June 30, 2001	atimes.com

The Koreas The Berlin Wall and the 38th parallel By Petra Kolonko Drawing historical comparisons is inevitably a risky undertaking, and the case of German and Korean unification is no exception. There are, however, enough similarities to provide a clue to future developments, beginning with the fact that South Korean president Kim Dae-jung was, and is, an admirer of Willy Brandt. He has often held the former German Chancellor as a model, and his Ostpolitik as an inspiration, for his own "Sunshine" policies. And just like Brandt before him, Kim Dae-jung's efforts have been rewarded with that most prestigious of awards - the Nobel Peace Prize. There are certainly other similarities between the two men, not least that both were regarded suspiciously by their domestic political rivals. In the case of Brandt, his background as an anti-fascist activist during the Hitler years, his exile, and his charismatic personality made him an outstanding, though not necessarily accepted, politician. Brandt faced tough opposition for his Ostpolitik and its emphasis on reconciliation with Germany's eastern neighbors. Naturally, such a policy towards the German Democratic Republic, as East Germany was then called, was controversial. The (West) German constitution called for an eventual reunification of the German state, and many of Brandt's conservative critics feared that Brandt was neglecting this goal and actually selling out to the communists. He was branded a traitor and accused of being a communist agent. This criticism had some merit: East Germany was an extremely repressive state tightly attached to the then powerful Soviet Union. The East Germans had built a wall dividing the two states, replete with machine guns, mines, barbed wire and guards with orders to shoot all who attempted to escape. Hundreds were murdered trying to defect to the West. In East German prisons, political prisoners were tortured, and the infamous Stasi, the internal state police, kept a covert watch over the entire society. The worst suspicions concerning their activities were confirmed after unification when the Stasi files were opened. The East German army was part of the Warsaw Pact that threatened not only Germany's eastern frontier but the Western world as well. To deal with such people was, for many, a serious political error, and, indeed, Brandt's Nobel Peace Prize in 1971 was not greeted with unanimous approval. On the other hand, Kim Dae-jung's Nobel Peace Prize invoked a great outpouring of pride in South Korea. This feeling of pride did not last long, and soon criticism of the president's domestic and foreign policies were heard again. Kim Dae-jung's background, like Brandt, is also extraordinary. As a dissident under the military rulers of South Korea, he spent long stretches of time in jail, and once, while in exile, he narrowly escaped an assassination attempt. His campaign abroad for the democratization of his country was considered traitorous by the ruling conservatives, and it was not until South Korea became a fully democratic country that he was recognized as a political force - suspiciously so by the political establishment. Nevertheless, he was elected president in 1997, and had the opportunity to offer a new and fresh approach to the unification issue: talks were proposed, aggressive rhetoric was cooled down, South Korean business was able to invest in projects in the North, food aid was sent to a starving population, and a summit meeting was put on the table. The North, meanwhile, took its time reacting, and, in fact, appeared to not be impressed by these gestures from the new South Korean president. It remained as hostile as ever right up to the point where it finally agreed to a summit, and Kim Dae-jung travelled to Pyongyang for an historic meeting with the North's leader Kim Jong-il. When Kim Dae-jung arrived in Pyongyang, the streets were lined with tens of thousands of cheering Koreans waving flags and wearing their best traditional costumes. They cheered because they were told to. The great and powerful leader had ordered a welcome for the Southern president, and since spontaneous talks with the participants on the street were forbidden, it was impossible to know if the crowds were truly happy to see the leader of the "other" Korea - a Korea whose history, given to them by the Stalinist regime, was lopsided and simply horrifying. Kim Dae-jung was known to the populace of the North as a puppet of the imperialist United States, a land that exploited its workers and where its masses were leading miserable lives. In contrast, when Willy Brandt made his first historic visit to East Germany there were, of course, the usual welcoming committees, but, more importantly, there were spontaneous gatherings - people demanding to see Brandt, and they pinned their hopes for political change on the visit of the Western leader. Therein lies the key difference between German and Korean separation. At the time, East Germans were quite aware of what was happening in the West. They could listen to West German and American radio stations, and in some cases even watch West German television. There was contact between divided families; letters, although censored, were allowed. As a result of Ostpolitik, West Germans were able to travel to the East to see relatives. All of this has yet to happen in Korea. The Korean people suffer a much harder separation than that endured by the Germans. Korea was separated after a war of almost biblical destruction. For 40 years, both sides complained bitterly about the cruel separation of families, and yet they did everything in their power to continue it. Security was the invariable excuse - North and South, to this day, are technically in a state of war. There were no letters exchanged or other private contacts. Most of the divided Korean families do not even know if their relatives are still alive. There is no travel across the border. The Demilitarized Zone is a border just as deadly as that built by the East German communists. The few family reunions that took place recently as a result of the summit meeting were sad, somewhat tragic affairs as opposed to anything joyous; carefully selected, carefully orchestrated, and carefully organized, the relatives had to meet in hotels under the glaring lights of cameras. The South held a lottery to select the participants. Not only was there no lottery in the North, the regime handpicked hundreds of members from its