Week 9: Kim and Jager

In the Jager article, I was intrigued by the story Park Geun-byung teaches his students that depicts the USA as a dragon keeping the lovers on either side of the river from meeting. It is so interesting to learn about the way different countries educate students about their own, and other's, history. Honestly, the Korean War and Korean history were all but ignored in my schooling. However, from what I was taught, and most of what mainstream press has espoused, I was under the impression that the relations between ROK and DPRK were far more antagonistic and fragle than Jager's article suggests. I am then driven to wonder about the benefits to US foreign policy and military strategy that such a depiction may result in. I suppose a strong and dangerous DPRK and a weak, helpless ROK support the US power plays in the region, and allows for stronger rhetoric against nuclear development in DPRK and anti-communist sentiment. I am deeply disturbed by these likely possibilites, and by the foreign policy strategy they suggest, and how that US strategy functions around the globe, not just in relation to Korea. The state-centered security and military theory as is applies to US-Korean relations seems to be a distortion of reality, and I am bothered by learning of yet another instance where what I always believed to be true is only a version of reality, and one that promotes a sincerely "American" agenda.