Online interview between Jeong Yeong-hwan & Pak Noja
The issue of the ‘comfort women’ that needs to be viewed from a post-division perspective DAY 3

Q Pak Noja asks Jeong Yeong-hwan

Dr. Jeong. I suggest that we should share a major concern and ponder upon the issue together. The issue is the most suitable way we should analyze the issue of the sexual slavery of the Japanese military bundled up together with various sex crimes and sexual violence committed by Korea as a nation for over 70 years, what perspective the movement society should have and how it should act towards the state sex crimes of the Japanese military and Korea and their relations. As you may already be aware, the ‘Korean Armed Forces’ continued to use the name 'comfort women' even during the Korean War. At that time, there were dozens of 'comfort stations' that mainly dealt with the U.S. military and the 'Korean Armed Forces', and among those female victims, there were, for example, female activists from North Korean who were kidnapped and detained by the Korean military, but the composition of the victims varied considerably. I believe that many of them were the victims of previous cases of human trafficking. Since then, the Korean state has been acting as a kind of gigantic 'pimp' for prostitution in camp villages, managing the prostitution at a state level. Certainly, that does not mean that the responsibility of the Japanese military and the Japanese state regarding the sexual slave system of the ‘comfort women’ should be relativized or be watered down, but as we may need a framework to analyze the criminality of the Korean state in conjunction with the criminality of the Japanese state/military, For example, if we identify the Korean elite who collaborated with the Japanese during the colonial era and the Republic of Korea who maintained and inherited a substantial part of the colonial governing body as a de facto successor to the Japanese Empire, then the relations between the criminality on the issue of sexual violence/prostitution and the criminality of the Japanese Empire would be logically clearer. I would like to ask what your opinion is on this. In terms of movement theory, considering the historical nature of the ‘Republic of Korea’, in my opinion, it would be more reasonable for the movement of justice for the sex slavery of the ‘comfort woman’ victims to move towards a more transnational and truly global citizenship, and your opinion on this would be most welcome, too.

A. Jeong Young-hwan answers the questions of Pak Noja.

Please see my reply to your questions today. I think that there is a framework to analyze the criminality of Korea in conjunction with that of Japan. At the same time, I have put much thought into the specific method of analyzing the sexual slavery system of the Japanese military combined with the state sexual crimes of Korea. In order to dilute the liability of the Japanese military, Japanese revisionists often talk about the atrocities of the Korean military, especially the massacre of civilians or sexual violence during the Vietnam War. However, what they never mention is that the Japanese government at the time also actively supported the policy of the US military on Vietnam, including the aerial bombardment campaign against North Vietnam, faster than anyone else. That is why the international tribunal for war crimes in Vietnam held in 1967, the so-called Russell Tribunal, acknowledged the Japanese government's complicity in the crime of aggression in the US invasion of Vietnam. The revisionists focus only on the 'comparison' to offset the wrongdoings, and completely ignore the 'relationship' between the US, Japan, and Korea during the Vietnam War, but I believe that this 'relationship' is very important.

When it comes to relationships here, the two aspects of a temporal/diachronic relationship and a spatial/contemporary relationship should be viewed in an integrated manner. It would be difficult to understand the 'comfort stations’ of the Korean military without also considering the fact that the lineage of Japanese and Manchurian military officers was passed down to the Korean military. In other words, due to the human continuity of the Japanese/Korean military, the institutionalized sexual violence of Japanese militarism was reenacted in combination with anti-communism. Examining whether this aspect stems from fascism and anti-communism, or whether it is a general feature commonly found in modern military - also examining the cases of socialist states - although it may be the next step, for me as a history researcher, it is necessary to discover these facts of violence as well as the traces of those who have blown whistles for various forms of violence and subsequently learning from them. In this sense, I believe that the experiences of the Russell Tribunal mentioned earlier or the 2000 Women's International War Crimes Tribunal discussed in Q1 should be shared to a greater extent.

Q Jeong Yeong-hwan asks Pak Noja.

In this regard, the subject I would like to ask Dr. Pak Noja is about addressing the past wrongdoings of Japan, including the issue of the 'comfort women' in the Japanese military, and the current role of the Emperor. On February 10th, the Speaker of the National Assembly, Moon Hee-sang caused controversy when he said that the Emperor should apologize for the issue of the 'comfort women' in the Japanese military. The Japanese media broke the news in opposition, but this seems to be an issue that requires a more multilateral review.

