I get the feeling that South Koreans are a lot less keen to be unified than West Germans were before the cold war ended, probably justifiably so.
There was at least some exchange between West and East, nothing like the complete isolation of North Korea. East Germans could just turn on their TV and watch some West German television when they wanted to compare systems. (Areas the West German TV signals couldn’t reach were called “Valleys of the Clueless” :) East Germany was also one of the most “progressive” eastern bloc states, supposed to be a showcase for actually existing socialism. And, as far as tyrannies go, one of the milder ones, while Kim Jong-il is all the way up there with Hitler and Stalin.
Then there is time: East Germany survived for forty years, North Korea is in its seventh decade. It survived the last twenty years without a cold war keeping it alive (except the one between North and South Korea, I guess).
The German unification cost billions and caused many problems. By no means an easy process that’s now, twenty years after it started, by no means completely finished. So I kind of can understand South Koreans who are weary of the prospect of unification. Unification did work out ok. I don’t know whether that would have been the case had East Germany been a lot more like North Korea.
Most every South Korean wants reunification at some point. But the truth of it is that the current generation doesn't really think about North Korea much. Those that do cite the the German experiment as an example of a very cautionary tale about reunification.
This of course despite the fact that many older generation Koreans would feel compelled to have some kind of punishment for the "communists" (in quotes because the word is abused in South Korea by the older generation to the point of being meaningless) and their various crimes against the South. Of course this would further complicate reunification.
I think beyond just hearing what South Koreans say, look at what they do. The Kaesong Industrial Area is cited in the South as a way to try and drag at least some portion of the North's populace into the 21st century. Because if reunification of any type did happen, the consensus is that they are virtually without any useful skill to the South. Ultimately, reunification means that the Northerners will have to become productive, job holding, members of society. All of the BS they spend time drilling on in school, like the great works of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jung Il and learning how to perform in mass games and create propaganda ballets about dam construction, are absolutely meaningless in a modern industrialized world. If the two Koreas reunified tomorrow, they would have to figure out what to do with 20 million unskilled laborers.
The bright side is that the pragmatists see this as a way of perpetuating the cheap labor pool requirements for an export driven economy. South Korea has started bringing in labor from places like Indonesia, Nepal, Vietnam, etc. because they can use these laborers on low waged manufacturing jobs. If 20 million North Koreans suddenly became available, it would greatly simplify things (in theory) for the manufacturing chaebols in the South. They'd simply bus in Northerners at $10-20/day to build TVs and Ships and Construction equipment and all the other odds and ends that South Korea needs to produce to stay wealthy. Kaesong is supposed to be laying the ground work for that eventual day.
I think likely, if the regime collapsed in the North, they'd move to keep the two countries in place, but with very close economic ties, (perhaps like the U.S. and Canada, with a lax border) for at least a couple generations and use the North as a cheap labor pool and industrial center very similar to how many countries use China. Once the standard of living increased in the North to the point that the South could reasonably absorb the North, and/or the Northerners were demanding wages too high to keep the export model afloat, they'd probably reunify.
“I think likely, if the regime collapsed in the North, they'd move to keep the two countries in place, but with very close economic ties, (perhaps like the U.S. and Canada, with a lax border) for at least a couple generations …”
That’s exactly what some people in West Germany and also East Germany proposed after the fall of the Berlin Wall. It ultimately didn’t happen but that was a real debate.
I was in South Korea last month and there's a few different attitudes. There's a general sense that there should be one Korea at some point or other, though people disagree on the particulars based on what they focus on when they think about it.
Some people think the opportunities for manufacturing and development in North Korea are going to be great and are excited to have more Korean companies do their manufacturing in NK instead of China going forwards.
Many of the younger people are excited about the idea of no longer needing two years of mandatory military service, which is currently required mostly because of the North Korean threat (the older generation was more patriotic towards military service, the younger generation seems to see it as a bit more of a burden).
Some people are afraid of the ripple effect on the economy, in fact a lot of the Koreans I asked were aware of the West Germany/East Germany example you mentioned.
