. Of South Koreans questioned, only 13 percent thought Amer­icans "liked them" while 70 percent of West Germans assumed Amer‑

icans not only liked them but viewed them "as friendS."22 While Amer­icans had greater historical reasons to mistreat the German population

as an enemy, cultural and racial factors meant that treatment of a West­ern population was always far more respectful than that towards an East

Asian nation. The U.S. Military itself appeared to make the difference offi­cial through its publications. While the opportunity to explore cultural

Korea while at the same time occupying it, forcefully dismantling its existing government and threatening those Koreans who did not abide by its will with death? Ernst Fraenkel, an influential jurist and leading advi­sor for the U.S. Military Government in Korea, summarised his obser­vations of the nature of American military rule over the country: "Military

occupation of a 'liberated country' is basically self-contradictory."

"Liberation" during the Cold War increasingly became a euphemism for bringing a country into the Western sphere of influence or what soon began to be called the "Free World" to conceal its Western-dominated nature. This new definition of "liberation" would become commonplace

and remains so today.

Protests against American rule, described by Western observers as "absolutely ordered and peaceful," were widespread and made it clear that the imposition of foreign authority and undermining of self-governance was not welcome. Korean independence groups slammed bans by the U.S. Military Government on public protest and public assembly, and the position of the general populace was well known to the Americans.5 As the governor Lieutenant General John R. Hodge ob­served: "The Koreans want their independence more than any one thing and want it now."6

The accounts of Ernst Fraenkel, who arrived in Korea as the occu­pation was being established, are insightful as to the state of affairs at this time. Korea was one of the few places on Earth which Western mili­taries had yet to occupy, and as such Western cultural influences re­mained relatively few. Fraenkel thus described the lives of the Korean populace as a "completely separate world" from that of the Western occupiers, for whom the prospect of eating Korean food was "phan-tastic"—some-thing beyond consideration. Based on the vast differences between the American military governance and those upon whom Amer­ican rule was being imposed, Fraenkel questioned:

whether it is possible to have any contacts with them, except a very small crust of intellectuals who have been educated in U.S., Europe and Japan... And now we try to do the job to govern these people of whom we know so little and whom we will probably never under­stand. We enact statutes and even a constitution, establish insti­tutions which are wholly based on occidental thinking and apply ideas to the government of this country which are meaningful only in the framework of our tradition and civilisation.7

According to the German jurist, the goal of the American military government he was serving was to remake southern Korea in America's image—into a "virulently anti-Communist" state indefinitely intertwined

with American material and political interests.!

The treatment of the Korean population by U.S. military personnel was particularly poor, contrasting strongly with conduct towards allied European populations at the time. This served as another demonstration of the true nature of the two nations' relationship—far from that of liber­ator and liberated which the Americans claimed as pretext for imposing their rule. As the office of General Hodge itself observed: "Americans act as though Koreans were a conquered nation rather than a liberated

people."9 Widespread portrayals in American state media of the Pacific

War with Imperial Japan as a race war, as part of the "perpetual wars be­tween Oriental ideas and Occidental" and a crusade for Western civili­sation, likely influenced Americans to perceive Koreans as part of the East Asian resistance to Western rule under the Japanese Empire rather

sites such as castles and learn about a new country were used to pro­mote deployments to Germany, by contrast easy access to servile com­fort women was used to attract soldiers to Korea—there was not consid‑

ered to be any culture to speak of worth promoting.23 The nature of the relationship between the United States and South Korea was demon‑

strated by the former's extensive use of comfort women from the latter. The comfort women system was established under direct American mili­tary rule but would continue long afterwards. U.S. Army Colonel Donald Portway had thus concluded regarding the prime function of the U.S. Military Government in southern Korea: "The American Military govern­ment had as its basic purpose the provision of banquets, gifts and femi‑

nine company"—a conclusion he was far from alone in reaching.24

Serving the U.S. Military: Comfort Women in South Korea

Describing the perks of deployment to Korea, the American military newspaper Stars and Stripes specifically highlighted the attraction of ac‑

cess to servile Korean women—strongly objectifying them, and in doing so, encouraging similar perceptions from readers. It wrote: "Picture hav­ing three or four of the loveliest creatures God ever created hovering around you, singing, dancing, feeding you, washing what they feed you down with rice wine and beer, all saying at once: 'you are the greatest.' This is the Orient you heard about and came to find." The paper encour­aged American soldiers to take part in Korea's "night-time action," call­ing it "the ultimate experience"—which was thought to allude to the experience at camptowns near U.S. bases where soliciting prostitutes,

many coerced into the trade, was extremely common.25

Approximately 84 percent of Americans deployed in the Korea sur­veyed admitted to having been with comfort women. A U.S. captain deployed in Korea said there was an overwhelming cultural pressure among enlisted men to seek out prostitutes, and even those initially

against the idea would end up participating.26 When U.S. Navy ships

were set to dock in the Philippines or Korea, officers "threw the men con­doms as if they were Hallmark cards." Officers were known to tell their men that prostitution was a way of life for East Asians, and that Asians

like prostitution, which they "enthusiastically promoted."Z Although this

was used to justify the exploitation of Korean women, the extent to which chastity was valued in Korean society, and extra-marital sex or prosti­tution was abhorred, had few equals in the world. In her comprehensive study of the evolving Korean perceptions of chastity, Professor Katrina Maynes repeatedly emphasized how chastity was vital for a woman to be respected and considered of value. She wrote:

Respectable women ... were expected to uphold their chastity at all times. Their virginity was their greatest asset and their key to an hon­ourable marriage. They were instructed to guard their chastity with their life, and in the case of rape, women were taught that suicide was preferable. Respectable women could prove their honour through demonstrating chastity and upholding their husbands in life and death.28

Nevertheless, it suited the American agenda to depict Koreans as a population which "liked prostitution" to dispel any moral qualms sol­diers may have had against making full use of the opportunities provided to them.

U.S. military personnel's use of comfort women reportedly began as soon as the first American soldiers landed in Korea, with the comfort

women held to serve Japanese imperial forces raped by the AmericanS.29

Again the contrast between the depiction of the U.S. as a liberator and actual American conduct, that of a particularly brutal conqueror, was evi­dent. Japan's system of comfort stations was later vastly expanded under American rule and women were provided with modest salaries. Many of the first generation of prostitutes working for the U.S. were in fact former comfort women for the Japanese Imperial Army, working under a remark‑

ably similar system.30 In the centre of downtown Seoul the U.S. Army

occupied the 640-Acre Yongsan garrison that had been built for the Japa­nese Army. The neighbourhood quickly filled with brothels servicing U.S. troops, and GIs came to call the area "Hooker Hill." American expert Professor Arissa Oh noted on the comfort system's origins: "During the

period of U.S. occupation (1945-1948) camptowns, or kLjich'on quickly

sprang up around American military bases throughout South Korea. The system of US-oriented prostitution was built on the foundation estab­lished by the Japanese colonial government."31

Scholars Maria Hohn and Seungsook Moon, who carried out a de­tailed investigation into the comfort women system, noted regarding its establishment to service the U.S. Military:

The demise of [Japanese] colonial rule did not end the use of wom­en's sexual labour for foreign soldiers in Korea. Projecting its image as a "benevolent liberator" to teach democracy to Koreans, the U.S. military was deeply implicated in various forms of prostitution from the dawn of its occupation of Korea... The so-called decolonizing process led by the U.S. military continued to provide fertile soil for the rapid growth of private and unregulated prostitution (sach'ang) in Seoul, Ascom, Taejon, Kwangju, and Pusan... Well-paid American

soldiers aggressively sought out local women for sexual services. American GIs chased after Korean women in the context of racialized cultural difference, coupled with racism against the Koreans by GIs... Military authorities had to deal with the pervasive problems of the de­terioration of military courtesy, discipline, appearance, and training. Under the category of courtesy, the authorities addressed widespread racism against the Koreans, ranging from the use of the racial slur "gooks," physical assaults, reckless driving, and undue arrests of Koreans to making aggressive passes at Korean women.... GIs viewed sexual access to Korean women outside the respectability of marriage as their entitlement, as agents of European colonialism did towards

colonized women ofcolour.32

Much like in Japan at the time, where Western occupation was also imposed,33 from the early days of the U.S. Military Government in early September 1945 there were widespread reports of rapes by American military personnel outside the comfort women system. While there are scant records of the individual cases of rape, as it was in the interest of neither the military government nor the subsequent Syngman Rhee gov­ernment to keep them, there is substantial evidence from both Korean and American sources that widespread rapes did take place, including testimonies from South Korean victims. According to the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, the Korean population, though forced to tolerate the GIs' relations with prostitutes, complained of the