elite. There are still 100,000 separated families awaiting some word from relatives, and, although the North has agreed to build a railroad track across the border, no letters between families can cross. Not only is the pace of progress slow and often strictly on the North's terms, the North Korean regime expects to be paid for every concession made. There will certainly be a price to pay for every humanitarian concession to come. This was true, as well, for Germany. The West German government paid enormous amounts for transport access, for building roads, and for the release of political prisoners to the West. There's no doubt that West German money benefited the regime in the East. In addition, there was an ideological price to pay: the concessions came close to a de facto recognition of the East German state, the ultimate goal of the East German communist leaders. Although the times may have changed, the dilemma remains the same. Any move towards reconciliation and recognition, any payment in whatever form to the communists, may, in the end, stabilize a regime that terrorizes its population and is a threat to the security of the outside world. The North Korean state, with its immense army, is on the brink of economic collapse. Will South Korean and Western money help it survive? Food aid keeps arriving; eventually, there will be foreign investment earmarked for a Stalinist regime which thinks first of its own survival and not of its own people. So there is criticism of Kim Dae-jung in South Korea, saying that he pays too much money for too little change. The same criticism was voiced in Germany, and it is difficult to guess how the Ostpolitik initiated by Brandt would have turned out had it not been for a man named Michail Gorbachov. Historians and politicians are forever debating whether it was Ostpolitik that softened East Germany from the inside, allowing contacts to be made with the West and eventually bringing about the fall of the communist regime, or whether it was the strong-arm power politics represented by American president Ronald Reagan, or whether it was the changes in the Soviet government itself. German partition was the centerpiece of European partition; once the Soviet Union or, rather, Gorbachov, gave his consent to unification, the entire Eastern block collapsed. North Korea is no longer a part of a bloc, and its only ally, China, is a reluctant one. In recent years, the Chinese government has carefully distanced itself from its former friend, and it has even established relations with South Korea, a crucially important economic partner and major source of foreign investment. The North Koreans, in the eyes of the Chinese, have become like a beggar - a strategically important one, but a beggar nonetheless. The fact that Kim Jong-il came to China before he made his big decision on the Korea Summit could be an indication that North Korea listens to Chinese advice. Perhaps the Chinese advised him to open his country to the outside world and initiate economic reforms along the lines of the Chinese government. Whatever the Chinese-North Korean relationship, it would undoubtedly be a stretch of the imagination to state that the Chinese leaders have the same influence over Kim Jong-il and his regime as Gorbachov had over the East German state. Nor is it possible to compare the economic situation of North Korea and East Germany. The East German state was one of the most developed in the Eastern bloc whereas North Korea cannot even be considered an industrial nation. Undoubtedly, the cost argument concerning unification is a powerful and sobering one for South Korea. If they complain about the costs of small gestures at present (and they do), they must realize that the price of eventual unification will be staggering. This is a cost that will be carried almost exclusively by the South Koreans, and they are well aware of how astronomical that cost was to the West Germans. In accepting the Nobel Peace Prize, Kim Dae-jung cautioned that Korean unification was still a long way away, and that it would take decades, not years, to accomplish it. Such a long transition might well be in the interest of not only North and South Korea, but of the delicate balance of power in the region in general. A unified Korea would irrevocably alter the alliances that now exist in Asia, just as German unification changed East and West relations and the entire balance within Western Europe. China would no longer have North Korea serving as a buffer to the Western world, and, if it is indeed true that Kim Jong-il has agreed to allowing the substantial United States military presence to remain in South Korea, China would face the unpleasant sight of American troops on its border. Not only would Nato's Partnership for Peace be approaching from the West, but China would have an Eastern boundary to worry about. And the situation grows ever more complicated if, despite a relaxing of tensions on the Korean peninsula, the United States went ahead with its plans for a Theater Missile Defense in East Asia. China could only logically conclude that the system was aimed at itself. At the same time, Japan has used the North Korean military threat as a practical justification for closer military cooperation with the United States. The truth is, however, that Japan has a deep mistrust of Chinese military power. With North Korea out of the picture, the gap between China and Japan would grow ever wider. There are obvious economic considerations that argue for a slow Korean unification process, and there is the stability of the region as a whole to consider. But compared to German unification, there is one crucial factor which may very well delay Korean unification indefinitely: there has been absolutely no change within North Korea, and after resisting any form of change for 50 years, it is highly unlikely that Kim Jong-il's regime will suddenly show a different face. It is significant to recall that from the time Willy Brandt began his Ostpolitik and won his Nobel Prize, it took almost two decades before the last remnants of the wall crumbled. Previous articles in this Heartland series on the issues relating to the Korean peninsula include: * Fig leaf (Jun 15) * A Chinese viewpoint (Jun 15) * The price of uncertainty: What Koreans want (Jun 20) ((c) Heartland. This version has been edited by Asia Times Online.) To subscribe to Heartland, please email cassanpress@sina.com

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