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Donald Kirk

Donald Kirk has been covering Korean Peninsula issues for decades.

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Donald Kirk

From 'ppalli-ppalli' to tragedy

By Donald KirkBlame it on Korea's culture of “ppalli-ppalli” ― “quickly, quickly.” That was the simplistic explanation that a Korean gave me for the crowd surge in the narrow Itaewon alley where so many were trapped, crushed and died last weekend. “They were madly pushing each other,” she said. “It's in the genes.”Maybe, but the horror of Halloween follows other disasters going back years that had nothing to do with crowd control. Rather, they were all about the greed of the tycoons who ran the Sampoong Department Store, the collapse of which in 1995 killed more than 500 people, and the sinking of the Sewol in 2014 in which more than 300, mostly high school kids on a school outing, drowned. The owners also were obsessed with the ppalli-ppalli mentality ― and the desire to get rich quick.It's possible to take the ppalli-ppalli theme to much greater extremes. The rapid rise of Korean business and industry from the ashes of war, the spread of K-pop as a worldwide phenomenon ― they're all driven by the desire to move quickly, quickly, to ov

Nov 3, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

Act Three for Xi in China

By Donald KirkXi Jinping, the strongest, most enduring Chinese leader since Mao Zedong, opens possibly the climactic act of his rule with his uncontested election to a third five-year term as general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, which controls just about everything in China. No, the government does not operate independently of the party. Top government officials are party members. Almost all young people hired for government jobs also belong to the party.The arrogance of the party is evident at the party congress, which has been going on this week in Beijing. Forget about open speeches or lively debates or give-and-take on critical issues. Behind closed doors, Xi and those closest to him have been telling everyone what to say and do. How they wield such tight control is somewhat mysterious. Obviously, they've been planning well in advance to be sure of the results.Outside China, confirmation of Xi's grip on power gives rise to urgent questions. At the top of the list is what he'll do to increase China's influence worldwide ― from Africa to the rest of Asia to the America

Oct 20, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

Playing with fire

By Donald KirkIt's getting harder all the time to think that Kim Jong-un is just play-acting when he rams through a law saying North Korea can unleash a nuclear warhead whenever he feels threatened. And it's also getting harder to assume the Americans and South Koreans will never translate the lessons of their own war games into real live action.It's as though war were creeping up slowly after we'd been shrugging off the possibilities, not always paying much attention to missile shots and military exercises, dismissing them as “just newspaper stories” that a lot of people don't bother to read.Well, maybe all the test shots and the counter-tests are not for real, and maybe there's nothing to worry about, but weren't people in Paris and London saying much the same thing in the 1930s before Adolf Hitler turned his Nazi regime against them and plunged the world ― the Western world ― into World War II. On the other side of the globe, in the Far East, Japan had been acting up for decades, taking over South Korea, setting up its own phony state in Manchuria, and talking up the j

Oct 6, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

Art of non-apology

By Donald Kirk The pomp and circumstance surrounding the passing of Queen Elizabeth II evoked memories of the days of the British Raj.It fell to the queen during her long reign to keep up the appearance of far-flung imperial riches while presiding over the final disintegration of what had once been the world's most powerful, wealthiest empire. As millions mourn her passing, some asked why in her decades as queen she never apologized for all the evils perpetrated by her royal ancestors, and the admirals, generals and colonial officials who had bullied and exploited millions from Africa to Asia to America.The calls for a royal apology remind one of the persistent demands that Japan apologize for all the wrongs committed by Japanese leaders as they sought to turn Japan into the hub of an empire extending from China through Korea and Southeast Asia, which the Japanese called a “co-prosperity sphere.” Over the years, demands for a Japanese “apology” have never ceased while the Japanese repeatedly express their sorrow for the sins of their forebears.The problem with

Sep 22, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

Admitting North Korea to 'nuclear club'

By Donald KirkJames Clapper, a retired air force lieutenant general who served two tours in South Korea and then as President Barack Obama's director of national intelligence from 2010 to 2017, has shocked a virtual forum by asking, rhetorically, if “our policy of demanding North Korean denuclearization is going to work.”The U.S. has been “imposing sanctions forever,” said Clapper, who directed intelligence for the U.S. Forces Korea Command for two years in the 1980s and visited Pyongyang eight years ago to bring home two Americans who had been imprisoned there. “Our approach,” he argued, “has not been successful.”Washington, he said, should accept the reality that North Korea should indeed be recognized as one of nine nuclear powers. To which he added, “Of course we should allow a North Korean presence in Washington” ― a liaison office in exchange for a similar U.S. office in Pyongyang. Clapper's comments were largely at odds with others at the forum, conducted by the Institute for Corean-American Studies (ICAS) based in Ph

