[LETTERS TO THE EDITOR]A distorted view

Lee Seo-hyun’s letter to the editor demonstrates confusion about both the U.S. policy toward Korea and Korea’s sunshine policy. She places blame on the current U.S. administration for the perceived failure of the sunshine policy to check North Korean brinkmanship.
This cannot be true as the sunshine policy has been in effect over two separate U.S. administrations and has yet not accomplished the feat. The writer also falsely blames so-called “hostile” U.S. policy for alienation between the two Koreas.
To be accurate, blame for Korea’s division lies first with the Soviet Union, which thwarted the American UN motion to unify all of Korea by way of national elections, and then with the North for its invasion of the South. The author’s false claims extend as well to accusations of U.S. “torture” at Abu Ghraib. Rights abuses there, though regrettable, were minor, and immediately exposed and rectified.
Finally, the writer’s naive statement that military intervention can only hinder peace and human rights is certainly ironic. The peace and human rights she enjoys today are the result of U.S. intervention on Korea’s behalf.
The United States continues to guarantee peace on the Korean Peninsula while working on behalf of human rights and freedoms. By contrast, the sunshine policy was not designed to do either of these things, but only to enhance inter-Korea ties.
That does not mean that the two policies are at odds. The writer simply does not understand their respective purposes and has uncritically accepted some of the anti-American historical distortions that enjoy popularity among today’s rumor mill.

by Ron Stevenson