Korea Today

George M. McCune

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9780367178420
• eBook ISBN: 9780429603563
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

Published in 1950: Here is the first comprehensive study of Korea since its liberation and division. Written by an outstanding American authority with long personal knowledge of the country, it provides an analysis of the American and Russian military occupations, the efforts of the United Nations to deal with the problem of Unification of the country, the political and economic policies followed in the northern and southern regimes, and an appraisal of the U.S. program of economic and military aid to South Korea.

CHAPTER ONE

The Historical Background

THE HISTORY OF AN OLD KINGDOM

KOREA has a long history. Located on a peninsula with admirable boundaries but with the disadvantage of being at a crossroads of civilization, and peopled by a race which many centuries ago became unified as a distinct group with its own physical and cultural characteristics, Korea has grown to a nation of twenty-nine million persons. Korea has also become one of the world’s most acute trouble spots.¹

The peninsula of Korea is roughly 150 miles wide and 600 miles long and has an area of 85,228 square miles. The country is mountainous with a coastline dotted with islands, a combination of scenic attractions which has given rise to a native poetical tradition in praise of the beauty of the land. On the north, the Yalu and Tumen rivers form the boundary which separates Korea from Manchuria. For a short distance of some eleven miles at the mouth of the Tumen River, Korea shares a boundary with Soviet Siberia. Famous Paektu (White Head) Mountain is the source of both rivers, with its highest peak rising to an elevation of over 9,000 feet.

Northern and eastern Korea is largely mountainous territory, whereas the southern and western sections are for the most part hill-and-valley country. The Diamond Mountains (called Kumgang-san by the Koreans), situated in central Korea next to the eastern coast, have long been a mecca for tourists from all parts of the Far East owing to the spectacular scenery found there.

Along much of the eastern coast the mountains rise abruptly from the seashore, a marked contrast with the western coast where the ground rises gradually from the shore. The western half of the country is therefore well suited to farming and as a result comprises most of the rich rice lands which support a large portion of the population. The eastern coast, on the other hand, has natural resources best suited to the production of hydro-electric power and to deep-sea fishing.

The origin of the Korean people, like that of other old nations, is obscure, but the traditions, folk-lore, customs and beliefs of the people studied in the light of finds discovered in recent years in the shell-mounds, grave-sites and monuments of various kinds afford some information as to the ancestors of the present inhabitants of the peninsula. Recorded history does not begin in Korea until about the time of Christ, but from then on the history of the Korean people is well documented.

Tradition places the founding of their society in the year 2333 B.C. by a mythical personage named Tan’gun. Another famous figure is that of Kija, a Chinese refugee, who is credited by Korean tradition with the founding of the first Korean kingdom, Choson, in 1122 B.C. The archeological evidence so far uncovered in Korea does not substantiate either the Tan’gun or the Kija tradition, but it throws much light on prehistoric Korea. According to deductions made from such evidence, various clans and tribes inhabited the peninsula in the centuries before the Christian era. They possessed a neolithic culture from which they emerged during the first millennium before Christ, reaching the stage of a bronze and iron culture shortly before the opening of the Christian era. These tribes were a mixture of Tungusic and proto-Caucasian invaders, who had arrived in successive waves via the plains of Manchuria and the steppes of Mongolia and Central Asia.

Traces of the early neolithic settlements are found in all parts of Korea. In southern Korea these early inhabitants were called the Sam Han (Three Han). These Three Han achieved a considerable reputation for their tribal organization, certain unique customs, and their skill at handicraft. Accounts of the Three Han may be found in the Chinese records of the Han dynasty. In northern Korea the dominant early tribesmen were called the Yemaek (second cousins of the Sam Han), and they joined together to form the ancient kingdom of Chosŏn (founded according to tradition by Kija). Choson finally gave way in 108 B.C. to a Chinese invasion. The Chinese then established several colonies in northern Korea, the most famous being that of Lolang (called Nangnang by the Koreans), with its capital at Pyŏngyang.

The tombs which the Chinese left behind, dating from the second century before Christ to the third century after Christ, have proved a treasure-house of information about the art and industries of Han China. Excellent examples of lacquer, bronze minors, pottery, jewelry, battle equipment, and so on, have been found in the few tombs, among hundreds in the area, which have been excavated up to the present time. A fertile field awaits the Korean archeologist in the further discovery and study of Lolang grave finds.

Recorded Korean history begins with the period known as the Three Kingdoms, 57 B.C. to 668 A.D. During this period the country was divided into three parts: the northern section occupied by the warlike kingdom of Koguryo, the southeastern by Silla, and the southwestern by Paekche. Koguryo, whose jurisdiction extended over the greater part of Manchuria as well as over the northern part of Korea, fought off invading barbarians in many campaigns and engaged in one great war with China, in 613, from which the Koreans came off victorious. Fifty years later, however, Koguryo came to an end before the combined attacks of the T’ang dynasty of China and those of Silla.