The general sentiment seems to be about 50/50 - half in favor of unification the sooner the better, half in favor of having North Korea as a separate state but with much friendlier and greater cooperation between them, and with a better government in the North. The older people seem more in favor of a short term unification, the younger people seem more disposed towards having North Korea be a separate state until they're ready to join back up.
Everyone - everyone in South Korea hates Kim Jong-il, and most people seem kind of embarassed and blush when you mention him.
There's a general sense that there should be one Korea at some point or other
This is a quite popular opinion to express publicly, but I think the support for it is rather shallow. When push comes to shove, unifying Korea would have immediate economic impacts to South Koreans more severe than the United States swallowing Mexico.
(South Korea has 48 million people who have essentially Italian living standards. North Korea has 23 million people and is desperately poor. The day the border goes down every man under the age of thirty in North Korea would try to cross to South Korea, looking for any available job. That historically does not endear large immigration populations to their host nations.)
I agree. This gives us the prospect of a democratic nation with internal passports and a border where you'll be shot for trying to cross. I don't think that is likely, which is why I'm pessimistic about the odds of reunification.
Archgoon got it in one. I have an East Asian Studies degree, but most Americans don't, so when I discuss the current or historical economies of East Asian countries I usually use a North American or European frame of reference. ("Japan in 1960 was substantially poorer than Mexico" works very effectively to get someone's attention.)
Everyone - everyone in South Korea hates Kim Jong-il, and most people seem kind of embarassed and blush when you mention him.
What about this, which came from B.R. Myers's book "The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves and Why It Matters":
"Even in South Korea there are those who feel the Kim Jong-il regime, under which they themselves could not live for a single day, to be somehow more "authentically" Korean."
It covers about a year in the life of a family who have two young girls training in preparation for the Mass Games. Utterly compelling and handles a very difficult subject matter with sensitivity and without passing judgement.
I looked at the BBC video embedded there. I noticed the DELL logos. It makes me wonder how the DELL logo is explained to the students who encounter it. Are they told DELL is a Korean company? Do they wonder why they don't see that hardware elsewhere?
Having the benefit of hindsight in looking at outside interventions elsewhere (Africa, Iraq, Afghanistan etc ) I think that maybe the best thing would be for all other countries (including China) to stop interfering in North korea. It's not possible of course
I agree, this is something Koreans (both North and South) will have to fight for themselves (only "fighting" metaphorically hopefully). Korea has a history of being oppressed by various other nations and the official ideology of North Korea ("Juche") is basically, amongst other things, saying "f*ck you" to the rest of the world. People are actually serious about it, it's not just some propaganda. Clearly, in a situation like this, foreign intervention is possibly not the best way forward.
I agree in theory, but I'm reminded of a quote by Trotsky - "You might not be interested in war, but war is interested in you."
North Korea is on China's borders, thousands of people each month sneak into China from North Korea, and their crazopathic government is next door to China no matter what. I think China being very mildly pro-NK is a case of "Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer." North Korea is probably the biggest potential threat to China if relations were to break down between them.
The documentary mentions that North Korea survives thanks to food from the World Food Programme. Cut all imports, and I wonder how long the régime would last when even the army starts starving to death.
Of course, it's possible millions of people would die in the process.
This is something that always puzzles me. How come it's accepted as a given that countries cannot seal their borders.
The Soviet Bloc were pretty good at it
EDIT also the border between north and south korea is pretty tight
The Eastern Block wasn't that good at all at sealing borders. Many millions of people have emigrated to the West from Eastern Europe during the Cold War.
Wikipaedia says 13.3 million crossed east to west europe between 1950 and 1990, 75% of this movement was sanctioned so that makes for 4 million irregular crossings or about 100,000 per year. Currently the US is estimated to have 11.5 million illegal immigrants with about 0.5 million entering each year
The UK is an island but our borders have more holes than a colander. Illegal immigration and people smuggling are a huge issue here, and a political hot potato. The problem must be 10x worse for countries with land borders.
I don't buy this.
What's lacking is the political will to secure the borders of the UK. If the UK is so porous then how come Germany wasn't able to stroll over in 1940.
People have been told that's it's impossible to keep out illegals and through repetition and the evidence of their eyes have come to believe it.
Meanwhile in 'nice areas' the only illegals visible are the domestic servants who would otherwise be unaffordable.
