Opinion - The Korea Times

Reporters versus editors

By Donald Kirk  Fights between reporters and editors are classic.  Reporters don't trust editors, and editors don't trust reporters. That little observation is by way of commenting on what has to be about the worst reporter-editor rift in the history of journalism. That's the betrayal of the Canadian correspondent who parachuted behind enemy lines in World War II only to have his paper refuse to believe he'd ever been there ― and then not only dismiss him arbitrarily but have him disaccredited and blackballed for any future anywhere in journalism.Don North, a long-time broadcast correspondent, whom I first met in Indonesia in 1965-66 during “The Year of Living Dangerously," then encountered in Vietnam in the old days and saw at a reunion of Vietnam hacks in Saigon at the end of April, tells the tragic tale.  North's book, “Inappropriate Conduct: Mystery of a Disgraced War Correspondent," is the saga of the “disgrace" of Toronto Star correspondent Paul Morton. Drawing upon archival sources in Italy, England and Canada, as well as copious interviews and

Jul 9, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Slaughter on the 'Northern Limit Line'

By Donald Kirk For several hours on June 29, 2002, images of warships in the West or Yellow Sea filled television screens in Korea. I was in Seoul watching avidly as reports of a raging battle dominated the news even as South Korea's beloved Red Devils were about to play Turkey in a match to decide third or fourth place in World Cup 2002.For me, the day was one of the busiest I have ever had as a journalist. From Seoul, I frantically wrote a story on the West Sea shootout for the New York Times before riding the KTX to Daegu, where I wrote another story for the Times that evening on South Korea's 3-2 defeat by Turkey. I can't recall ever having reported and then written at length on two such hugely different topics, from such widely separated datelines, in one day for the same paper.For many Koreans, incredibly, the question was which was more important, the West Sea naval battle or the World Cup. Yes, six Korean sailors were killed in the shootout, casting a pall but hardly distracting from the final match.For a time, it seemed as if their sacrifice was almost forgotten as demo

Jul 2, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Remembering the horrors of war

By Donald KirkIt's a time for anniversaries and memories of the tragedies that have afflicted Northeast Asia over the past century.On Tuesday, the Japanese remembered the horror of the single worst battle in Asian history, the three-month struggle for Okinawa. The battle ended with the final defeat of the Japanese by U.S. forces on June 23, 1945, after the deaths of 200,000 people, more than half of them civilians.Then, on Thursday, Koreans marked the 65th anniversary of the North Korean invasion of South Korea, the opening of a contest in which several hundred thousand combatants from all sides and several million civilians were killed.Those statistics pale beside the numbers who died in World War II before Japan surrendered on Aug. 15, 1945, ending Japanese rule over Korea and much of China. On the 70th anniversary of that date, Koreans will listen to see how or if Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe apologizes not only for the Pacific War but for the entire colonial era.  So profound are current differences between Korea and Japan that President Park and Prime Minister Abe

Jun 25, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Eating hearty in Pyongyang

By Donald Kirk You have to wonder what Kim Jong-un is eating these days. Every time his picture appears visiting a military unit or a factory or an agricultural cooperative, he seems to have gained a kilogram or two. What's he feasting on? What's his favorite late-night snack? Is he a choco-holic or does he guzzle down a few too many rice cakes?Who knows, could it be Kim is addicted to Choco-pies, the South Korean savory that was so popular among North Korean workers at the Gaeseong Industrial Complex? Is there any truth in the theory that he was so upset by weight gains attributed to Choco-pies that he personally ordered the South Koreans to stop distributing them? He may have known of no other way to keep himself from snacking on them, one after another.The answers to the above questions are speculative, as observers of the North Korean scene are well aware. In fact, they are so speculative that one might question whether they're worth raising at all. OK, but how often do we read or hear rumors about North Korea that have little or no basis in proven fact?    Kim's d

Jun 18, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Killers on the loose

By Donald KirkAIDS, SARS, MERS ― the four-letter acronyms leap from the headlines like killers in a horror movie each time the latest deadly disease spreads shock and awe among people to whom the inability to find cures seems unimaginable.It was just a century or so ago when the first antibiotics were killing every day viruses that now seem to have morphed beyond the control of the latest innovations in modern science. Or, to put it another way, the viruses have a way of staying one step ahead of scientists and doctors.The phenomenon of MERS, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, began making headlines years after most people had forgotten about SARS, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which killed nearly a thousand people 12 and 13 years ago. Remember SARS? It's not clear whether the scientists ever really found the cure, but the syndrome has been quiescent, almost forgotten, after having been confined like a frothing beast to where it could no longer spread terror among unsuspecting victims.Then along came MERS, a cousin of SARS, a disease for which there is no magic pill, no quick sho

