Posted on : Sep.26,2006 14:03 KST
Jeong Hee Jin, Lecturer at Yonsei University
Power relations, whether by gender, class or region, are reflected when foreign words are translated into Korean. The English word sexual harassment, for example, has been mistranslated into Korean (when interpreted by the Chinese characters used) as "sexual teasing." While the English word to "harass" implies an intentional and repeated attempt to attack someone, the Korean word of teasing, implying mere mischief, results in a trivialization of the matter at hand.
The phrase "flexibility in the labor market" is the same. Unlike developed nations, South Korea, with its near nonexistent social safety net, has adopted this phrase to euphemize the process whereby employers lay workers off on a whim. From the perspective of the workers, a "rigid" labor market is preferable, but this word gives off a negative nuance.
After his election in 2000, President Bush forwarded a plan for the reshuffling of U.S. troops stationed abroad - the Global Posture Review - as part of developing what was termed "strategic flexibility." The focus of the plan is in allowing for the free and rapid redeployment of U.S. troops stationed worldwide. Rather than stationing U.S. soldiers as fixtures in a given country, the goal is to put them in position to be mobilized and transferred quickly to any spot in the world. The zone of operations for U.S. Forces Japan has been expanded from the Far East to include the Middle East, and U.S. Forces Korea, rather than being used to counter only North Korea, is also available for use in interventions in China and Taiwan and any other areas of conflict in Northeast Asia. While this may be "flexibility" from President Bush’s perspective, it alternatively means the flexibility of the U.S.’s destructive power to those nations that are to be attacked. If a military is tasked with murder and violence, then is it not desirable that they not be deployed in the first place?
Defining the South Korean wartime command transfer issue as a conflict between the desire for self-reliance and the necessity of the South Korea-U.S. alliance is a distorted dichotomy. The true nature of the issue is neither one of self-reliance nor alliance. I have grown weary having to continuously criticize the ignorance of those conservatives clamoring that the "transfer of wartime control = weakening of the alliance = South Korea’s insecurity." These people remind me of the fact that the initial stationing of U.S. troops in South Korea was not merely to prevent a southern advance of the North Korean Army, but also to deter the Syngman Rhee administration’s plans for an invasion of the North. Currently, South Korean military expenditures outnumber those of the North by a factor of 9, a figure that nearly approaches the North Korean GNP itself. The South Korean national income and scale of trade are, respectively, 33 and 155 times as large as that of the North. From 1994 to 1998, South Korea was the world’s fourth largest importer of weapons, while North Korea fell in at about the 70th slot. Over the last 10 years, South Korean weaponry expenditures have outpaced those of the North by a factor of 37.
Just as the Peace Network, the People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy, the Peace Building Center and other specialist groups have pointed out, the transfer of wartime military command is more a matter of the U.S.’s need for strategic flexibility than that of military sovereignty. In some respects, the collapse of the socialist sphere and resultant rise of the post-Cold War era is not a victory for capitalism. To the military-industrial complex, the ultimate goal of the Soviet-U.S. conflict was neither victory nor defeat. The fundamental objective was in emphasizing the semblance of a threat, thus throwing the world into a state of military tension and constructing an oppressive security order. Indeed, the motive of warring nations is not to achieve victory or the end of war, but rather to prolong the fear brought on through war. After the formal "enemy" that was the Soviet Union disappeared, the U.S. fastened its eyes on Iraq and North Korea as the new enemies. After all, if the U.S. lacked an adversary, then "Pax Americana" would be impossible. The "War on Terror" is unrelated to whether or not a foe actually exists, but rather is merely a product of the U.S.’s wish to wage war in and of itself.
Therefore, as long as the will of the U.S. does not change, a permanent war will persist. In order to execute such an offensive, the cooperation of (and, in particular, the bearing of economic burden by) such "allied nations" as Japan and South Korea is essential. The problem is that this money is not being devoted to peace in Northeast Asia, but rather to the securing of U.S. hegemony. That is the reason that the U.S. has taken such proactive steps as suggesting that the transferal of wartime military command take place in 2009, a full three years earlier than the date first proposed by the Roh administration. In a situation where the U.S. is telling us to take this command authority off of their hands, does it make sense to refer to this as ’the restoration of self-reliance’?
If the transfer of wartime military command leads to the increase of South Korean outlays to the armed forces, this will mean not that South Korea is "reacting to the potential threat presented by neighboring countries" but rather that, just as the U.S. has planned, Korea will become a full-fledged member of the regional alliance to "threaten regional countries" (read: North Korea). I hope that President Roh’s statement that "self-reliance is the symbol of a sovereign nation" does not mean that national unification will be carried out through reliance on military means. The desire for a wealthy and militarily strong nation for the goal of "independence" is merely a move in imitation of the U.S. Currently, the country on our peninsula that suffers the threat of war is not South Korea but North Korea, under the shadow of a U.S. preemptive strike. To strengthen our military any further is tantamount to carrying out an invasion.
