He came to give the country back to the people

Joseph H. Chung (정희수), Ph.D. Professor of Economics at Quebec University in Montreal (UQAM)

(지난 호에 이어)

8. Korea-Japan Relations

The history of Korea-Japan is long and bumpy at times. But, until the annexation of Korea to Japan in 1910, it had been relatively peaceful with exception of the 1590s marked by the invasion of Toyotomi Hideyoshis in Korea.

But, since the annexation of Korea in 1910, the Korea-Japan relations have been unstable, insecure and even hostile.

This paper is interested in discussing the two periods of Korea-Japan relations, the period of colonialism (1910-1945) and the period of neo-colonialism (1946-2022). To be more specific, my chief concern is with the impact of Japanese colonialism and its neo-colonialism on the collective life in Korea.

There can be multitude impacts of the Japanese colonialism in Korea. But, the horrible impact was the danger of losing completely the identity of Korea and Koreans. The Japanese were trying to force Koreas to forget about Dan-gun, Korean names, Korean culture. They even wanted to replace the Korean trees with the Japanese trees. The Japanese wanted to become the master in the Korean peninsula well served by Korean slaves.

However, the impact which hurt Korea most was the fatal division of Koreans into two hostile camps, namely, pro-Japan camp who collaborated with the Japanese invaders and sold Korea for their personal wealth and might on the one hand and on the other, the anti-Japan camp including those who fought against the Japanese risking their lives.

The pro-Japan group camp led by Lee Wan-yong and high ranking politicians, military officers, newspaper owners and bureaucrats worked for the Japanese interests. By the way, Lee Wan-yong and 39 others were knighted in 1929 by the Japanese Emperor for giving Korea as a gift to the Emperor-God.

I call them "traitors" who collaborated with the Japanese in stealing houses, lands other precious assets belonging to Koreans, capturing teen age girls to be sent to the hellish military camp of "comfort women", conscripting young Korean men to be sent to kill Korean patriots, forcing hundreds of thousands of Korean worker to die in Japanese mines and factories due to over work, hunger, disease and torture carried out by the Japanese masters.

This is the tragic legacy of the 45-year Japanese occupation in Korea.

The nightmare of Japanese brutal beastly aggression was over in 1945. At least, it was what Koreans thought. The Koreans were dancing and singing in the street to celebrate the freedom. Yes, Koreans were happy. But, soon, they had to face the dark clouds of fear and despair covering the peninsula and saddening their hearts.

Right from the beginning of the post-war era, the two groups had to fight to the end. Their hostile feelings were too strong and too deep to find conciliation.

The pro-Japan conservative South Koreans (PJCSK) being a minority group and hated by the pro-Korea liberal South Koreans (PKLSK) knew that, to survive, they had to take power.

Now, to take power, the PJCSK needed money. So, Park Chung-hee asked the help of Kishi Nobuske who was the most racist and merciless ruler in Manchuria in the 1930s. He was maternal-side grandfather of former assassinated prime minster of Japan, Shinzo Abe. He was a A-Class war criminal but escaped hanging due to his utility to serve the U.S. interests.

Kishi Nobuske gave, in 1963, to Park Chun-hee as much as USD 66 million to create the first major political party in Korea, the Democratic Republican Party (DRP), which was given the role of making South Korea a neo-colony of Japan.

By neo-colonialism, I mean the state of colonialism without the coloniser country being present in the colonized country.

Since 1963, the political parties of the PJCSK changed many times the party name, probably, to hide their connection with Japan.

The post-war Korea-Japan relations were peaceful under the PJCSK government and rather frictional under the government of the PKLSK.

Since 1945, the PJCSK ruled South Korea for 62 years while the PKLSK governed South Korea for 15 years.

Under the rule of the PJCSK, the Korea-Japan relations have been the maintenance of the Japanese neo-colonialism, while the Korea-Japan relations under the PKLSK have been the fight against the Japanese neo-colonialism.

There are three kinds of neo-colonial relations between Korea and Japan: economic, political and security neo-colonial relations.

The economic neo-colonialism: From the beginning, Japan established the Korea-Japan production chain which made Korea economy dependent on the Japanese economy. In this arrangement, Korea imports high value-added input goods (intermediary goods) from Japan and exports final products produced by assembling the inputs to produce finished products.

Now, in the case of high tech product such as portable telephone, the value added of the assembling work is about 5% of the sale price.

For example, let us assume that Korea imports input goods from Japan by paying $95 and that it exports to Japan the finished product for $ 100.

Korea's net gain is only $5, while the Japan's surplus is $90. So, Korea's trade deficit with Japan is $ 90.

Under this situation, it is impossible to have trade surplus with Japan. In fact, Korea has never had trade surplus with Japan since 1945.

It is true that despite the chronic trade deficit, the Japanese neo-colonialism has nevertheless contributed to the Han River Miracle.

But, to assure sustained and healthy economy, Korean economy should become more autonomous.

In fact, Korean economy has been becoming more and more independent from the Japanese economy. This trend has been enforced by President Moon Jae-in.

Under President Moon, Korea's dependence on Japanese input goods fell from 30% to 23%. Korea's dependence on Japan for total exports fell from 7.0% in 2012 tp 4.8% in 2018. Japan's trade surplus (Korea's deficit) fell from 2.49 trillion yen in 2017 to 1.33 trillion yen in 2020.

The political neo-colonialism: The Japanese political neo-colonialism refers to a situation in which Japanese political interests are promoted by the PJCSK. The political interests of Japan is the denial of war crime committed by Japan against Korea, especially the beastly collective rape of 200,000 Korean girls at the Japanese military camp of comfort women.  (다음 호에 계속)

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