A BuzzFlash Reader Contribution

GET BUZZFLASH ALERTS

CONTRIBUTOR ARCHIVES  

Korean War's Lessons

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION
by Ronald Martin

I read with great interest the editorial entitled Letting our Soldiers Die (5/28/06) and the corollaries drawn between Vietnam and Iraq. Similar condemnatory analysis befits the Korean conflict.

As history unwound, South Korea existed for forty years under the thumb of various repressive, US-sponsored dictators, gaining civilian democratic control of its government only in the late 80's. North Korea, in constant fear for its very existence, has squandered badly needed resources on a military sufficiently strong to deter the combined US and South Korean forces.

Had the entire Korean peninsula gone under the thumb of the iron curtain, in all likelihood during the dissolution of the former USSR, Korea, like the eastern European nations that bordered Russia's western flank, would have gained its independence in the early 90's.

Considering the examples of China and Vietnam and the nations of eastern Europe, they would likely have embraced market reforms that would have improved the livelihoods of the citizens of the entire Korean peninsula over the past decade and a half, not just the 'lucky' inhabitants south of the demilitarized zone. The land and its people would also have been the richer for having been able to reduce its military expenditures for the last 50 years in half, and the populations of both Korea and the US would not have endured the loss of tens of thousands of their young men to war.

The world has paid a terrible, terrible price for the refusal of the US to accept that "democracy" can mean a majority of a nation chooses leaders or a form of government whose priorities and agendas may be vastly different from ours, or may even oppose the imposition of economic dominion by the US.

The conflicts and loss of life and resources will continue until the citizens of the US take responsibility for the actions of their elected representatives.

Ronald Martin

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION