With all do respect (and my intention with this comment is not to offend but rather to speak frankly), Koizumi and his cabinet are not clueless (well, they may be, but not for this reason). This is how the world works: Koizumi is in fact just a politician, just like Roh. Koizumi is in his story, and so is Roh.

Probably the reason Koizumi doesn't really care about this is that the recent public sentiment in South Korea about the US and North Korea has led him to a stark realization: South Korea is unlikely to be a politically reliable partner in confronting an increasingly pushy China. And the decision to remove the WMD reference is about building support for the partner he thinks he can count on with China, which Japan views as the big issue right now.

Behind the outrage, this is the simple reality of power and nations. South Koreans have to realize a simple but very tough fact: countries like the US and Japan need the ROK allot less than the ROK needs them. The simple truth is that the ROK has no real leverage against Japan.

And Japan knows that. I actually think that the best thing the US could possibly do for the ROK is to withdraw and leave them to face the DPRK and China alone for a while. It would, I think, tone down a bit this emotional hysteria with which the Korean public (esp. the young) seem to approach relations with the rest of the world. That would make the ROK a much more formidable and respected player on the world stage: one that the Japanese would actually have to pay attention to, one that does not diminsih itself by throwing punches in the air.

What Japan is doing is what nations always do. It may not be right (I would probably agree with you that in some moral sense it isn't.) But this is the way of the world. To think otherwise is really to be clueless.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2002221734_plate28.html

As this article suggests, another factor in Japan's position may be that they are wondering just how many times they have to apologise before their Asian neighbours forgive them.

In 1998, former Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi made a direct apology to South Korea for Japan's war-time actions that was publicly accepted by then-South Korean President Kim Dae Jong. President Roh's recent statements seems to suggest this apology wasn't enough. Or maybe he just wants to get as much political leverage out of the history card for as long as he can?

I'm in no way condoning Japan's past atrocities - but surely there must come a time when everyone agrees to move forward and look to the future instead of the past?

Peter, what you are implying is even worse. If they are not clueless then they are doing this intentionally. Re your suggestion that US troops should leave South Korea, I'll bet South Korean engineers can build enough nukes from the moment the announcement is made and the last American troop leaves to protect itself.

Scott, if someone apologizes and then does something that make it seem as if the apology was not genuine at all, what should one do? Just shrug and forget? Prime Minister Obuchi apologized so it's OK to alter history in the textbooks so that Japanese kids can say "WTF are you talking about?" in the future?

No Don, it isn't worse: it is the way of the world. And it has been that way for far, far longer than people have seriously suggested this moralistic approach to the actual intercourse between nations. The terrible mistake here is the silly (and it is worse than silly to the extent that this mindset could actually hurst the welfare of the ROK, which you clearly care about and I have to say I've always been impressed with on visiting) attempt to extend to nations the norms of morality that apply between individuals.

As for nukes: that is a very dangerous game, my friend. ROK is not a superpower, and cannot back up threats in the redundant fashion that a superpower like the US can. Play the cards you have, not the ones you wish you had. Trust me about this: in the DPRK, you are choosing the wrong nation to challenge to a chicken race.

Look, Don, I think that the Japanese are engaging in standard shenanigans, and I have called it that from the get go (I am the same Peter that commented on your earlier post on this subject). But moralistic fulmination of the sort that might be appropriate were this one individual trespassing against another (isn't that essentially your earlier metaphor?) is just wasted breath that has no real currency in the affairs of the world.

By the way, Don, lest you think I am just some white boy with no sensitivity to these things, I will point out that I am fiercely loyal to and proud of my Irish heritage: my ancestors were also from a small, proud and nationalistic society long accustomed to dealing with a powerful, greedy and opportunistic neighbor. And yes, this isn't an abstraction: members of my family died to throw out that neighbor. I don't think I need to spell out who I am talking about. But there is no point calling that neighbor immoral: on some level it is just absurd to ascribe something like that to a state.

Peter, I understand what you are saying but we have a fundamental differences in our opinions about reality and how best one should deal with it. WW II was reality and so was the Holocaust. Could Japan repeat what it did in WW II? I believe the answer is very likely if we just let things happen because they are just the nature of the dog-eat-dog world we live in.

Let's separate intent from capabilities. The Japanese are human: biologically they are basically indistinguishable from you and I (only superficial cosmetic differences). All peoples of the world are capable of the inhumanity displayed by the Japanese in WWII. So in that sense there is no real reason to worry about the Japanese per se. Yesterday's villain could just as easily be tommorrows victim, etc. etc. The capacity for inhumanity exists in all of us, and the capacity for collective inhumanity exists in all societies. In that sense, I have to be honest: I find the hysterical nationalism and victim mentality of the Koreans as threatening as the ever so polite but un-fucking-believably persistent pushiness and revisionism of the Japanese. (And yes: i fear the dark heart of my Irish people as much as I do that of the English. We may have been history's victims, but at moments of empowerment we have also demonstrated a real capacity to be SOBs.)

So how then are we to assess the threat that a soceity represents? Well, by its current *capacity* to inflict harm, and that is some strange combination of military strength and freedom to operate aggressively. By that standard, I'd be far more worried as a Korean about China. Far more worried.

Besides, be patient with the Japanese as a society: we waited far longer for an apology for the UKs handling of the Potato Famine (by many measures a far worse tragedy for the Irish that the Japanese occupation of ROK was for the Koreans-amittedly, whatever that means to the individual victims in either case) than you guys have for the Japanese occupation. But eventually, the English actually did come around. Probably the Japanese will too (and if you are going to tell me how much worse the Japanese are, read more about the track record of the English).

Don, of course it's not OK. As for the content of the disputed textbook/s, it might be a problem if Japanese kids only derived their knowledge from textbooks. The fact of the matter is they don't - newspapers, the internet and other people will all help them to form an opinion based on a diverse range of information sources. Textbooks are probably one of their least-trusted sources.

In addition, my understanding is the current dispute is over the content of one set of textbooks from one publisher. Each municipal government in Japan chooses their textbooks from those available from a large selection of publishers so the effect of a textbook that contains "misleading" text will certainly not be as strong as you might think.

I'd also like to respond to the phrase "if we just let things happen because they are just the nature of the dog-eat-dog world we live in." That is the illusion of power, my friend: the fact that you are dissatisfied with ways of this world does mean that you, or I, or anyone else, are empowered to do anything about it. All you can really do is to see the world for what it is, and react as best you can. I once asked my father what a moral man is, and he said "Someone who sees the world for what it is, not what he wishes is to be, but never loses sight of how the world should have been and determines his own actions accordingly."

The world is changing, ever so slowly. But neither you nor I (nor, say, Bush or Koizumi) has much power to affect that process. We can only play the cards we are dealt according to the current rules of the game. And play no more meanly that we ourselves need to to survive. You can't decide Japan's course or even Korea's: you can only determine your own, and even then only partially.

Let me kindly suggest a lifestyle change that might help you reconcile yourself with this world: become a Carolina basketball fan. Now, I know my timing is poor (after all, we just took it all), but we Carolina fans have had to live for years now in the burning light of Duke's evil power. Sports are a metaphor for life, and once you see how manifestly unfair Duke's success is (how could a just God ever give so many national championships to such snotty elitists who constantly commit fouls and never get called for them??????) the rest of the world's inequities no longer seem quite as strange.














And yes: I am kidding.

ROFL.

[Camera fades on the three loud drunks arguing in the bar...]