Sep 8, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

Ukraine-style wars

By Donald KirkRussia's invasion of Ukraine evokes unpleasant comparisons for Northeast Asia. It's easy to envisage China invading Taiwan or enabling a North Korean invasion of South Korea.Neither of these scenarios is going to play out right away, but then, a few short years ago, who was predicting Russia would invade Ukraine? China's President Xi Jinping, looking for reelection, by acclamation, if possible, to a third five-year term at the congress of the Chinese Communist Party in November, will probably settle ― for now ― for intimidation exercises. They're to show that his People's Liberation Army (ground, navy and air elements), could take over the island at any time but is holding off, testing to see the responses of the U.S., Taiwan, Japan and South Korea too.In a waiting game, 72 years since Mao Zedong's Red Army took over the mainland, China has time on its side. That does not mean that Xi, the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao, will be willing to wait forever. He may set the end of his third five-year term in 2027 as the deadline for showing his might as the man who re

Aug 25, 2022By Donald Kirk
Ukraine-style wars
Donald Kirk

At odds on Taiwan

By Donald KirkChina's claims to Taiwan bear a disturbing resemblance to Russia's war with Ukraine. You just cannot ignore the similarities and parallels despite the geographic differences. Sure, Ukraine is right next to Russia, and Taiwan is about 100 miles from the Chinese mainland. Still, Russia's President Vladimir Putin and China's President Xi Jinping are soulmates in their drive to recover territory that they're convinced, historically, is theirs.In each case, chances for their success depend partly on the willingness of the United States and some of its allies to rush to the defense of the beleaguered land.In Ukraine, the U.S. and its NATO allies have pumped in billions of dollars' worth of weaponry but are not willing to risk their own war with Russia by imposing a “no fly zone” where they would inevitably clash with Russian planes. From there, the war could escalate into the bombing of Russian air fields and Russian attacks on NATO bases, some of them American.Taiwan is a little different. The Chinese have yet to attack the independent island state. So far, they'

Aug 11, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

Edging toward war

By Donald KirkChinese rhetoric over Taiwan is getting more strident all the time. It's hard to believe the Chinese will go beyond the kind of big talk we've been hearing since Chiang Kai-shek fled there with his defeated forces before the victory of Mao's Red Army on the mainland in 1949, but the shrill nature of Chinese intimidation there and elsewhere is cause for mounting concern.The implications are clear. If China were to move militarily against Taiwan, both the United States and Japan would get involved. The U.S. has no troops, no advisers, no defense pact with Taiwan, with which it has no formal diplomatic relations, but we may be sure Americans would enter the war initially as advisers. In a real showdown, the U.S. might also provide air support from bases in Okinawa and Guam, as well as aircraft carriers, while rushing in billions of dollars' worth of supplies as it's doing for Ukraine.Ominously, from the viewpoint of nations worried about a resurgence of Japanese military power, the Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be just what Japanese conservatives need to nullify Article

Jul 28, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

New US ambassador takes aim

By Donald KirkThe United States has a new ambassador to South Korea at a pivotal moment in U.S.-Korean relations and the confrontation between North and South Korea. Philip Goldberg has arrived in Seoul just as the U.S. and the ROK are beginning to see eye to eye and South Korea's President Yoon Suk-yeol promises to repair the damage done during the presidency of his predecessor, Moon Jae-in.Luckily, Goldberg will not have to persuade Yoon of the dangers of scaling down joint military exercises or appeasing Kim Jong-un in hopes of another meeting filled with promises that will never be fulfilled. As Goldberg gets over jetlag from his flight from Washington and looks at his schedule, he has the luxury of knowing that the Yoon administration has changed course from the previous five years of liberal if not leftist governance.Goldberg won't have to edge his way around contentious issues as did the previous ambassador, Harry Harris, a retired admiral who once commanded all U.S. forces in the Pacific. Perhaps unavoidably, Harris, with no previous experience as a diplomat, had a way of ups

Jul 14, 2022By Donald Kirk
Donald Kirk

Carrying on Marcos' legacy

By Donald KirkThe inauguration of Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. as president of the Philippines opens a highly controversial period in the convoluted history of a country mired in rampant corruption, lawlessness and an anti-drug campaign that's taken at least 30,000 lives.Widely known by his nickname, Bongbong Marcos projected calmness and courtesy after winning the presidential election by an overwhelming margin in May. His background, however, suggests he may have trouble keeping up appearances. Marcos' father, Ferdinand Marcos Sr., ruled by martial law for half his 21 years in office, throwing tens of thousands of opponents into jail, several thousand of whom lost their lives. Finally, in February 1986, he was forced out in the “People Power Revolution.”In 1986, I watched as hundreds of thousands ― at least 1 million, possibly 2 million ― filled the 12-lane avenue known as Edsa, the acronym for Epifanio de los Santos, a revered literary and political figure a century ago, calling for Marcos' ouster. Like South Korea's Candlelit Revolution of 2016-2017, wh

Jun 30, 2022By Donald Kirk
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