If countries are as helpless to prevent immigration as is generally implied then we might as well dismantle borders altogether.
> If the UK is so porous then how come Germany wasn't able to stroll over in 1940.
A few thousand unorganised migrant workers who are trying to smuggle themselves in with no more than a suitcase each and try to hide in the corners of soceity when they get there is quite different from a massive uniformed army with tanks and trucks who then try to take over the running of the government when they get here.
Also the army was legally allowed and ordered to shoot the Germans who were trying to come over, whereas they is not the political will to shoot migrant workers.
It's not the will to shoot illegals that's needed, simply the will to implement the law as it stands by putting in the necessary resources into border policing and deporting those illegals who are discovered. Almost all illegals into the UK entered as paying passengers, ie they needed a ticket. If commercial carriers can police their passageways why can't the government police the doorways to those routes?
This is a preview of the future without oil. The North Koreans lost all their oil subsidies from the Soviets in the early 90s. That's why they had the famines in the 90s, nobody drives cars and why there are no tractors.
The list of search results displayed from the DPRK's search engine was interesting. The query "handbook" brought up quite a few hits on IBM's Websphere Application Server, and even a guide on deploying UMTS towers. Does anyone have more information on how the country's network access works?
Anyone know why NK keep letting these videos get made, even though it makes them look like total douche bags? Do they really believe something good would come out of it?
I doubt that's anywhere near as significant as the hard foreign currency they get via arms (and technology) trade (a circa $100 mil/year business at least).
Everyone already knows that they are "total douche bags", so allowing these videos does little harm. But by allowing these videos NK can show that they are opening up and being progressive etc. which helps foreign relations.
"Look, we are the good guys, we have changed. We even allowed that one video."
I hold that the existence of North Korea, and it's conditions, makes a mockery of the United Nations. How can the world community of nations allow a country like that to exist and treat it's people like that? Why do supposedly "good" and civilized nations allow that to continue? Yes it might require military action to end it. But perhaps it would be worth it in order to reduce the suffering of 20+ million people.
This is a highly simplistic analysis, if for no other reason that any attempt to use force to rectify the situation will result in the needless death of likely thousands of innocent South Koreans.
... as opposed to the millions who have probably died under North Korean misrule, and the thousands or millions more who will likely also die in the future due to it?
I disagree it's a simplistic analysis, and I even disagree that a "simple" analysis is inherently bad. But I think we both agree that people dying is a bad thing.
I would agree with you... unfortunately, there's only one thing that complicates the matters: nuclear weapons. If attacked, NK would of course be overwhelmed - but not before doing some massive and catastrophic damage to their near and not so near neighbors.
Nuclear weapons hardly change the balance of the equation even.
So much of South Korea's population lives in the Seoul metropolitan area and within range of hardened, well-hidden North Korean artillery that it makes it a near certainty that any hot-war on the peninsula would come at the price of hundreds of thousands to millions of South Korean deaths. Add in nuclear weapons, unconventional warfare (who knows how many sleeper terrorist agents the DPRK has in the South), and conventional battlefield losses and you get a horrific butcher's bill on both sides for any likely engagement. Stacked against that the ongoing horror visited on North Korea's citizens by its own regime is not enough to warrant such sacrifices, sad as that is.
There was at least some exchange between West and East, nothing like the complete isolation of North Korea. East Germans could just turn on their TV and watch some West German television when they wanted to compare systems. (Areas the West German TV signals couldn’t reach were called “Valleys of the Clueless” :) East Germany was also one of the most “progressive” eastern bloc states, supposed to be a showcase for actually existing socialism. And, as far as tyrannies go, one of the milder ones, while Kim Jong-il is all the way up there with Hitler and Stalin.
Then there is time: East Germany survived for forty years, North Korea is in its seventh decade. It survived the last twenty years without a cold war keeping it alive (except the one between North and South Korea, I guess).
The German unification cost billions and caused many problems. By no means an easy process that’s now, twenty years after it started, by no means completely finished. So I kind of can understand South Koreans who are weary of the prospect of unification. Unification did work out ok. I don’t know whether that would have been the case had East Germany been a lot more like North Korea.