widespread rapes of women outside this system.34 A South Korean sol‑

dier interviewed stated to similar effect: "I was conscripted into the ROK army and had to do sentry duty at the house of a big-shot American. Each night they took our Korean girls in there to be defiled. I don't want

your sort of 'Free World."'35 Professor Arissa Oh, an expert on the occu­pation period, noted regarding these incidents: "Rape of local women

was largely undocumented but widespread enough to prompt com­plaints from South Korean officials." It was highly in keeping with their conduct elsewhere for U.S. troops deployed across the region to commit

rapes en-masse against women—a practice also extremely common from

1945 in Japan3G and later in Vietnam.Z

Franziska Donner, the Austrian wife of President Syngman Rhee,

claimed that establishment of comfort stations where Korean women would serve American personnel had been necessary, as GIs had previ­ously kept "taking" any woman they wanted—a reference to widespread

rapes.38 From a woman who strongly supported the occupation, whose husband had been hand-picked by the U.S. military to assume power,

this admission was a powerful indicator as to the extent of the sexual crimes being perpetrated. Reports by victims and their families of mass rapes were so widespread and pervasive that they prompted complaints

by South Korean officials to U.S. commanders.! Comfort stations were seen as a way to prevent this by providing American personnel with con‑

trolled access to Korean women. While it was an essential part of the American occupation to try to be seen as benevolent democratizing saviours, rather than as rapacious conquerors, accounts from the time strongly indicate the latter was much closer to the truth.

Comfort Women After American Military Rule

The end of formal U.S. military rule over southern Korea in 1948 and the establishment of the Republic of Korea under Syngman Rhee's rule saw the country continue to provide comfort women to service American personnel. The government put in place by the U.S. Military was instrumental in encouraging the continuation of the comfort women sys­tem, both directly and indirectly. Professors Seungsook Moon and Maria Hohn concluded in their study of the comfort women system that the Rhee government relied heavily on prostitution to provide foreign cur­rency as a result of its ineptitude in economic management, stating: "In the face of dire wartime poverty, the way the Korean government viewed

prostitution as an inevitable means to feed its people."40 Ms. Kim, a for­mer prostitute, recalled when interviewed regarding government policies:

"They urged us to sell as much as possible to the Gl.s, praising us as

'dollar earning patriots."i By the early 1960s the South Korean govern­ment relied on the comfort women system to provide 24 percent of the

country's Gross National Product (GNP), far more than the system serv‑

ing the Japanese Imperial Army ever had.42 As Kim Ae Ran, a 58-year-old former prostitute interviewed in 2009, said: "Our government was one

big pimp for the U.S. military."±

During 12 years in office Rhee's administration never instituted a na‑

tional economic policy and the ROK made almost no economic or social progress. As professors Uk Heo and Terrence Roehrig noted in their study of South Korean political history, alongside rampant corruption "Rhee also had little expertise or interest in economic development, and his economic ministers were similarly inexperienced and untrained in

economic policy making."44 Supporting the comfort women system pro­vided the Rhee government with a means of earning foreign currency, compensating for its own economic ineptitude.

Few investigations were made into government involvement in the

comfort women system in South Korea, although the New York Times was several decades later able to conduct an investigation and interview former prostitutes. Those interviewed claimed their government had

been heavily involved in human trafficking in relation to the sex trade and provision for the U.S. Military for many decades. The investigators re­viewed South Korean and American documents, which they concluded "do provide some support for many of the women's claims." Although the South Korean government remained silent on the issue, in 2006 Kim Kee Joe, a government official and former high level liaison to the U.S. Military, admitted in a televised interview: "Although we did not actively urge them to engage in prostitution, we, especially those from the county offices, did often tell them that it was not something bad for the country

either."45

The state's active encouragement of the comfort women system ser­vicing the U.S. Military was confirmed in a ruling by the Seoul High Court on February 8, 2018. This policy had been adopted for the sake of both strengthening the military alliance and earning foreign currency. The court concluded: "In regarding the right to sexual self-determination of the women in the camptown and the very character of the plaintiffs as represented through their sexuality as means of achieving state goals, the state violated its obligation to respect human rights." It further reported: 'according to official Ministry of Health and Welfare documents, [the state] actively encouraged women in the military camptowns to engage in prostitution to allow foreign troops to 'relax' and 'enjoy sexual services' with them."46

A number of means were used to coerce women into entering the comfort women system and providing sexual services to American per­sonnel. One very significant, though indirect, means of coercion was the destitution which had resulted from the policies of both the U.S. Military and Rhee government. The wartime scorched earth policy, destroying en­tire towns and villages across Korea and burning the crops and livelihoods which people had relied on for generations, left a large seg­ment of the population with few possessions and no means of providing for themselves. At a conservative estimate, the war created two million refugees in South Korea—and between 20 and 25 percent of the popu­lation at the end of the war could not support themselves. Little was done to compensate these families or help them restart their

livelihoods.i This combined with Rhee's economic ineptitude, his focus

on militarisation, the low wages available to conscripts and the poor so­cial welfare available meant many Korean families faced very serious destitution. Thus, both during the war, and afterwards when a presence of hundreds of thousands of Americans remained, many women, partic­ularly mothers with dependants, had no choice but to enter the comfort women system. The claim that the comfort women system was based on consent thus strongly contradicts the available evidence from both South Korean and U.S. sources.

Professor Arissa Oh concluded in her own study: "Many women had few options other than questionable employment in tearooms, restau­rants, and bars, where a thin line separated the hostess and the sex work­er. Other women were seduced through false promises, or raped. Wid­ows often resorted to sex work to support their children."48 It was often the reality that women had to either sell their bodies to Western soldiers or see their children starve. In 1952, the final year of the Korean War, the U.S. State Department reported that of the "UN Aunties," a term for the prostitutes servicing the Western soldiers, half were widows. This statis­tic alone is highly indicative as to the true nature of prostitution in wartime and post-war South Korea and the desperation of those who en‑

tered the trade.49

Seungsook Moon and Maria Hohn publicized the findings of their

investigation on the methods of coercion used to obtain comfort women for American forces after the Korean War, stating:

It appears that, while some women would have been trafficked through force and deception, the masses of impoverished Korean women, single and married, were mainly recruited by private busi­nesses that secured approval from authorities. The majority of women working in UN comfort stations were married, which sug­gests that sexual labour was a desperate attempt to feed children and families. The force of abject poverty and the death, disability, and dis­placement of men during the Korean War further multiplied the number of women who had to prostitute themselves for survival.50

Based on an analysis of the circumstances, it is clear that what was called consensual was actually very far from consensual work, with a pri­mary workforce of widows and married women being a strong indicator of this. The conditions which forced women into prostitution were caused by the very same external actors who benefited from having ac­cess to large numbers of desperate Korean women.

A number of other studies of the comfort women system reached similar conclusions regarding the supposed "consent" of the women who were forced to sexually service Western solders. Referring to the continuity between this system and that which had preceded it on a smaller scale under the Japanese Empire, associate professor at Amer­ican University in Washington D.C. and expert on foreign and military policy David Vine concluded in his research: "With the assistance of Ko­rean officials, U.S. authorities continued the system absent formal slav­ery, but under conditions of exceedingly limited choice for the women involved."5'

Professor Lee Jin Kyung, an expert on labour migration in South Korea, noted regarding the nature of the "consent" of South Korean women to serve American soldiers that it was hardly worthy of the term. It was in fact very similar to the system of "comfort women" Japan oper­ated, but on a far greater scale. She concluded regarding the nature of prostitution in South Korea:

Prostitution is an occupation "choice" that is largely forced on them as a matter of bare subsistence and survival.., prostitution is an insti­tutionalization of sexual violence via commercialization, for the ways in which the "consent" is forcibly manufactured out of unequal social and economic relations among sex workers, their employers and their clients. In other words, considering this inherent coerciveness and structural violence built into prostitution, I would like to concep­tualize prostitution as another kind of necropolitical labour.

