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Five U.S. lawmakers with the House International Relations Committee, including its chairman Henry Hyde, on Thursday wrote to President Roh Moo-hyun saying if violent attempts to topple the statue of U.S. general Douglas MacArthur continue, "we would respectfully request that rather than allow the general's statue to be defaced or torn down, the people of Incheon and all of South Korea turn over the statue of general MacArthur to the American people." The lawmakers expressed unease about reports over the last couple of months of violent assaults on the statue, and said Congress and the American people could not countenance having the hero who twice led Allied forces to liberate Korea called a war criminal.
The feelings of Americans watching the controversy over the statue are only natural. When a nation where 50 years ago many of your young people died in a war to protect the freedom of a country hardly anyone had heard of calls the man who in a way symbolizes all of them a war criminal, a murderer and an enemy of unification; when you can expect his statue to be toppled any moment; wouldn¡¯t you be furious?
It is short-sighted to indulge in anti-American movements to your heart's content in Korea but hope that no anti-Korean sentiment pops up in the United States. Two years ago, broadcaster CBS brought the American public a scene of Eighth U.S. Army commander Gen. Charles C. Campbell pouring out his feelings when he watched the U.S. flag torn down and burnt during anti-American protests in Korea. The public outcry that resulted made its way into the media and Congress, and is now having a decisive influence on U.S. policy decisions. The MacArthur statue issue, too, has now become a Congressional issue, and the day is not far off when it will influence White House policy.
If we are to stop the MacArthur debate from becoming a new bone of contention between South Korea and the U.S., our government must take a clear position on the issue and resolutely confront any attempt to remove the statue. The U.S. is naturally more concerned about what the ruling forces are thinking than about the claims by those who want the statue torn down. But Washington, too, must resist an emotional response. With both the Korean government and the vast majority of Koreans denouncing attempts to topple the statue, phrases in the U.S. lawmakers' letter like "liberating Korea twice" are apt to hurt Korean pride.
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