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A recent survey asked people which country they believes most threatens Korea's security. 33 percent named North Korea, and 39 percent named the United States. Among people in their twenties, 58 percent said the U.S. was the bigger threat, while only 20 percent cited the North. If we were to act upon the results of that survey, then the U.S. should be considered the Republic of Korea's main adversary, instead of North Korea.
This utterly amazing perception of our security situation by the people could, in certain circumstances, have frightful results. Diplomacy and security are areas of specialty, but they nevertheless work within the range of what is permitted by the people's understanding of events and how they feel about them. History is full of episodes where countries have made poor diplomatic judgments, such as the choosing of allies and adversaries, and found their very existences threatened. We experienced a similar unfortunate turn of events one hundred years ago.
The North Korean Workers' Party platform supersedes the North's constitution, and it calls for the communization of the South. Of the North's more than one million regular forces, two thirds are forward deployed in a attack posture. The North is developing nuclear arms.
Despite this, when it comes to the North Korean nuclear issue the government and various areas in our society have continued to unilaterally call for the U.S. to exercise self-restraint, instead of calling for the North to changes its ways. The airwaves are flooded with programs inciting anti-American sentiment, but it has become truly hard to find anything discussing the threat that is North Korea, from the perspective of security. In classrooms of all grade levels, the North is described as an object of reconciliation and cooperation, while the United States is always portrayed as belligerent. Many people are dumbfounded by these survey results, which can be said to be the necessary result of the unilateral direction of the comments and actions of our society's learned individuals.
Part of the reason for these mistaken views of the younger generation is the interpretation of history that is the backlash response of those who oppressed under the authoritarian regimes of the past. This deranged state of public opinion probably will not figure itself out easily, as some of the most representative figures of the same interpretation of history are honored as friends of the current government or social elders. But unless we set the people's security consciousness straight by making the right choices of ally and adversary, there can be no telling when this country will find itself at a serious crossroads.
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