Jun 11, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

War clouds over troubled waters

By Donald Kirk     SUBIC BAY, Philippines ― The presence here of the USS Shiloh, a cruiser laden with missiles and cannon, reminds visitors of a bygone era. It was almost 25 years ago that the U.S. Navy had to abandon Subic Bay and the U.S. Air Force evacuated Clark Air Base, across the mountains to the west, after the Philippine Senate voted “no" to  renewing the lease to these historic bases.A lot has changed since then. The Americans persisted in saying was the Shiloh was on a “routine" port call, but its mission showed that the U.S. is standing behind Philippine defiance of Chinese claims to the South China Sea, including the Spratly Islands southwest of here and the Scarborough shoal to the west.  So doing, the Philippines finds common cause with Vietnam, which, like the Philippines, also has a stake in the Spratlys.There is supreme irony in this realignment of forces against China's policy of expansionism, literally, in the form of reclamation of 2,000 acres from the shallow waters around reefs and atolls long held by the Chinese.  Sate

Jun 4, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Women's quest for peace

By Donald Kirk The crusade of WomenCrossDMZ for peace on the Korean Peninsula had certain defined boundaries.  Don't talk about human rights and nukes. Say all you want about American sanctions on North Korea and the need for a peace treaty to end the Korean War.The women were no doubt disappointed that they could not dramatize their plea for a treaty by going from North to South last Sunday through the truce village of Panmunjom.  Surely they would have liked to have stood there saying the armistice signed on that very spot more than 60 years ago was no substitute for a treaty guaranteeing enduring peace.You could see why South Korea and the U.N. Command were a little reluctant to provide such an easy forum for the women to publicize demands heard regularly from North Korea.  Nonetheless, making the crossing by the well-traveled road running by the nearby Gaeseong Industrial Complex, the 30, including U.S. activist Gloria Steinem and two Nobel Peace Prize laureates, made the most of a mission that played into the hands of their hosts in Pyongyang.Steinem's claim

May 28, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Playing the Great Game

By Donald Kirk Two very different visitors crossed paths in Seoul this week. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi bumped into each other after calling on President Park Geun-hye at the Blue House.  They're old pals. Kerry and Modi have met in New Delhi and Washington and see eye to eye on a lot of things, notably their fears about conflict from one end of Asia to the other.Among India's greatest concerns is Pakistan, forever staging incidents along the “line of control" in divided Kashmir, and China, eager to nibble across the “line of actual control" between China and India in the high Himalayas. For Kerry, the worst problem in East Asia is North Korea, whose leader, Kim Jong-un, ranks among the world's most ruthless dictators. Inevitably, Kerry's worries are spread over a wider geographical spectrum than those of Modi.  While in Seoul, Kerry had to answer a question about the fall of Ramadi to ISIL, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.  As a skilled diplomat and politician, he had no problem explaining

May 21, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Raising the stakes in NE Asia

By Donald KirkThe stakes are escalating in the contest for Northeast Asia. North Korea's got nukes and lots of missiles, most recently maybe the SLBM for submarine-launched ballistic missile. The U.S. has glistening new hardware too.  THAAD, Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense, the missile system for Star Wars, is capable, they say, of knocking out an incoming missile 150 kilometers over the Earth's surface. No, it would not always hit its target, but at a few hundred million dollars a shot you've got to believe it wouldn't be a total waste.Before we declare Star Wars, however, think of all the stuff that's likely to go into the inventory of the U.S. Armed Forces, and its allies, in the next few years. The U.S. Marines on Okinawa already have Osprey helicopters. These ungainly looking birds take off like helicopters, their twin rotors beating like those of outdated Chinooks, and then level off horizontally so they look like two huge propellers an on old-style non-jet transport plane.The Osprey has been roundly criticized for its enormous expense. The cost of developing and build

May 14, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Betraying America's allies

By Donald Kirk SAIGON ― It's become fashionable among intellectuals from left and right to talk about the Vietnam War in terms of “lessons learned." Better yet, critics of U.S. policy write and talk about “lessons not learned." One of the latter emailed asking me to tell him “in a nutshell" what would be the “lessons not learned" from Vietnam.  I told him I couldn't possibly answer that question so quickly but added I was pretty sure he believed he had all the answers.Yes, that response was rather sardonic. In fact, the person at the other end of the dialogue called me a “wise guy." The reason for my sarcasm was that he obviously believes one lesson learned from Vietnam is that the U.S. should not dabble in foreign wars in relatively small countries for some ideological reason that is not worth upholding. He believes George W. Bush during his presidency made a huge mistake in getting involved in driving Saddam Hussein from power and then propping up a regime and an army that seems not too effective in fending off ISIS, the Islamic State of

May 7, 2015By Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk

Read more

Reporters versus editors

Slaughter on the 'Northern Limit Line'

Remembering the horrors of war

Eating hearty in Pyongyang

Killers on the loose

War clouds over troubled waters

Women's quest for peace

Playing the Great Game

Raising the stakes in NE Asia

Betraying America's allies

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