"Necropolitical labour" is a term she coined for forced labour, in which there are significant risks of violence and death, evidenced by the number of prostitutes killed or otherwise seriously harmed in their work by GIs, but the alternative to which is death.52

In her "Research for the Reform of Law and the Prevention of Prosti­tution," Elaine Kim concluded that the Korean War and the U.S.—Republic of Korea Mutual Defense Treaty had between them laid the basis for the comfort women system, with wartime destruction sepa­rating families and creating orphans and widows. This system "mass produced" women who had no choice but to enter the comfort women system or else starve—leaving women and young girls without homes or

some receive advice on the type of man to avoid (e.g. violent types) from more experienced prostitutes.60

Interviews with a number of comfort women indicated the true nature of "consent" in the system they worked in. Jeon, a former sex worker

aged 71, was interviewed by the New York Times in 2009. Orphaned in

the war at 18 years old she had been forced to begin work in the comfort women system in Dongducheon camptown near the frontlines to service American soldiers. "The more I think about my life, the more I think women like me were the biggest sacrifice for my country's alliance with the Americans. Looking back I think my body was not mine, but the gov­ernment's and the U.S. Military's," she had said. Jeon had a son in the 1960$ but gave him up when he was 13. Selling mixed-race children to families in the United States was common practice for comfort women at the time, many of whom could not afford to raise the children them­selves. At the time she was interviewed, Jeon was subsisting by selling items she picked up from trash for a living.61

"Johnston's Mom," a pseudonym used by another woman in the comfort woman system, was in her late twenties when interviewed in Songsan, Uijongbu, north of Seoul. Her interviewer described where she lived as "a run-down cement building-front off an alley ...a small dark room with gray cement walls and a few pots and pans-the kitchen." Her sons were the children of two different American servicemen, and an American soldier, the father of neither of the boys, had shortly before­hand been living with them. He had provided food in return for sexual services, a "contract cohabitation" which was common in camptowns. She could not bear to sell her sons (European-looking children sold for $50-200) and was forced to resume working as a prostitute to feed them. The interviewer discovered that as per their "contract," "Johnston's Mom" would have regular sex with the U.S. soldier in the same room as the young boys, as there was nowhere else to go. This case was not par­ticularly outstanding among the millions of relations that a million com­fort women had with U.S. soldiers. Such poverty, depravity and exploita‑

tion were commonplace.62

Comfort Women and U.S.-Korean Relations

The significance and symbolism of the comfort women system as a central part of U.S.-ROK relations sheds considerable light on the nature of American conduct and intentions towards the Korean nation, pre­senting strong evidence of the fate the DPRK has managed to spare its population by continuing a policy of resistance to forceful integration into the U.S.-led order. Indeed, this issue alone arguably vindicates the DPRK decision to fight for its sovereignty at all costs, and awareness of American intentions based on U.S. relations with South Korea may well contribute to fuelling the north's staunch defiance against America's hegemonic ambitions. As Professor Katherine H. S. Moon wrote: "The sexual domination of tens of thousands of Korean women by 'Yangk'I foreigners' [she later puts the total figure at around 1 million women] is a

social disgrace,"63 one which given the importance of chastity and ethnic pride in Korean culture is something any self-respecting and fully sover­eign Korean state would do its utmost to avoid.

Renowned American professor and historian of East Asia Bruce Cum-ings, a specialist in Korea, holder of South Korea's honourable Kim Dae Jung Academic Award for Outstanding Achievements and Scholarly Con­tributions to Democracy, Human Rights and Peace and former member of the U.S. Peace Corps stationed in Korea, observed in his assessment

livelihoods.53 Was not the intentional destruction of Korea and the liveli­hoods of millions with an intensive bombing and scorched earth policy,

and with the forceful imposition of leadership as corrupt and inept as that of Rhee, not an indirect way of forcing women into sexual slavery? By destroying a people's lives and their ability to provide for themselves, they were left helpless—after which a reliance on American resources could be fostered. These resources came at the price of comfort women for sexual service. American sociologist Kathleen Barry was one of a number of scholars who observed the similarities between the "industri­alization of sex" and the scale of sexual exploitation in South Korea with the sexual exploitation of conquered women by traditional imperial

conquerors.54 Professor Lee Jin Kyung at the University of California also noted that the approach of the United States to guaranteeing access to

Korean women was merely a "shift from the Japanese Imperial System of

Comfort Women" to a new system with the same ends.5

Regarding the means by which South Korean women entered prosti‑

tution, coercion and fraud were also extremely common means of re­cruitment. Flesh-traffickers and pimps would often wait by train and bus stations to greet young girls coming from the countryside, promising them employment and a place to stay. These girls, who often left the

countryside to seek work, would then be "initiated" through rape.56 They would then be employed in sex work or sold to brothels in the camp‑

towns. Advertisements offering jobs as waitresses, shopkeepers and singers were very frequently used to lure women to their "initiation cere‑

monies," after which they were psychologically broken by the shock and social shame of rape and could be sold into prostitution. Once a girl or

woman was in the power of such a system, it was extremely difficult for her to get out. Cultural and psychological reasons were significant

factors as these women were now considered fallen and would face sig­nificant social stigma and isolation. Pimps and brothel owners who co­erced women into prostitution also made extensive use of a debt-bond system, confiscating women's incomes, getting them into debt and pun‑

ishing any transgressions with violence.57 It was not unusual for Korean women to have to hand over 8o percent of their earnings to brothel own‑

ers, making it nearly impossible for them to pay off their debts.58

The South Korean police, notoriously corrupt in the Rhee years, were

themselves reported to be involved not only in trading drugs, but also in trafficking women for the comfort women system. According to a prom­inent study by Professor Lukasz Kamienski: "the police were... actively in­volved in trafficking in women and smuggling them to brothels, thus providing cover and protection for the entire underground sex and drug trade economy." With police themselves heavily involved in trafficking women, it is difficult to claim that the comfort women system was based on consent. Kamienski was far from the only one to comment on these

reports.?

Katherine H. S. Moon's research described the reluctance of women

to service foreign soldiers and how women were forcefully broken down to be able to provide sexual services to the American soldiers. She stat­ed:

Most women do not come into the clubs equipped with the "hostess-ing skills" and the willingness to share flesh with the GIs. For women who are new to the club scene, an initiation process often takes place. Some women attest to having been raped by their pimp/ manager; others have been ordered by the club owner to sleep with a particular soldier; yet others stumble into bed with GIs on their own;

of the centrality of the comfort women system to U.S.-ROK relations and its symbolism regarding the overall nature of the relationship:

One element in the Korean-American relationship has been constant: the continuous subordination of one female generation after another to the sexual servicing of American males, to the requirements of a trade in female flesh that simply cannot be exaggerated. It's the most common form of Korean-American interaction, whether you're a pri­vate in the Army, a visiting Congressman (for who special stables are maintained), or a Peace Corps teacher... It's also the most silent ex­change, as if the trade were chaperoned by the deaf, dumb and blind... It is the aspect that most struck me when I first lived in Korea, creating indelible impressions of a relationship that, because of the use made of Korean women, could not be what it was said to be: a free compact between two independent nations dedicated to democ­racy and anticommuniSM.64

As a member of the Peace Corps stationed in Korea, who witnessed first-hand what took place in camptowns and the prevalent attitudes among Americans towards Korean society and its women, Cumings' ac­counts are particularly useful. He observed:

If someone called attention to the ceaseless orgy, all the usual bromine pour forth to drown out the faint cries of peasant girls yanked off  train in Seoul and thrown into a brothel, a thousand little justifications for the abasement of a thousand little girls at American hands...the social construction of every Korea female as a potential object of pleasure for Americans. It is the most important aspect of the whole relationship and the primary memory of Korea for

generations of young American men who have served there... When I told an older "Korea hand" that I was going to Seoul with spouse, he

remarked, "why take a sandwich to a banquet?"65

In his description of the "whoring district" near an American military base Cumings described what he saw: "ridiculous-looking painted Ko­rean girls—often very young—peer from the doors ... a middle-aged woman with two kids hanging on to her who, in the middle of the street, asked me to come and 'hop on' in the chimdeh [bed]." He further ob­served: "Goofy-looking, stupid soldiers walk arm-in-arm with whores who are often only young girls—very, very young girls. How do these men justify this to themselves... [Koreans] simply hate them [the Amer­icans] and exist by pandering to their ever-base desires ... the adults avert their eyes when you look at them, and if they don't, they glare at you with a hatred that can be measured—an American who speaks Korean is the only things that shocks theM."66

According to Cumings, Korean prostitutes of all ages including chil­dren were sold under the comfort system. He recalled: "In Seoul women were available on almost every block—in a bathhouse, massage room, restaurant, or in the ubiquitous tea houses all over the city. You could get them very young, probably around twelve; kids were shanghaied into a kind of slavery as they got off the train from the countryside, looking for work to support their peasant families. Kidnapped, gang-raped and beat­en by pimps while learning their few necessary words of English, they

were ready for the street in a week."67 His use of the term "slavery,"

undermines the image of a consensual sex trade which is used to par­tially justify its existence and deflect criticism from the United States and the Rhee government.