I believe that Hirohito, the previous Emperor, is clearly responsible for the war. The current Emperor, who succeeded to the status of the Emperor, cannot escape political responsibility in this regard, and in that sense, I agree that the current Emperor, the ‘son of the principal offender of war crimes’ should offer an apology among the remarks of the Speaker Moon Hee-sang. However, what I am concerned about is that if the Emperor ever seeks to visit Korea - it would be most likely after his abdication and would be staged as a kind of show for political 'reconciliation'.

The ideological function assumed by the Emperor is still powerful today in Japan. The Emperor 'consoles' those who suffer from natural disasters and the like, and 'consoles ' the 'victims' of war. The Emperor performs these actions not as a principal agent of responsibility, but in a truly detached manner beyond responsibility or rights/obligations, suppressing social contradictions and staging the illusion of 'national integration'. So far, the Emperor has perhaps consciously assumed this function, and to some extent, it has been 'successful'.

According to a poll by NHK in Japan, 79% of Japanese people answered that they considered the image of the Heisei （平成）era as 'an era of peace without war.' In fact, the Heisei era after 1989 was a new era of war, when Japan fully began to dispatch overseas troops forbidden by Article 9 of the Constitution and switched from a 'base nation' to a 'dispatching nation'.

Shortly after the September 11 attacks in 2001, the Emperor offered condolences to the US Ambassador to Japan, whilst in 2004, he delivered a message to the then-US Vice President Cheney that he wanted the Japan Self-Defense Forces to contribute towards the happiness of Iranians, thereby supporting decorating a series of US-led military actions of Japan as a ‘dispatching nation’. Even Japanese liberal intellectuals never criticize the functions of the Emperor, but rather regard the Emperor as a 'symbol of peace' against Prime Minister Abe. In this sense, I believe the Emperor's ideological function of 'integration' has been growing deeper than ever since the war.

I am deeply concerned that the Emperor's visit to Korea in such a situation would not help to address the issue, but rather result in an exemption of the Emperor, who was the chief ruler of colonial rule. What do you have to say on this matter.

A. Pak Noja answers to the question of Jeong Yeong-hwan.

Dr. Jeong, thank you for your valuable comments. This question raises many important implications. First of all, it is a clear historical fact that Hirohito was a war criminal. It is also the opinion in accord among senior researchers such as Herbert P. Bix, who wrote the famous critical biography of Hirohito, and many indeed believed so in the US military immediately after the war. The evasion of any semblance of war responsibility of the Emperor was nothing more than a political judgment (the beginning of a new link with Japanese conservatives) and not a legal judgment. Therefore, 'the son of the principal offender of war' is not an incorrect statement as it is a simple fact.

Yes, I share your concerns, too. As you mentioned, the Emperor's conservative function “national integration” remains strong, and there are still quite a few politicians trying to stage a political “Korea-Japan reconciliation show” in Korea. It may be slightly different from Japan, but the ruling class of Korea still displays considerable division on foreign affairs. Liberals currently in power are rather passive about the “US-Japan-Korea alliance triangle” emphasized by the Obama administration in the past, as they focus instead on reconciliation and cooperation between the two Koreas. When it comes to alliances, it appears that they only consider the Korea-US alliance but not the alliance ‘triangle’. This is because China, who will play a key role in the North-South reconciliation project, does not welcome the alliance ‘triangle’, and also because the image is not well received among those who vote for the liberals. However, the liberals represented by the Democratic Party are only a branch of Korean politics. In addition to this, several factions with far-right inclinations represented by the Liberty Korea Party among others still exercise considerable influence, and in particular, they have secured considerable support from the military and special state agencies (such as intelligence agencies). Even the liberals cannot completely ignore the intentions of the far right. That is why, for example, the liberal regime cannot pardon the former member of the National Assembly Lee Seok-ki against the positive opposition of the far right. As for the far right, most of them support the US-Japan-Korea alliance triangle.

Therefore, if the far-right returns to power, or if the liberal regime pushed into the position of a lame-duck feels too constrained by the far right, then they may stage the show of the ‘Emperor's visit to Korea’ or the resultant show of ‘reconciliation’ at any time. Shows like these will, above all, severely violate the human rights of victims. For victims who have not yet received any compensation or proper apologies at a state level, or any guarantee for the prevention of a recurrence, the show of 'reconciliation’ will be nothing more than an act of 'violence in the name of reconciliation' as Dr. Suh Kyong-sik pointed out yesterday. It is critical for the social movement camp in Korea to bear this possibility in mind and to accurately communicate their definite intent of opposition to the political circles and society in advance.