Few foreigners know this but here it is: most South Koreans admire their brothers and sisters in the North, the DPR Korea. The USA does not know this because such feelings are shared in private but then again what can you do if you have a foreign power on your soil controling your policy? Some react, others lie in bed with their master.
After all, the Japanese did it increasingly from 1876, then de facto from 1910 until 1945, by which time the founder of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Kim il-Sung, had made a name for himself as an anti-Japanese guerrilla fighter and commander. And hero. After all, the Japanese took five hundred thousand Korean girls and ladies and turned them into "comfort women" to receive the dirty water from tired Japanese imperial invaders. After all, the Koreans provided half a million male slaves to the Japanese invader. It is this that Kim il-Sung was fighting against and the South Koreans know this.
The South Koreans, or the citizens of the Republic of Korea, know that South Koreans took part in the Sinchon Massacre which shows the torture and murder of civilians by mainly South Korean military personnel but also US soldiers, acting under the auspices of Washington. The South Koreans know that the USA deployed 32,557 tons of chemical weapons on North Korean civilians. The South Koreans know that the USA and its South Korean puppet planned to invade the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in 1950. They know that these plans were seized by North Korean agents and they know that these documents counter the lies used by the US State Department claiming that the war started when the North invaded the South. As was its right under international law, the DPRK defended itself. And so ensued the Korean War between 1950 and 1953.
The South Koreans know that in this war, the Americans dropped more bombs on North Korea than it used in the entire Pacific arena in the Second World War. They know that in this war, the United States of America dropped 635,000 tons of explosives as opposed to 503,000 in the Pacific conflict. They know that in this war, the United States of America deployed 32,557 tons of Napalm, a chemical weapon, on North Korean citizens. In this war, three point five million Koreans were killed. In this war, Pyongyang was bombed, it was carpet bombed and after three years of day-and-night humiliation, two buildings were left standing.
The South Koreans know that in this war, 20 per cent of the North Korean population was murdered by the United States of America and they know that American soldiers carried out the most barbaric atrocities, strafing air-raid shelters full of women and children, laughing as their screams filled the air as they burned to death. They know that in this war, US soldiers poured gasoline on civilians and stood back watching as they died a horrific death. The South Koreans know that in this war, US military personnel decapitated political prisoners with Samurai swords and they know that in one shelter, nine hundred women and children were incinerated. Korean children. Incinerated. As US soldiers looked on and giggled. Some say a few masturbated.
The South Koreans know that in one massacre of Koreans, 500 civilians were forced into a ditch and doused in gasoline before someone tossed in a match. The South Koreans know that American soldiers were seen pouring fuel down the air vents and they were seen setting fire to the civilians sheltering below.
The South Koreans know that the Partial Test Ban Treaty (PTBT) bans nuclear tests in the atmosphere, outer space and under water. However, the DPR Korea is not a party to this treaty. Neither is underground testing banned under the treaty, unless radiation is released into the atmosphere. The South Koreans know that the CTBT, or Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (1996) is not in force and the DPR Korea is not a party to this treaty.
The South Koreans know that the DPR Korea did sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1985. This treaty expressly bans the manufacture and testing of nuclear devices, under Article II. However, the DPR Korea withdrew from the treaty in 2003, having given notice to the UNSC, as per Article X (I) which allows for member states to withdraw from the treaty. The South Koreans know this.
The South Koreans know that the Nuclear Disarmanent Declaration made by the DPR Korea is taken as some to be legally binding. This statement was made under the fourth round of the Six-Party Talks on the DPRK nuclear weapons program (PR China, Japan, DPR Korea, Russia, Rep. Korea, USA) in 2005. The declaration by Pyongyang was not a public declaration, but rather, was an affirmation made in private negotiations with five other nations and secondly, where is the evidence that Pyongyang intended to be bound by circumstances, especially after Iraq and Libya spelled a clear lesson that if you destroy your weapons then you are invaded.
And here we get to the crux of the matter. If you destroy your weapons, Washington invades you. Ask Iraq. Ask Libya. Ask Syria (proxy invasion by western-bcked terrorists).
And if someone tries to use the UNSC (United Nations Security Council) as a legal entity or legal source, then let us ask Washington under which UN law did it invade Iraq? Or did the USA breach the UN Charter and breach international law with its invasion?
And regadring nukes, if the DPR Korea cannot have them, has anyone investigated Israel and found out whether the number of nukes it has is really 80 and with fissile material for a further 200 nuclear missiles?
The point is that the DPR Korea stands up against all these monumental injustices and these attempts to humiliate Koreans. The DPR Korea wants foreign troops off Korean soil and wants peace and reconciliation with the South. That is all they ask for. From a position of pride and dignity. The South Koreans know this and they also know in whose bed they lie.
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey
Pravda.Ru
Twitter: @TimothyBHinchey
timothy.hinchey@gmail.com
*Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey has worked as a correspondent, journalist, deputy editor, editor, chief editor, director, project manager, executive director, partner and owner of printed and online daily, weekly, monthly and yearly publications, TV stations and media groups printed, aired and distributed in Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, East Timor, Guinea-Bissau, Portugal, Mozambique and São Tomé and Principe Isles; the Russian Foreign Ministry publication Dialog and the Cuban Foreign Ministry Official Publications. He has spent the last two decades in humanitarian projects, connecting communities, working to document and catalog disappearing languages, cultures, traditions, working to network with the LGBT communities helping to set up shelters for abused or frightened victims and as Media Partner with UN Women, working to foster the UN Women project to fight against gender violence and to strive for an end to sexism, racism and homophobia. A Vegan, he is also a Media Partner of Humane Society International, fighting for animal rights. He is Director and Chief Editor of the Portuguese version of Pravda.Ru.