In the 1950$ the South Korean population was just 19 million. Of these just over half were females (96.1 males to 100 females as of

1956) and around half again were young women. American soldiers de­ployed to the country, technically a battle zone due to the armistice, had

short rotations of around one year, and those with wives were discour­aged from bringing them. The short rotations and significant number of soldiers deployed meant that between 1950 and 1971 around 6 million American soldiers served in Korea. In this time it is estimated that

around 1 million Korean women worked in the comfort women system.69 This was at least five times the number that worked for the Japanese

army, the highest estimate for which was "up to 200,000 women, mostly from Korea, but also from other parts of Asia" (meaning well under 200,000 from Korea itself and even less for Korea below the 38th

parallel).70 The figure of 1 million also excludes the significant number of women who were raped by GIs and other foreign personnel outside the

comfort women system from 1945 onwards, as the number of rapes committed were not recorded by the government or police. There is only evidence from testimonies, as previously mentioned, that they did take place and on a very wide scale but there are no exact figures.

It is notable when observing Korean-American and Korean-Japanese relations in the twenty-first century that Japan's taking of under 200,000 Korean comfort women (the majority of its 200,000 comfort women

from all Asia, as a highest estimate) is frequently made an issue by politi­cians and activists, and is a well-publicized crime. At the same time,

however, the more recent American use of 1,000,000 South Korean comfort women under terrible conditions and with often highly ques‑

tionable consent, as well as the rapes of many more, is not mentioned or addressed. South Korea demands apologies from the Japanese

government, builds statues in the honour of the comfort women, and is paid reparations by Tokyo. On the other hand, Seoul makes almost no mention of similar crimes committed by the United States, which oc­curred both more recently and on a larger scale.

The trafficking of comfort women to serve the U.S. forces in the ROK has meanwhile continued on a considerable scale, although many are now trafficked from abroad particularly from the Philippines and sold at

auction.?± Women from overseas continue to be offered jobs in Korea and subsequently forced to service American personnel, with the number

of women effectively enslaved in this way numbering in the thousandS.72

A U.S. State Department report found that trafficked Filipina women working in the ROK in the 2000$ were so desperate and hungry as to beg

U.S. soldiers to bring them bread.73 A study carried out in 2007 by three

professional researchers similarly concluded that U.S. bases in the ROK were "a hub for the transnational trafficking of women from the Asia-Pacific and Eurasia to South Korea and the United States."Th This raises serious questions regarding the consistency of South Korean condem­nations.

The purpose of comparing the coercion of Korean women into mili­tary sex work by the Japanese Empire with the far larger scale on which this took place under the U.S. military is not to exempt the former or lessen the rapaciousness or degrading nature of its crime against the Ko­rean people, but rather to bring to light the inherent double standards present in South Korean claims against Japan when considering more re­cent American crimes. One explanation for these double standards is that the United States exerts very considerable influence over the ROK and has left Seoul dependent on American good will for military and eco­nomic support. Just as the Japanese collaborators in Korea did not raise

the issue of the Japanese Empire's use of comfort women, publicize their suffering, or demand compensation for their countrywomen, it is simi­larly unlikely for closely U.S.-aligned South Korean governments to make a case against the United States. A second reason is that the comfort women in Korea were in most cases unpaid by the Japanese, and were

essentially slaves.1 The women serving the United States on the other

hand are more often depicted as having chosen sex work consensually for financial benefits. While the first is a plausible explanation, the com­mon notion that Korean women consented to sell themselves to the American soldiers, and that the means the U.S. Military used to obtain comfort women were therefore fundamentally different from those used by the Japanese Empire, proves to be largely untrue.

Methods used to recruit comfort women to serve American soldiers involved rape and violence to disorient and break women in. They would afterwards have little choice but to "consent" to sex work for the U.S. Military. The Japanese in Korea had often employed middlemen using similar methods. Pimps recruiting women for the U.S. forces would often advertise jobs as nurses or factory workers and would then force the respondents into sexual slavery. One major difference was that the Japanese saw comfort women as a temporary wartime measure to satisfy soldiers and began recruiting them in large numbers in wartime when they believed men risking their lives for the empire required special rest and recreation. The recruitment of comfort women was not however ever meant to be a permanent state of affairs which would continue into peacetime. By contrast, although there was no open war in Korea for over two decades after 1953, the U.S. Military recruited hundreds of thousands of comfort women during this period. In fact the prostitution industry in South Korea expanded significantly after the war had ended and after the signing of the Korea-U.S. Mutual Defense Treaty that year. While access to comfort women has been considered by a number of militaries

throughout history as a means to redress men for risking their lives and enduring the stresses and exhaustion of combat, even this somewhat feeble pretext used by Imperial Japan could not be put forward as an ex‑

cuse by the United States Military for their conduct in South Korea.76 In contrast to the Japanese case, the American military's access to comfort

women could not be considered a necessary evil of wartime. It was in fact a permanent and indefinite state of affairs, continuing even in peace­time.

Due to the poor state of the ROK's economy under the Rhee govern­ment, worsened further by the bombings and scorched earth tactics of the U.S. Military, South Korean women had hunger, even in peacetime, as an incentive to sell themselves. The Japanese Empire had not left the Asian peoples they conquered starving in peacetime, and to the contrary

had made efforts to increase agricuItural7 and industriaI78 outputs of their overseas territories which were highly successful. Due to massive

investments in damming and other key infrastructure, Korean agricul‑

tural output increased manifold under Japanese ruIe.Z

Had the Japanese colonial administration instead left Koreans starv‑

ing as the American imposed Rhee government had, and as American wartime policies such as scorched earth had exacerbated, perhaps the

Imperial Army would have not needed to forcibly recruit comfort women. Directly causing the population's destitution and starvation, and impos‑

ing inept administrators—then paying a bare subsistence wage for sexual services was the American way, not that of the Japanese. Did this really

make the American comfort women system more "consensual" and "voluntary?" Had the Japan firebombed Korea and enacted scorched

earth policies to destroy the people's means of providing for themselves, rather than investing in infrastructure and raising living standards as they did, perhaps more Korean women would have been drawn to "consen­sual" sex work out of desperation as they were under the American com­fort women system. How genuine was the "consent" of Korean women servicing American personnel, who outnumbered those serving the Japa­nese many times over, and was America's conduct really more moral than that of the Japanese Empire or could it be considered even more immoral and depraved?

As for the treatment of Korean women when under the power of for­eign soldiers—sources almost unanimously indicate similar if not greater levels of brutalisation by American soldiers as was the case under the Japanese. An independent survey of 243 South Korean comfort women servicing American personnel found well over two thirds experi­enced "beating, sexual violence, theft and robbery, in declining order of frequency" at the hands of American soldiers.80 As one said anony­mously when interviewed, "some GIs are mean and nasty, especially when they are drunk ... at worst a woman encounters a GI who beats her and murders her." American conduct towards Korean women, as in many other Asia-Pacific nations, was strongly influenced by perceptions that they were dealing with an inferior people. A U.S. military chaplain quoted by Time magazine noted that personnel tended to view Korean women as property, much as Westerners serving at imperial postings across the world once "owned" sex slaves of conquered nations in

Africa,81 the AmericaS82 and elsewhere. He stated: "Some of them own their girls... before leaving Korea, they sell the package to a man who is

just coming in."83 Another noted regarding prevailing attitudes among American servicemen to East Asian women: "They were property, things,

slaves... Racism, sexism—it's all there. The men don't see the women as human beings—they're disgusting, things to be thrown away... They

speak of the women in the diminutive."84 Koreans were perceived as a

culture and people with whom Americans were entitled to do as they pleased, including inflicting abuse and demanding sexual favours. Ac­cording to one comfort woman interviewed, GIs would tell Korean women that they would never beat women in America but as they were in Korea they were free to do so to Korean women—supposedly to justify their behaviour. It was common for Korean women to be harshly beaten by drunk soldiers, and other women interviewed consistently painted a

very similar picture.85

South Korea today remains profoundly influenced by the comfort women system put in place under U.S. military rule—arguably far more so than that which took place under the Japanese Empire. As Katherine H. S. Moon noted regarding the social changes which occurred in South Korea as a result: "Increasingly Koreans view the history of prostitution and the contemporary forms of sex tourism in Korea as manifestations of foreign domination over the country."86 She further noted that many in South Korea saw the comfort women system "as representative of U.S. domination over Korean politics and the continued presence of U.S. mili­tary bases as perpetuation of South Korea's neo-colonial status visà-vis the United States."87

