The South Koreans most definitely did not want to be unified under communism, and preferred the division to living under the communists with Kim. They actually had underground meetings and discussed this possibility early on. The Rhee govt. was definitely corrupt, and oppressive. To say they were more so than the N. Koreans is certainly arguable.
...not to mention that the Soviets invaded Korea in 1945. So yes, a unified Korea under Soviet domination was definitely possible (history tells us how well that worked out), unfortunately the US divided Korea up and made it possible for half of Korea's citizens to live in a pluralist democracy with a flourshing market economy rather than a totalitarian medieval cultish dictatorship racked by famine and death. Facts are so imperialistic.
Don't be obtuse, Sam. Soviets entered Korea not to fight the Koreans but the Japanese Imperial Army (your sentimental favorite) in 1945. It wasn't an invasion in any traditional sense. They didn't have their own government, let alone own military, under the Japanese occupation, for crying out loud. There has not been a unified Korea since the U.S. divided it more than 60 years ago. So at best you are talking about a hypothetical situation. Nobody can say for sure what a intact Korea would turn out, ruled by either party. It's not a good practice to confuse imagination with facts.
Bwahahahaha. Yes the Soviets were benign WWII saviors of the Korean people who were just doing their part in fighting the Japanese, the US is lucky the Soviets were around to help them fight the war in the Pacific, they really helped throughout the campaign. I'm sure they would have just kicked out the Japanese and then left them to their own devices - I mean really, that's what they did in East Germany, Poland, Czechslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, etc etc--- right? Combine the benign Soviet expansionism of Josef Stalin with the pluralistic approach of Kim IL Sung and there's no telling how much better off Seoul would be right now! Why I bet they wouldn't have to worry about cloning scandals, right? Yes, a Korea unified in famine, repression, and poverty is worth it to remain IDEOLOGICALLY PURE!
So, when the North had largely been "liberated" by the United Nations, China intervenes, the war goes on for years longer, with huge casualties on both sides, and the two countries remain divided. Oh, that makes perfect sense. Keep D&D Civil.
The North certainly committed its share of war crimes but that doesn't absolve the U.S. from its own despicable acts during the Korean War. To be fair, with all the ravings going on against the current War, it is much "cleaner" and more "humane" than the one in Korea, thanks to 24x7 live cable news and the Internet age.
Deckard, the Chinese intervention was necessitated by the US intervention, it was purely reactive and necessary to preserve the rights of North Koreans and for their benefit, as the results today have shown (no problems with childhood obesity, e.g.). The US intervention, meanwhile, was not necessitated by the Soviet or North Korean invasions, but an unprompted preventive war of imperialistic aggression. I know this is true because wnes said it.
you need to stop the brainwashing process thats happening to you via the media....no wonder nobody has replied to your ridiculous post...i'm sure they dont take you seriously
Since this thread was about Iraq, this article in the Jordan Times says that 30,000 more Iraqis flee as violence continues in the "new and democractic" Iraq: http://jordantimes.com/fri/news/news5.htm
What happened in East Europe may not necessarily occur in Northeast Asia. Consider 1) the extent of the area the Soviets had to "cover," 2) their Euro-centric strategy, and 3) the difficulties in logistics and the broken Soviet economy after WWII, it is reasonable to think they would leave the Korea alone. Indeed, the proposal by Truman to split Korea was surprisingly quick to be accepted by Stalin who was just happy to take it as a freebie. Again, the Koreans were deprived an opportunity to decide their own fate on their own term because of U.S.' criminally self-serving intervention. There should be no spin on this fact.
The....uh.....broken Soviet economy? Wnes, you are just getting creamed on this one. Really. Take a deep breath and move back over to Taiwan.
Yes they did. And the south koreans are much better off for it. Take comfort in the fact that neither you nor I are as wrong as wnes on this subject, who really should fall back across the Yalu river if he knew what was good for him.
A "freebie?" The Soviets rushed to take what they could of the former Japanese Empire, once their defeat was clear. They wanted no part of a war with Japan, unless it was easy pickings. The opportunity presented itself, and the Soviets made their moves. Keep D&D Civil.
