hankyoreh

Defense Minister Lee Sang-hee recently created controversy when he said, “Among the newly-conscripted soldiers, there are a significant number of people who regard 60 years of the Republic of Korea as a history of collaborators and flunkies and the military as a tool of governance by the establishment, along with other people who have biased perceptions of the nation, the nation’s enemies and history.”

Lee’s remarks were made on Monday during a meeting with some 140 top military generals including Kim Tae-young, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and chiefs of staff of the army, navy and air force. “The military should turn them into strong warriors and healthy democratic citizens with a firm perception of the nation,” Lee said.

Regarding the defense minister’s remarks about the “biased perceptions” of new conscripts, one defense ministry official said, “According to a recent survey, 35 percent of elementary school students said the Korean War began because South Korea invaded the North. Four years ago, 34 percent of newcomers at the Korea Military Academy answered their main enemy was the United States.” The official said the minister’s remark accurately describes the education that many newly-conscripted soldiers receive prior to beginning their military service.

Kim Jong-dae, the chief editor of the monthly magazine D&D Focus, said, “Democratic citizens should be able to have various opinions, but Minister Lee Sang-hee is forcing soldiers to have a certain perception of history and the nation. It is an anachronistic idea that infringes on a soldier’s freedom of ideology and conscience and is similar to the New Right’s claims about the need to ‘correct left-leaning history education.’”

Lee also commented on inter-Korean relations. “With the perception that ‘in the era of inter-Korean exchange and cooperation, there will be no provocations from North Korea,’ some have criticized the military’s basic mission of dealing with all military contingencies as unnecessary and likely to provoke North Korea into action,” Lee said.

The remark was seen as a rebuttal against the criticism that careless remarks by high-ranking military officials have made inter-Korean relations, already shaky, worse. In March, Kim Tae-young, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the military needs to launch preemptive strikes on nuclear sites in North Korea. Recently, Defense Minister Lee said China should be banned from engaging North Korea if the North becomes mired in an emergency. However, the defense minister has been criticized for neglecting his role, as a member of the diplomatic and security team, of steadily managing inter-Korean relations.

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