The comfort women system began to decline only with South Korea's economic rise, which forced American servicemen in the country to in­creasingly rely on trafficked women from Southeast Asia from the late 1970s. The system would leave behind a considerable cultural legacy—including a normalisation of the sex trade. By 1989 the country's night­clubs, bars and entertainment sector made up 5 percent of the Gross

National Product, with 400,000 establishments offering sexual services and between 1.2 and 1.5 million South Korean women selling sex. This was one fifth of the total number of women aged 15 to 29. A range of ser­vices were offered at a variety of locations, from seedy inns to luxury ho‑

tels, to cater for the very large numbers of clients. In the early 2010S the sex trade in South Korea made up 4 percent of GDP, as much as fish‑

ing and agriculture combined.90 Up to one fifth of South Korean women between 15 and 29 have at some point worked in the sex industry—over 1

million womel.i A report by the U.S. State Department released in 2008 indicated that young girls and women from South Korea are very often

made victims of human trafficking to Western nations in significant numbers. These include Western Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zea‑

land and the United States as well as to Japan.92

The comfort women system which was continued and expanded in

South Korea, and the experiences of those whom through various cir­cumstances were forced into it, provides key context to the ongoing con­flict between the DPRK and the United States. Pyongyang not only abol­ished the comfort women system from 1945, but also strictly enforced the outlawing of prostitution entirely and establishing formal legal equal­ity for women. The country remains highly sexually conservative until today, with adultery remaining a serious crime by law and even divorce being rare and strongly discouraged.

Had Pyongyang yielded to Western pressure, or accepted the Amer­ican Supreme Commander's demand for unconditional surrender during

the war, it is almost certain its women and young girls would have been subjected to very similar if not worse treatment including sexual violence

on a massive scale at the hands of the U.S. Military. While the country would pay a price for its defiance of the Western-led order, from

firebombing and demonization to seven long decades of harsh eco­nomic sanctions, the nation's dignity, pride and right to self-determination were never violated—neither were its women. The fate of South Korea as a U.S. client state, including not only comfort women is­sues and widespread rapes but also factors such as the imposition of in­tense Western cultural influences, the indefinite and costly American military presence, and continued American influence over state policy, arguably vindicate North Korea's choice of resistance to intense external pressure over the harsh alternative. As a statement from the DPRK's For­eign Ministry read, amid talk of American military intervention in 2017: "Three million people have volunteered to join the war if necessary ...in terms of dignity we are the most powerful in the world. We will die in

order to protect that dignity and sovereignty."93

Americanisation in South Korea

In parallel to the comfort women system, another major phenom­enon that emerged during the U.S. military occupation and would come to shape South Korean society and its relationship with the United States was the deep Americanisation and westernisation of South Korean soci­ety. This again led to a sharp contrast between U.S. relations with the two Koreas and provides context key to comprehending the nature of conflict between North Korea and the United States.

American efforts to westernize South Korean society and develop a soft power base were considerable from the beginning of the military occupation period, with the U.S. Information Service reporting it had: "one of the most extensive country programs that we are operating any­where"— very large investment considering the underdeveloped state of the country compared to other American client states. The service had

referring to the extensive growth of plastic surgeries and other emerging methods among East Asian populations of "Europeanising" their appear­ances: "All the above trends seem to illustrate the growing influence of Western cultural domination. From actual imperialism to modern cul‑

tural colonialism via mass media."98

Lisa Takeuchi Cullen's article "Changing Faces" in Time magazine as‑

sessed the growing popularity and rising trend towards altering one's features to appear more Western in Western-aligned East Asian coun­tries. Regarding the influences which caused East Asians to favour West­ern features, she noted:

The culturally loaded issue today is the number of Asians looking to remake themselves to look more Caucasian. It's a charge many deny, although few would argue that under the relentless bombardment of Hollywood, satellite TV, and Madison Avenue, Asia's aesthetic ideal

has changed drastically.99

Harvard psychology Professor Nancy Etcoff, author of Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty, noted to much the same effect: "Beauty,

after all, is evolutionary... Asians are increasingly asking their surgeons for wider eyes, longer noses and fuller breasts, features not typical of the race." Concepts of beauty evolve over time and reflect what is seen as desirable—the traits of the dominant people or caste. Under the Western sphere of influence, "under the relentless bombardment of Hollywood, satellite TV, and Madison Avenue" among other mediums through which an idealisation of the West is promoted, concepts of beauty have shifted

to idealise the aesthetics of the dominating power.19.E

As Time magazine reported, common surgeries to "Europeanise" appearances in South Korea went beyond facial features:

Just as Asian faces require unique procedures, their bodies demand innovative operations to achieve the leggy, skinny, busty Western ideal that has become increasingly universal. Dr. Suh In Seock, a sur­geon in Seoul, has struggled to find the best way to fix an affliction the Koreans call muu-dari and the Japanese call daikon-ashi: radish-shaped calves. Liposuction, so effective on the legs of plump West­erners, doesn't work on Asians since muscle, not fat, accounts for the bulk. Suh says earlier attempts to carve the muscle were painful and made walking difficult. "Finally, I discovered that by severing a nerve behind the knee, the muscle would atrophy," says Suh, "thereby reducing its size up to 40%." Suh has performed over 600 of the operations since 1996. He disappears for a minute and returns with a bottle of fluid containing what looks like chopped up bits of ramen noodles. He has preserved his patients' excised nerves in alcohol. "And that's just since November," he says proudly.i

Professor Pak Seong Won concluded regarding the extent of western­ization, as demonstrated by the aforementioned surgeries and ideal­ization of western aesthetics: "we can see how Koreans internalize U.S. values and how they undervalue Korean uniqueness in terms of beauty

and body."12 The origins of Europeanisation surgeries in Korea no‑

tably has close connections to the early U.S. Military presence in the country—which is indicative of their nature as a manifestation of West­ern dominance over and consequences of westernisation of South Ko­rean modern culture. Prominent American plastic surgeon David Ralph Millard worked with the U.S. Military in post-war South Korea from 1954

nine centers in Korea which offered American cultural items including

films, publications and other such services.94 The early stages of the American appropriation of soft power were described by British Minister Vyvyan Holt in his visit to the ROK in 1950, shortly before the outbreak of the war, when he observed: "Radiating from the huge ten-storied Banto Hotel, 'American influence' penetrates into every branch of adminis­tration and is fortified by an immense outpouring of money." Cultural influence was spread by scholarships to study in the United States, mis­sionary denominations, travelling cinemas and theatres playing American films, the Voice of America and sports such as baseball. This cultural influence was described by the minister as "exceedingly strong" and as a result "American is the dream land" to fast growing numbers of Kore‑

ans—an allusion to the growing idolization of the U.S.25

Korea expert Professor Robert Jervis noted in a paper for the Journal of Amen can-East Asian Relations that an

intangible effect of the war is the penetration of American ideas and values into South Korean society. While the three-year American mili­tary occupation (1945-1948) has already laid the ground-work for the Americanisation of South Korean society, the war, by bringing hun­dreds of thousands of American soldiers to Korea, by inundating South Korea with American goods, books, and films, and by multi­plying South Korea's links with the United States manifold, helped to quicken its pace and broaden its scope. Whether this is good or bad

is open to debate.2

American soft influence in South Korea, as in its other East Asian client states, would only grow as these states further modernised. In his research paper "The Present and Future of Americanization in South Korea," appearing in the Journal of Future Studies, Professor Pak Seong

Won noted: "South Korea has done nothing to curb Americanization since the ios, and in an era of globalization, Korean society is becom­ing more influenced by the United States in terms of economic, political, and psychological realms." Pak indicated that South Korea was influ­enced by the United States through three main means:

i) the number of U.S.-educated Ph.D.s in universities and govern­ment, 2) the propensity to adopt American lifestyles, and 3) the high market shares of American movies and television programming. These categories represent knowledge, life, and playfulness—in short culture. Results of the examination in the three categories are as­tounding, because South Korea is deeply influenced by Americans. Even though Korea was decolonized from Japan in 1945, Korea now seems to be colonized by the U.S. in economic, political, and cultural realms.97

Arguably one of the most conspicuous impacts on South Korean society, and on those of many East Asian nations in the Western Bloc's sphere of influence, has been that on aesthetics—namely towards an ide­alisation of Western physical features. In his paper published by Univer­sity of Hawaii, titled "Dynamic Beauty: Cultural influences and Changing

Perceptions—Becoming Prettier or Erasing One's Own Culture," Amer‑

ican researcher Christopher Frazier observed: "A culture's ideals of phys­ical appearance are dynamic. Change can be induced by external cultural contact and, particularly, domination. Do these affected standards of beauty imply a kind of reversed ethnocentrism?" Frazier went on to write,

and explored the possibility of surgically altering the appearance of the human eye from "Oriental to Occidental." A Korean translator ap­proached him, seeking to be "made into a round-eye," as he felt that his Asian appearance was leading the Americans he worked with to mistrust him. Millard agreed, writing: "As this was partly true, I consented to do

what I could."