While the world's attention is on Lebanon, Iraq is coming apart at the seams. Iraq's police overwhelmed by violence More than 3,000 Iraqis were killed in June, an escalation of the country's death toll. By Dan Murphy | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor BAGHDAD At her home in central Baghdad, Niran al-Sammarai frets over the fate of her husband, kidnapped Saturday with 30 of his colleagues from a conference hall in one of the most heavily patrolled parts of Baghdad. In Rasafah district, a police captain says he and colleagues are contemplating mass resignations in frustration over mistrust from US forces and orders from Iraqi politicians to release known criminals. In the once fashionable Mansoor shopping district, metal grates are drawn over half of the businesses. And in Karada, one of Baghdad's safest neighborhoods, many of the businesses are shuttered too. The remaining shopkeepers complain that poor security is driving customers away. In Baghdad and across much of the center and south of the country, the rhythms of normal life and commerce are rapidly breaking down in a sign that US and Iraqi government plans to build an effective security force are faltering. Reports of police standing aside as civilians get attacked are common, as are claims by survivors that government security forces, infiltrated by sectarian militias, took part in the killings. The United Nations estimates 14,338 Iraqis were killed in the first six months of the year, and there are indications the rate of bloodshed is rising; more than 3,000 Iraqis were killed in June, most after the June 7 killing of Al Qaeda leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose death US officials had hoped would diminsh violence. "The government promised security, but the increasing number of bombs in our neighborhood proves that they're failing,'' says Ibrahim Mohammed, who runs a leather-jacket store in Karada where sales have collapsed "to almost nothing" in the past few months. The escalating violence induced the reclusive top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani to call Thursday "on those who are keen for the unity and future of this country ... to exert maximum efforts to stop the bloodletting." Members of the Shiite endowment board, which oversees Shiite mosques, suspended their work for five days in a sign of solidarity with their Sunni counterparts after 20 members of the Sunni endowment board were kidnapped. But despite such moves to bring unity, violence has continued largely unabated. US military officials said Thursday that violence jumped in the capital over the past five days from an average of 24 attacks a day to 34 despite a security plan unveiled last month with much fanfare. "We have not witnessed the reduction in violence one would have hoped for in a perfect world," said US spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell at a press conference. But he said the plan is "a start." Policemen interviewed across the capital say it's too dangerous to confront insurgents and militia groups. Recently in Mahmoudiya, south of Baghdad, men, women, and children were killed in an insurgent assault that witnesses interviewed by Iraqi journalists say local police did nothing to stop. The kidnapping of Ms. Sammarai's husband illustrates the extent of the problem. Her husband, Ahmed al-Hajia, who heads Iraq's National Olympic Committee, was leading a committee meeting on Saturday at the Oil Culture Center in Baghdad's Bab al-Sheikh neighborhood. The center is next to Baghdad's busiest bank, a quarter-mile from Baghdad's Major Crimes Unit, and a half-mile from Tahrir Square, where Saddam Hussein's statue was toppled after US forces captured Baghdad. The area is usually rife with Iraqi police and army checkpoints. Nevertheless, at about 2 p.m. that day a group of more than 20 gunmen in the uniforms of police commandos roared up to the hall in about 20 white Toyota pickup trucks - the type used by Iraq's police. The men overpowered the few guards and burst inside, according to four witnesses, none of whom wished to divulge their names because they feared retribution. The attackers were "very calm, very professional, not nervous at all," says a hall employee, pointing to four bullet holes in the ceiling from a rifle burst used to establish control over the hostages. He and other witnesses say the gunmen spent a methodical 30 minutes separating Olympic Committee officials and journalists from waiters and other employees of the hall, cuffing them with plastic zip ties and blindfolding them. By 3 p.m. they had left with about 30 hostages, Mr. Hajia among them. Since the attack, 10 of the hostages have been released while two of the guards have been found dead. "What this really proves is how far out of control Iraq is now,'' says an official from the Olympic Committee. "We know there are checkpoints in the area. But any group of men with uniforms, with guns, can just drive wherever they want and no one will dare stop them." The witnesses refused to speculate on whether police were responsible or insurgents in uniform. "Answering those kinds of questions is very dangerous,'' one man said. But some quarters seemed convinced the police were involved. Last Saturday US and Iraqi soldiers raided the Major Crimes Unit (MCU). They arrived after dark without warning and policemen there opened up on the soldiers. A brief firefight ensued, injuring some bystanders. Eventually order was restored and US soldiers went inside saying they were looking for Mr. Hajia and others kidnapped but found nothing, according to a policeman who works there. The MCU has been considered by US military trainers to be one of the most professional police units in Baghdad. It has managed to sidestep the sectarian loyalties that lead many Baghdad residents to view police as little more than Shiite militias. American Military Police working to improve the unit's effectiveness had gone home for the day shortly before the US raid. "Clearly they got a bad tip, but I'm very, very angry,'' says the police officer. "We've worked closely with the Americans, we've taken a lot of risks and they couldn't have handled this in a different way?" For him, he says the raid was the last straw. In recent months he says the unit has captured a number of men they believed were running Shiite death-squads in the city. But the Interior Ministry, which oversees the police, secured the alleged killers' freedom in all cases. "There's too much interference from politicians, from the Americans, to do this job properly." He says that he and five other senior members of the unit are likely to quit soon. Sammarai says her husband's kidnapping was political, and not financially motivated. She charges there are opponents of her husband who wanted to drag the committee into sectarian politics and were angry at his insistence that "sports and politics shouldn't be mixed." "Our country is bleeding. All my husband wanted to do was build something - he helped get us to Athens, he was putting the past behind us. This is so unfair," says Sammarai. Another official on the committee, who didn't attend the meeting, also says he believes the attack may have been undertaken at the behest of Hajia's rivals. He points out that the hostages released so far have included Shiites, Sunnis and Christians, which implies it wasn't motivated by sectarian hatred. http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0721/p01s04-woiq.htm