During the fourth century, when Koguryo strength and prestige were still at their height, Buddhism was introduced into the kingdom along with a flood of other cultural features of Chinese civilization. The southern kingdoms of Silla and Paekche, in their turn, assimilated Chinese culture through the introduction of Buddhism, with spectacular success, and in due course passed it on to Japan.

Allied with the newly established T’ang dynasty of China, Silla soon overthrew the two rival kingdoms and set up a hegemony over the entire peninsula in 668 A.D. The supremacy of Silla lasted for almost three hundred years, during which time the high quality of its culture earned for the period the term of Golden Age. The capital of Silla, Kyongju, was the center of a well-to-do, rather benevolent, civilization. Korea never had anything like it in the more sophisticated and turbulent ages that followed. Many Buddhist temples, monasteries and pagodas of great size and splendor were built and all the appurtenances to furnish them provided. Some pagodas, temples and bronze bells still remain as monuments of this age.

During the Koryo period (935–1392) which followed the Silla, the capital was located at Songdo in central Korea. It was during this period that the name Korea came to be applied to the country by Westerners. The last two centuries of this era were disturbed by the recurrent invasions of the Mongols which ended, finally, in Mongol domination of the country, the first time that the whole peninsula had come under foreign rule. The king accepted the overlordship of the Khan and married a Mongol princess. In 1275 the Koreans joined the Mongols in their unsuccessful invasion of Japan. The Koryo kingdom had also to wage constant warfare against Japanese piracy during most of the fourteenth century. Despite these troubles, Korea reached a high level of achievement culturally. Korean scholars made great progress in literature, Korean artisans perfected the well-known celadon pottery associated with the period, and Buddhist culture in all its aspects reached its zenith.

General Yi T’aejo in 1392 ended the dissolution of Koryo by establishing his own dynasty in a new capital fifty miles south of Songdo at Hanyang, or as it was known from then on, Seoul. The dynasty remained in power until the Japanese annexation of Korea in 1910. During its 500-year rule the Yi dynasty passed through several brilliant periods of political and cultural development. The first, occurring immediately in the opening years of the fourteenth century, was probably the greatest. At that time an alphabet was invented which was admirably suited to the Korean language, movable metal type was developed (at least fifty years before Gutenberg), encyclopedias and histories were written, and good government established according to the strictest of Confucian principles.

Two hundred years after the establishment of the dynasty, the Japanese invasion of 1592 put an end to the prosperity of the country but seven years of conflict resulted in the with-drawal of Japanese troops and the abandonment of Hideyoshi’s plan of conquest. One cause of the Japanese retreat was the brilliant naval victories of Admiral Yi Sunsin, who invented the iron-clad turtle ship which he directed with such superior strategy that he was able to break the strength of the Japanese navy. The austerities endured during this devastating war resulted in another renaissance in Korea, which was cut off in twenty years by the invasion of the Manchus.

In 1653 there occurred a small incident of interest to Westerners. A Dutch ship, the Sparrow Hawk, was wrecked on the island of Quelpart and the thirty-six survivors were brought to the capital for investigation. They were forbidden to leave the country and were turned loose to earn their living as best they could. Thirteen years later eight of these men contrived to escape to Japan in a junk, and from there returned to Holland by one of their own ships calling at the Dutch port of Deshima. On his return to Holland one of these men, Hendrik Hamel, wrote an account of his adventures which provides the Western world with the first authentic report on the hermit kingdom.

Not until 1882 did Korea break down the stubborn isolation which had been self-imposed during the Yi dynasty, to make a treaty with a Western power—and then only because Japanese pressure forced it. The first Western nation to conclude a treaty with Korea was, curiously enough, the United States. For many centuries Korea had maintained the so-called tributary status within the orbit of the Chinese Confucian system without restricting her own independence. Contact with China, therefore, had been relatively unhampered and extensive. There had also been a more or less constant contact between Korea and Japan from the year 1609 on, although these contacts were limited to one port, that of Pusan. Trade was carried on between the two countries through this port via the island of Tsushima. A modern treaty took the place of the old agreement, in 1876.