The status of westerners as a superior class in Korea, and the ideali‑

sation of the West which followed, led the popularity of

surgeries to surge. Millard sought to devise further procedures not only to alter eyelids, but also to raise nasal bridges and widen eyes. The interpreter was very happy with the results, noting that he was often thought to be an Italian or Mexican as a result—an improvement in his eyes from the status of a Korean. "Asianness" and Korean features were

increasingly associated with inferiority as western influence grew.12

Millard went on to train local doctors to apply his methods and pub­lished two papers on the subject, titled "Oriental Peregrinations" and "The Oriental Eyelid and its Surgical Revision." Both of these works had highly racialist tones. By the 1990$ "Euro.eariisation" surgeries had be­come a widespread and normalized part of modern South Korean cul­ture. This not only revealed but also cemented Koreans' sense of racial inferiority. As Professor Nadia Y. Kim noted: "the U.S. military and [Mil­lard] were crystallizing Koreans' sense of inferiority to their White racial

bodies."105 The most popular plastic surgeries to date, with the exception

of hair transplants, are all " uropeanisation" surgeries, including double eyelid and eye widening surgeries, rhino-plasticity used to give the nose a high bridge andso make them protrude further from the face as Euro­pean noses do, and forehead augmentation—which makes the forehead protrude from the face as European foreheads do. Others include chin

augmentations—using implants or fillers do make the face look more angular in the western style, and V-line jaw reduction surgeries which have much the same effect. The popularity of these surgeries in South

Korea remains very high.12

While the Korean translator who approached Dr. Millard had wanted to Europeanise his features to prevent discrimination from his American bosses, South Korean society appears to have internalised these Western values and paradigms to the extent that Korean features are widely looked down on by Koreans themselves. As South Korean writer Carol

Eugene Pak noted in the Canadian magazine The Varsity: "Many South

Koreans envy and idolize 'Western' facial features, whether they are con­scious of it or not. Perhaps it is because of a Western-dominated media or the pedestal South Korean society places the United States upon. Whatever the reason, contemporary South Korean society has deeply internalized its bias towards Western beauty, so that Koreans who do not possess 'Western' features often face prejudice in the work-place and in daily life." She was one of many to attribute the prominence of plastic surgery in the country, with the world's highest rates of plastic surgery

per capita,i7 not to a high beauty standard, but to a deep idolisation of the West—one which dates back to the time of American military rule.9.

The importance of inferiority complexes among a target population and pressing the idea of Western racial prestige was frequently alluded to by European leaders during the colonial era as key to sustaining Western leadership.199 Such trends could be observed in the post-colonial era be­yond South Korea. In her paper titled "Retto-kan: Japan's Inferiority Com­plex with the West in Contemporary Media and Culture," Dr. Erika En­gstrom noted that under U.S. occupation, much of the Japanese popu­lation had started to believe "that Japan was inferior, not only as an

Euro seani

sation

economic power, but also as a race." This developed into "retto-kan," which could be translated as "inferior class feeling." According to En-gstrom's study it would prevail even after Japanese living standards and

its economy had left most of the Western world behind.11

While aesthetics provides a more conspicuous example of the effects

of American and Western influence on South Korea, it is an indicator of a much wider phenomenon of idealisation and adulation of the West and one of many examples. South Korean Congressman Choi Soon Young, for one, presented data in 2007 indicating United States' considerable influence on the country through education. He pointed out that Korean society valued U.S. educational ties more than any others—with the majority of professors at leading universities holding degrees from the

U.S., which accounted for over 8o% of foreign doctoral degrees.ii! Sim­ilar trends can be observed among the country's political elite. From

1948-1968 much of the Korean leadership boasted higher education in Japan which, as the previous imperial power occupying Korea, had heav­ily influenced the Korean elite through education. This Japanese influ­ence would gradually recede to be replaced by an American one, and from 1968 to 2001 71% of ministers in the ROK held degrees from the

United States.112 This fosters not only positive views towards and close ties with the new hegemon, as it was intended to do towards Japan be‑

forehand, but also ensures that American thought will continue to have a

major influence over scholarship and political discourse in the country. This influence has, according to the aforementioned study conducted by

Pak Seong Won, been very profound, and placed U.S. educated profes­sionals in a superior class leading to discrimination against those lack‑

ing an American education.113

An understanding of these trends is critical to comprehending not only the nature of the American relationship with South Korea and its other East Asian client states, but also of its conflict with North Korea to which these relationships provide a stark contrast. As one of very few states to have never been subjugated and occupied by a Western power, North Korea lacks the colonial-era foundations for Western soft influ­ence and an idealisation of the West common to many countries for­merly under American or European rule. North Koreans were never sec­ond class citizens in their own country, which combined with a lack of

Western soft influence and a strongly nationalist "Korea-first" identityii

perpetuated through media and education, means its population are not moved to remake themselves in the image of or to idolise the West—aesthetically or otherwise. The extent of Western influence in South Korea and other Asian client states, and the depths to which it has permeated, shows the alternative fate for the Korean population to that of resistance under the DPRK—namely life under a system which attributes the greatest value not to one's own nation, culture and thought, but in­stead under one which is heavily influenced by and idolises the Western hegemon. The implications of this have played a central role in the con­flict between North Korea and the Western Bloc—led by the United States—throughout its seventy-year duration.

====

NOTES

Mi Kunjongch'ong kwanbo: Official Gazette, United States Army Mili­tary Government in Korea, Seoul, Wonju Munhwasa, Proclamation No.

1.

Mi Kunjongch'ong kwanbo: Official Gazette, United States Army Mili­tary Government in Korea, Seoul, Wonju Munhwasa, Proclamation No.

1.

3Fraenkel, Ernst, ' Entry 24 January 1946: Augzeichungen vsm 15. Vis 30. Januar 1946 uber Fraenkels Ankunftzeit in Korea,' in: Franker, Ernst,

Gesarnmelte Schrften , Baden Baden, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 1999.

40ne prominent example in East Asia is Singapore's National Mu-seum—which similarly and somewhat ironically refers to the restora‑

tion of British colonial rule in 1945 as 'liberation' (National Museum of Singapore, Surviving Syonan Gallery, Level 2, accessed March 8, 2018). .5'Message to U.S.A. Citizens,' G-2 Weekly, October 30, 1945.

Letter from Commander in Chief, U.S. Army Forces, Pacific to Joint Chiefs of Staff, December 16, 1945. Folder: Papers of Harry S. Truman,

SMOF: Selected Records on Korean War, Pertinent Papers on Korea Situation; Box 11, SMOF, National Security Files, Papers of Harry S. Truman, Harry S. Truman Library.

7Fraenkel, Ernst, ' Entry 24Janua!y 1946: Augzeichungen vsm 15. Vis 30. Januar 1946 uber Fraenkels Ankunftzeit in Korea,' in: Franker, Ernst,

Gesarnmelte Schrften , Baden Baden, Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 1999.

SKim, Monica, The Interrogation Rooms of the Korean War; The Untold

History , Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 2019 (pp. 47, 49-51).

9'Report on Standards of Living Conditions, Military Courtesy Disci­pline, and Training,' April 29, 1946; 'Deterioration of Standards,' May 3, 1946; 'Courtesy Drive,' November 6, 1946; 'Message from the Com‑

manding General, USAFIK,' January 17, 1947; 'Instructions to Courtesy Patrol Officers,' July 21, 1948; 'Personal Conduct,' August 27, 1948, all

in NARA, RG 554, box 50.

Hohn, Maria, and Moon, Seungsook, eds., Over There: Living with

the U.S. Military Empire from World War Two to the Present, Chapel Hill, NC, Duke University Press, 2010 (p. 43).

10 Dower, John, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War, New York, Pantheon, 1986 (p. 7).

jj. Schrijvers, Peter, The GI War Against Japan: American Soldiers in Asia

and the Pacific During World War II, New York, New York University Press, 2005 (P. 212),

iz Diary of Admiral William Leahy, October 20, 1942 (quoted in Thorne, Christopher, Allies of a Kind: The United States, Britain and the War

Against Japan, 1941-1945 , Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1978 (p. 157)).

