'Shut up and attack'

By Park Moo-jong

Park Sung-hyun thrilled not only her fellow Koreans but world golf fans by coming from behind to win the coveted 2017 U.S. Women's Open Championship on Sunday at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey.

While U.S. President Donald Trump, owner of the golf club, was watching, the 23-year-old Korean and her seven fellow players "shut their mouths up and attacked" to dominate the major competition by finishing in the top 10, with the remaining two being Spain's Carlota Ciganda and China's Shanshan Feng.

Trump, wearing a "Make America Great Again" hat in his viewing box, excitedly clapped and raised two thumbs in the direction of Park, who smiled and waved, then went to sign her scorecard.

Ironically, American ladies failed to finish among the top 10 for the first time under the gaze of Mr. Trump preaching "America first."

We, Koreans, were happy watching Ms. Park teach, in her triumphant interview, the world people a coined Korean term "Dak Gong," an abbreviation of "Dakchigo Gonggyeok" meaning, literally translated, "shut up and attack."

Dak Gong is her nickname her Korean fans gave her because "I am more aggressive in my game and I focus on my attack and being aggressive" as she said in the interview through an interpreter.

A month ago in Paris, Latvian tennis player Jelena Ostapenko, 20, became the first unseeded player to win the women's singles since 1933 in the 2017 French Open thanks to her "Dak Gong," namely her highly aggressive playing style featuring powerful inside-out ground strokes and a tendency to aim for the lines.

But the coined word should be copyrighted by, if any, the Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors Football Club, now overwhelmingly leading the year's K League Classic, the first league of Korean professional football.

The term was the invention of Choi Kang-hee, head coach of the Jeonju-based team, who introduced his offense-oriented tactics under the policy that offense is the best defense in early 2010.

His aggressive tactics worked and earned the team numerous championships in the K League, FA Cup and AFC Championship League over the past 20 years.

Choi's brand has already been in vogue in Asia since the "Dak Gong soccer for fun and fans" was introduced in the education seminar of the AFC Championship League held in Malaysia in 2012.

Frankly speaking, however, one-sided dependence on attack is not almighty in any sport or in our daily lives either.

Choi's "Dak Gong" does not necessarily mean attack only. Supporting his brand is hidden defensive power. Without a stable defensive system, "Dak Gong" is impossible as the Korean national team for the 2018 Russian World Cup is proving in the ongoing final qualifying round for the upcoming global soccer festival.

Choi's tactical formula with a strong emphasis on offense may rival the world-renowned "Catenaccio" of Italian football, meaning "door-bolt" that implies a highly organized and effective backline defense focused on nullifying opponents' attacks and preventing goal-scoring chances.

When the Korean fans were watching Park's play on TV, many of them must have been shouting "fighting" to cheer her, clenching their hands.

Foreigners, particularly English-speaking people, may be embarrassed by such an aggressive slogan and feel displeased, asking "who is fighting whom."

This "Konglish" word with a literally violent meaning is here, there and everywhere in our society, with almost everyone from school kids to senior citizens using it on many different occasions.

Together with the coined term, "Dak Gong," "fighting" eventually implies the aggressiveness of Koreans fiercely competing for survival in a divided country.

Of course, the aggressive term has a positive meaning for Koreans. When the nation was forced to the brink of bankruptcy during the unprecedented foreign currency crisis and had to rely on the International Monetary Fund's bailout program in late 1997, many used the organization's acronym, saying "IMFighting" as a slogan to cheer the efforts to overcome the economic pinch.

"Dak Gong" is rapidly spreading in our daily lives as the nation faces a heap of difficult economic questions with an ever-rising unemployment rate and the mighty influence of union workers.

The militant trade union members are ever intensifying their "all court press" against the government and their employers in an apparent "Dak Gong" strategy.

Even a leading banker is shouting the slogan for the survival of banking institutions in the digital era: "Shut up, attack and invest until going bankrupt."

As far as aggressiveness is concerned, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un who is madly striving to develop nuclear arms with blood in his eyes with an apparent all-or-nothing strategy.

Then, should South Korea "shut up and defend" or "Dak Bang or Dakchigo Bangeo (defense)?" No. We should have the first-strike capability. The point is balance.

But the term in the news, "Dak Gong," should be for sports and is good for this year's U.S. Open champion.

Park Moo-jong is the adviser of The Korea Times. He served as the president-publisher of the nation's first English newspaper from 2004 to 2014 after he worked as a reporter of the daily since 1974. He can be reached at moojong@ktimes.com or emjei29@gmail.com