Korea was slow in adapting to the Western world, in contrast with Japan which adapted and adopted so fast. After two revolts, one in 1882 and one in 1884, the Korean court turned to the conservative Chinese government for support, which was forthcoming in the person of the Resident, the young Yuan Shih-k’ai. Chinese conservatism was opposed by Western liberalism coming from the missionary group, and also by a Japanese economic penetration that was gathering momentum rapidly. In 1894 the Tonghaks, a revolutionary group of cultists opposed to all foreign interference, Asiatic or Western, gained considerable ground among the Korean lower classes and in an attack upon the government caused confusion among their rulers, followed by the arrival on Korean soil of both Chinese and Japanese troops. At this moment Japan was prepared to act decisively to end Chinese influence in Korea and to enforce “reforms” upon the Korean court, and China, although unwilling to withdraw, was still in no position to force the issue. The Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) was hardly a war. It lasted only a few months and ended with an easy victory for the Japanese. In the treaty which followed, Korea’s tributary relationship with China was severed and her so-called independence was then guaranteed by Japan.

In the decade 1895–1905 Western diplomacy opened Korea to much greater Western influence: railroads were built, mines opened, and commerce developed. At this time Russian interests in Korea, coupled with the expansion of Russian imperialism in Manchuria, came into conflict with Japanese imperial ambitions. The ultimate result of this clash was the Russo-Japanese War (1904–1905) which successfully eliminated the Russians from their position of rivals of the Japanese in Korea. At this time and immediately following the war Japan, furthermore, obtained the consent of the other powers to the absorption of Korea into the Japanese Empire, and step by step, in spite of the vigorous opposition of the Korean people, this was accomplished. Annexation was finally completed in 1910, at which time Korea became a colony of Japan.

The long historical continuity, during which Korean cultural and social patterns became firmly fixed, has left a unique heritage to the Koreans. They became a nation of one race, one language, one culture, and one proud past. The homogeneity of the Korean people is a significant factor in an evaluation of Korean political problems. Whatever disunity and diversity appear on the Korean political stage are not products of fundamental differences in race or culture within the Korean community, but are consequences of less substantial causes.

Factionalism, nonetheless, has long been a characteristic of Korean politics and was particularly vicious in the last years of the monarchy. Party warfare was an old story in the Korean court, and in the period from 1560 to 1725 the monarchy was greatly weakened by such strife. During part of that period, a struggle between two parties, the Nam-in (Men of the South) and Puk-in (Men of the North) was especially dominant and its traces are still evident today with the north-south division of the country. Party members even wore distinguishing colors and dress. In the latter part of the nineteenth century, party warfare centered in the controversy over Westernization, with a conservative clique opposing the progressive element.

Korea has had many periods of brilliant government and cultural achievement, but in the latter nineteenth century, while the country was attempting to adjust to the Western international system, the Korean monarchy fell into a state of disintegration. The Confucian principles which had been adopted by the Korean court long before had been pursued to such extreme ends that government was corrupt, inefficient and inflexible. Leadership could not arise from the people because of despotic rule, and the people, therefore, took no part in a government which was conducted by a bureaucracy that was reactionary and factional. Only in the small villages and within the social circle of the family could the people exercise democratic privileges.

Reform measures in the latter days of the monarchy made almost no headway. A few steps were taken in the direction of better educational methods, reorganization of government, improvement of the administration of justice, and the granting of a somewhat larger measure of popular representation. But the urgency of such reform to bring the nation abreast of the outside world was not grasped by either the government or the people. In the decade 1885 to 1895, immediately after Korea was opened to the West, the country slipped backward into conservatism in obedience to Chinese dictation. Then, in the next decade, when Chinese influence was eliminated, the country was subjected to the pressure of power politics in a way which completely thwarted any constructive effort at reform from within.

Soon after the opening of Korea in 1882 the struggle for power began in its modern phase. The first two protagonists were Japan and China. Other secondary tensions were reflected in Korean politics, however, such as the Anglo-Russian rivalry which resulted in the occupation of Port Hamilton by British forces in 1885. Chinese designs to convert the tributary status of Korea, which had no counterpart in Western international practice, into a protectorate were finally challenged by Japan in the Sino-Japanese War. The result for Korea was the loss of the once comfortable connection with China which was reg...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Copyright
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Foreword
• Author’s Preface
• Introduction
• 1. THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
• 2. KOREA AS A JAPANESE COLONY
• 3. KOREA IN 1945
• 4. KOREA IN INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS SINCE 1945
• 5. THE AMERICAN INTERIM REGIME
• 6. AMERICAN ECONOMIC POLICIES
• 7. AGRICULTURE IN SOUTH KOREA
• 8. INDUSTRY AND LABOR IN SOUTH KOREA
• 9. THE SOVIET POLITICAL REGIME
• 10. ECONOMIC POLICY IN THE SOVIET ZONE
• 11. AGRICULTURE, LABOR AND INDUSTRY IN THE SOVIET ZONE
• 12. DIVIDED KOREA
• 13. THE FUTURE OF A DIVIDED KOREA
• Appendices
• Bibliography
• Index