13 Stueck, William and Yi, Boram, "' An Alliance Forged in Blood": The American Occupation of Korea, the Korean War, and the US—South Ko‑

rean Alliance,' The Journal of Strategic Studies , vol. 33, no. 2, April 2010 (pp. 177-209).

Defty, Andew, Britain, America and Anti-Communism: The Information

Research Department, Abingdon, Routledge, 2007.

15 Schrijvers, Peter, Bloody Pacific: American Soldiers at War with Japan London, Palgrave Macmillan, 2010 (p. 211).

16 Moyer, Robert H., enlisted on August 13, 1947, Korean War Veterans' Survey Questionnaire, Military History Institute Archives, Carlisle, Penn‑

sylvania.

1-7 Lisiewski, Joseph Vincent, [Sgt, 7th Div. 32nd lnfRgt.], enlisted in an­ticipation of the draft on 3-4-51: Korean War Veterans' Survey Question‑

naire, Military History Institute Archives, Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

18 Voorhees, Melvin B., Korean Tales, Franklin Classics, 2011 (p. iso).

19 Steinberg, David I., Korean Attitudes Toward the United States: Chang­ing Dynamics, Abingdon, Routledge, 2015 (P. 234).

Hastings, Max, Korean War, London, Pan Books, 2012 (Chapter i: The Stony Road, Part : The Cause).

21 Lewis, Lloyd B., The Tainted War: Culture and Identity in Vietnam

Narratives, Santa Barbara, CA, Praeger, 1985 (p. 55).

22 Moon, Katherine H. S., SexAmongAllies , New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997 (p. 119).

3 Ibid. (PP. 33, 36).

24 Portway, Donald, Korea: Land of the Morning Calm , London, George G. Harrap, 1953 (P. 291).

25 Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies , New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997 (p. 33).

26 Ibid. (P. 37).

27 Nyen Chan, Emily, 'Engagement Abroad: Enlisted Man, U.S. Military Policy and the Sex Industry,' Notre Darrie Journal of Law, Ethics and Pub‑

lic Policy, vol. 15, issue 2 'Symposium on International Security ,' Article 7, 2012 (pp. 631-632).

Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex ArnongAllies, New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997 (PP. 33' 37).

28 Maynes, Katrin, 'Korean Perceptions of Chastity, Gender Roles, and Libido; From Kisaengs to the Twenty First Century,' Grand Valley Journal

of History, vol. 1, issue 1, article 2, February 2012.

9 Schrijvers, Peter, The Cl War Against Japan: American Soldiers in Asia

and the Pacific During World War II, New York, New York University Press, 2005 (p. 212).

30 Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies, New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997 (p. 46).

31 Oh, Arissa, To Save the Children of Korea: The Cold War Origins of In­ternational Adoption, Stanford, CA, Stanford University Press, 2015.

3Z Hohn, Maria, and Moon, Seungsook, eds., Over There: Living with the U.S. Military Empire from World War Two to the Present , Chapel Hill, NC, Duke University Press, 2010 (p. 43).

33 Dower, John, Embracing Defeat, Japan in the Wake of World War II, New York, W. W. Norton & Company, 2000 (P. 579).

Sims, Calvin, '3 Dead Marines and a Secret of Wartime Okinawa,'

New York Times, June 1, 2000,

Takemae, Eiji, Allied Occupation ofJapan, New York, Continuum In­ternational Publishing Group, 2002 (p. 67).

Tanaka, Yuki and Tanaka, Toshiyuki,Japan's Comfort Women: Sexual

Slavery and Prostitution During World War II, Abingdon, Routledge, 2003 (P. 163).

34 Association with Korean Women, January 25, 1947, National Archives and Records Administration, RG 554, box 50.

35 Winnington, Alan, and Burchett, Wilfred, Plain Perfidy, The Plot to Wreck the Korea Peace , Britain-China Friendship Association, 1954 (p. 129)

36 Abrams, A. B., Power and Primacy: The History of Western Intervention

in the Asia-Pacific , Oxford, Peter Lang, 2019 (Chapter 6: Vietnam's Thir­ty Years of War).

37. Ibid. (Chapter : The War Against a Defeated Japan: Elimination of a Threat to Western Hegemony in Asia).

3a Moon, Katherine H. S., SexAmongAllies , New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997.

39 Hanley, Charles J. and Choe, Sang Hun and Mendoza, Martha, The Bridge at No Gun Ri: A Hidden Nightmare from the Korean War, New York, Henry Holt and Company, 2001 (P. 189).

4Q Lee, Na Young, 'The Construction of U.S. Camptown Prostitution in

South Korea: Trans/Formation and Resistance,' (Thesis, Ph.D.), Univer­sity of Maryland, Department of Women's Studies, 2006.

41 Choe, Sang-Hun, 'After Korean War, brothels and an alliance,' New York Times, January 8, 2009.

_4.Z Moon, Katherine H. S., SexAmor?g Allies, New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997 (p. 44),

43 Choe, Sang-Hun, 'After Korean War, brothels and an alliance,' New York Times, January 8, 2009.

44 Heo, Uk, and Roehrig, Terence, South Korea Since 1980, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2010 (p. 18).

Henderson, Gregory, Korea: The Politics of Vortex, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1968 (pp. 348-349).

.5 Choe, Sang-Hun, 'After Korean War, brothels and an alliance,' New York Times, January 8, 2009.

_4.E Kim, Min-Kyung, 'Court Finds that South Korean Government En­couraged Prostitution Near U.S. Military Bases ,' I-Iankyoreh , February 9, 2018.

47 Koh, B. C., 'The War's Impact on the Korean Peninsula,' The Journal

of American-East Asian Relations, Vol. 2, no. 1, Spring 1993 (p. 58). Nathan, Robert R., An Economic Programme for Korean Construction, Washington D.C., United Nations Korean Reconstruction Agency, 1954 (P. 22).

4. Oh, Arissa, To Save the Children of Korea: The Cold War Origins of In­ternational Adoption , Stanford, CA, Stanford University Press, 2015 (p. 49).

49 Ibid. (p. 49).

SQ Hohn, Maria, and Moon, Seungsook, eds., Over There: Living with the U.S. Military Empire from World War Two to the Present , Chapel Hill,

NC, Duke University Press, 2010 (p. 52).

.51 Vine, David, Base Nation, How U.S. Military Bases Abroad Harm

America and the World, New York, Henry Holt and Company, 2015 (p. 164).

.52 Lee, Jin-Kyung, Service Economies: Militarism, Sex Work, and Migrant

Labor in South Korea, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2010 (p. 82).

.53 Kim, Elaine, 'Research for the Reform of Law and the Prevention of

Prostitution,' The Women's Studies Quarterly , vol. 8, issue 1, Spring 1990 (p. 89).

.54 Barry, Kathleen, The Prostitution of Sexuality , New York, New York University Press, 1996.

.ss Lee, Jin-Kyung, Service Economies: Militarism, Sex Work, and Migrant

Labor in South Korea, Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 2010 (p. 79).

.5E Moon, Katherine H. S., 'South Korean Movements against Milita‑

rized Sexual Labor,' Asian Survey , vol. 39, no. 2, March—April 1999 (pp. 310-327).

.57 Hye Seung Chung, Kim Ki-duk , Champaign, University of Illinois Press, 2012 (p. 34).

Moon, Katherine H. S., 'South Korean Movements against Milita‑

rized Sexual Labor,' Asian Survey, vol. 39, no. 2, March—April 1999 (pp. 310-327).

Mal Magazine, vol. 26, August 1988 (p. loS).

Lee, Diana S. and Lee, Grace Yoonkyung, 'Camp Arirang,' Third World Newsreel, (Documentary), 1995.

Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies, New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997 (pp. 19-20, 23, 24, 132).

Economy During the Japanese Period').

78 0I1 17 [Governor-General of Korea Statis‑

tical Yearbook 1942],' Governor-General of Korea, March 1944.

79. Williams, Christopher, Leadership Accountability in a Globalizing

World, London, Palgrave Macmillan, 2006 (p. 185).

Hohn, Maria, and Moon, Seungsook, eds., Over There: Living with the U.S. Military Ernpirefrorn World War Two to the Present, Chapel Hill, NC, Duke University Press, 2010 (p. 351).

i Klotz, Marcia, White women and the dark continent: gender and sexu­ality in German colonial discourse from the sentimental novel to the fascist

film , Thesis (Ph.D.), Stanford University, 2010 (p. 72).

Grobler, John, 'The tribe Germany wants to forget,' Mail &

Guardian, March 13, 1998.

82 Rankin, John, Letters on American slavery, addressed to Mr. Thomas

Rankin, merchant at Middlebrook, Augusta County, Va, Boston, Garrison and Knapp, 1833 (pp. 38-39).

3 'South Korea: A Hooch is Not a Home,' Time , October 9, 1964 (p. 48).

. D'Amico, Francine J. and Weinstein, Laurie L., Gender Camouflage: Women and the U.S. Military , New York, New York University Press, 1999 (p. 212).

85 Hanley, Charles J. and Choe, Sang Hun and Mendoza, Martha, The

Bridge at No Gun Ri: A Hidden Nightmare from the Korean War , New York, Henry Holt and Company, 2001 (p. 214).

86 Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies , New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997 (pp. 46-47).

7 Ibid. (p. 9).

88 Hughes, Donna M. and Chon, Katherine Y. and Ellerman, Derek P., 'Modern-Day Comfort Women: The U.S. Military, Transnational Crime,

and the Trafficking of Women,' Violence Against Women vol. 13, no. 9, 2007 (p. 918).

9. Shin, Hei Soo, 'Women's Sexual Services and Economic Devel­opment: The Political Economy of the Entertainment Industry and South

Korean Dependent Development,' Thesis (Ph.D.), Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, 1991 (p. 8).

Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies, New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997.

9Q Ghosh, Palash, 'South Korea: A Thriving Sex Industry In A Powerful, Wealthy Super-State,' International Business Times, April 29, 2013.

91 Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies , New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997.

Ghosh, Palash, 'South Korea: A Thriving Sex Industry In A Powerful,

Wealthy Super-State,' International Business Times, April 29, 2013.

92 U.S. Department of State, Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy and Human Rights, Trafficking Persons Report 2008.

93 Osnos, Evan, 'The Risk of Nuclear War with North Korea,' The New Yorker, September 18, 2017.

94, Cumings, Bruce, Korea's Place in the Sun , New York, W. W. Norton and Company, 1997 (p.255).

9.5 British Foreign Office, F0317, piece no. 84053, Holt to FO, May 1, 1950.

96 Jervis, Robert, 'The Impact of the Korean War,' The Journal of Amer­ican-East Asian Relations , Vol. 2, no. 1, Spring 1993 (pp. 57-76).

97 Park, Seong Won, 'The Present and Future of Americanisation in

South Korea,' Journal of Future Studies , vol. 14, no. 1, August 2009 (pp. 51-66).

Ibid. (p. 131).

Moon, Katherine H. S., 'South Korean Movements against Milita‑

rized Sexual Labor,' Asian Survey, vol. 39, no. 2, March—April 1999 (pp. 310-327).

59 Kamienski, Lukasz, Shooting Up; A History of Drugs in Warfare , Lon­don, C. Hurst &Co. Publishers, 2016 (p.148).

Moon, Katherine H. S., SexAmongAllies, New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997.

j. Choe Sang Hun, 'After Korean War, brothels and an alliance ,' New

York Times, January 8, 2009.

62 Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies , New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997.

Hye Seung Chung, Kim Ki-duk, Champaign, University of Illinois Press, 2012 (p. 34).

3 Moon, Katherine H. S., SexAmongAllies , New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997.

4 Pollock, Sandra, Let the Good Times Roll: Prostitution and the U.S. Military in Asia, New York, New Press, 1992.

65 Ibid. (p. 170).

66 Ibid. (p. 171).

.z Ibid. (p. 173).

68 Hohn, Maria, and Moon, Seungsook, eds. Over There: Living with the

U.S. Military Empire from World War Two to the Present , Chapel Hill, NC, Duke University Press 2010 (P. 351).

9. Moon, Katherine H. S., Sex Among Allies, New York, Colombia Univ­ersity Press, 1997.

7Q 'Japan PM urges S. Korea to remove "comfort woman" statue,' The Korea Herald, January 8, 2017.

7i, Enriquez, J., 'Filipinas in prostitution around U.S. Military Bases in

Korea: A recurring nightmare,' Coalition Against Trafficking in Women 1996.

Vine, David, Base Nation, How U.S. Military Bases Abroad Harm

America and the World, New York, Henry Holt and Company, 2015 (pp. 167-169).

Irvine, Reed, and Kincaid, Cliff, 'The Pentagon's Dirty Secret,' Media Monitor, August 7, 2002.

72 Lee, June, A Review of Data on Trafficking in the Republic of Korea , In­ternational Organisation for Migration, 2002.

Mary Jacoby, 'Does U.S. Abet Korean Sex Trade?,' St Petersburg Times, December 9, 2002.

'Human trafficking severe in Korea :US,' Korea Times, June 17, 2010

73 Demick, Barbara, 'Off-Base Behavior in Korea,' Los Angeles Times September 26, 2002.

74 Hughes, Donna M. and Chon, Katherine Y. and Ellerman, Derek P., 'Modern-Day Comfort Women: The U.S. Military, Transnational Crime,

and the Trafficking of Women,' Violence Against Women , vol. 13, no. 9, 2007 (p. 918).

75 Seungsook Moon, Regulating Desire, Managing the Empire: U.S. Mili‑

tary Prostitution in South Korea, 1945-1970 , Durham, Duke University Press, 2010.

7Mikaberidze, Alexander, Atrocities, Massacres, and War Crimes: An Encyclopedia , Santa Barbara, CA, ABC-CLIO, 2013 (p. 7).

77. Hsiao, Mel-Chu W. and Hsiao, Frank S. T., Taiwan in the Global Economy—Past , Present and Future in: Chow, Peter C., Taiwan in the Global Economy: From an Agrarian Economy to an Exporter of High-Tech

Products , Westport, Praeger, 2002 (Section V: 'Taiwan in the Global

98 Fraizer, Christopher, 'Dynamic Beauty: Cultural influences and Changing Perceptions—Becoming Prettier or Erasing One's Own Cul‑

ture,' Hohonu Journal of Academic Writing, vol. 4, 2006 (Pp. 5-7).

9.9. Cullen, Lise Takeuchi, 'Changing Faces,' Time, August 5, 2002.

loo Time, July 29, 2002.

101 Cullen, Use Takeuchi, 'Changing Faces,' Time , August 5, 2002.

1Q.2 Park, Seong Won, 'The Present and Future of Americanisation in

South Korea,' Journal of Future Studies , vol. 14, no. 1, August 2009 (pp. 51-66).

.103 'Eyes Wide Cut: The American Origins of Korea's Plastic Surgery Craze,' The Wilson Quarterly, September 2015.

Q4 Ibid. j.Q5 Ibid.

1o6 Park, Kyungmee, 'Addiction to Cosmetic Surgery,' Bokjinews , March 2007.

Scanion, Charles, 'The price of beauty in South Korea,' BBC News, February 3, 2005.

107 Hu, Elise, 'In Seoul, A Plastic Surgery Capital, Residents Frown On Ads For Cosmetic Procedure,' NPR, February 5, 2018.

Marx, Patricia, 'About Face,' The New Yorker, March 16, 2015.

io8 Park, Carol Eugene, 'For many South Koreans, beauty standards represent a cultural struggle,' The Varsity, March 5, 2017.

1Q9 Hotta, En., Pan Asianism and Japan's War 1931-1945, New York, Pal-grave Macmillan, 2007 (pp. 217-218),

.i10 Engstrom, Erika, 'Retto-kan: Japan's Inferiority Complex with the West in Contemporary Media and Culture,' Human Communication: a

Journal of the Pacific and Asian Communication Association , vol. 1, no. 1, 1997 (pp. 17-23)‑

111 ..iI!.# 0.%7F "DI Ab ," (50.5% of Seoul National Univ‑

ersity Professors Have American Doctorates), DIE.O1 2. ( Media

Today), January 17, 2005.

112 Park, Seong Won, 'The Present and Future of Americanisation in

South Korea,' Journal of Future Studies , vol. 14, no. 1, August 2009 (pp. 51-66).

3 Ibid. (Pp. 51-66).

jj. 'Interview: Ashton Carter,' Frontline , March 3, 2003.

jThe United States Office of War Information reported based on inter‑

views with 20 Korean comfort women servicing Japanese forces in Myanmar that they were induced by the offer of plenty of money, an opportunity to help provide their families and pay off family debts, easy work, and for some a new life in Singapore. Many Korean women en­listed for overseas duty based on these promises and were even re­warded with an advance payment of a few hundred yen. The women were forced to remain abroad until they paid their debts, after which many returned to Korea. While this was not how all Korean women who served the Japanese forces were recruited, it draws a revealing compar­ison with how women were similarly recruited women to serve U.S.

forces (< http://www.exordio.com/1939-19-4.5/codex/ 

Docu-men-report-49-USA-orig. htm lo rig. html >).