# NIS 41B, South Korea, Country Profile/A Shrimp Among Whales

​A Shrimp Among Whales (u/ou)
Wardship, however, is nothing new to Korea. The pattern of the "client-state" has prevailed throughout most of the peninsula's long history. China was the patron, and the relationship was specifically cast in Confucian terms of the mutual obligations of elder and younger brother. In practice, this usually meant a fairly flexible relationship and considerable autonomy for the Korean protege. Although the Korean kings received their authority at the hands of the Chinese emperor and followed his lead in foreign policy, Korea largely retained control of its internal affairs. At times, particularly early in the history of the Korean monarchy and near its end, when China was weak, efforts were made to assert full independence from foreign rule, but the most part Korea had to temper its course in deference to greater power on its frontiers.
This subservient role was forced on Korea by geography. In the history of East Asia, the Korean Peninsula has been a critical crossroads where larger and stronger powers have seesawed back and forth in centuries of struggle. The welfare and wishes of the Koreans, even after they had come to constitute a relatively sizable nation, were almost invariably ignored. The ambitions and quarrels of its larger neighbors have thus brought the unhappy peninsula more than its share of bridgeheads, battlefields, and buffer states.
Since prehistoric times nomads from Central Asia have collided with the more settled peoples on the eastern fringes of the Asian continent and invaded the Korean peninsula; some even pushed on and crossed the sea to Japan. Refugees from ancient dynastic struggles in China escaped to Korea, and were subsequently followed by invading Chinese armies. To hold the northern half of the peninsula, the Chinese planted a flourishing colony in northwestern Korea which introduced the civilization of China to the Koreans and served as a buffer against the northern barbarians from approximately 100 B.C. to A.D. 300. From then until the late 19th century, the rulers of China usually retained paramount influence in Korea without any direct presence there. Since early in the Christian era the Japanese also sought intermittently to exert control over part or all of the peninsula—on occasion as a bridgehead and base for operations against China. In the late 19th century colossal Tsarist Russia came into the contest in its search for warm-water ports in the Far East. In two short wars around the turn of the 20th century Japan defeated both China and Russia, with hapless Korea as a battleground and the eventual victim. The peninsula's pivotal position has brought little but suffering to its people, who have a proverb, "When whales fight, the shrimp suffers."
In one sense, however, geography has helped the Koreans by providing clear natural frontiers within which a remarkably homogenous population developed at an early date possessing a strong sense of separate identity. Deeply entrenched rivers and rough mountainous terrain along the peninsula's long northern base impede easy access from the Asian mainland. On the other three sides, Korea is separated from its neighbors by wide stretches of the Yellow and East China Seas and by the Sea of Japan. Except for sporadic raids from China and Japan in ancient and medieval times and a major Japanese invasion in the late 16th century, the encircling seas remained largely inviolate until the latter half of the 19th century, when French, U.S., and Japanese warships penetrated "Hermit Kingdom" waters.
Within the well-defined confines of their peninsula the ancient Koreans developed a distinct and remarkable uniformity of physique, language, and culture that clearly sets them apart from their neighbors. With few resident foreigners and no minorities, the Koreans, North and South, constitute perhaps the most homogenous of the major ethnic groups possessing independent (if divided) statehood today. Numbering almost 50 million, the Koreans are the 13th largest ethnic group in the world today. The ​Korean language, temperament, dress, and cuisine are distinct and contrast sharply with those of their neighbors. The proverbial quick temper and volatility of the Koreans contribute to that rebellious spirit which has won them the sobriquet, "the Irish of the East," and has helped preserve their independent identity in the face of foreign encroachment.
Altough mountains and waters clearly demarcate the peninsula for its inhabitants, these natural features also produce more than a dozen topographic divisions in the South alone which make central control and communication difficult. The South is almost as mountainous as the North, with the major mountain chain running along the east coast and sending a spur southwestward down the middle of the peninsula. Hilly or mountainous terrain takes up at least three-fourths of the country's area. Offshore South Korea has more than 600 inhabited islands, several of them 60 miles or more at sea; the largest and most important of all is Cheju-do, a separate province in the East China Sea.
Despite such geographic diversity—or perhaps because of its potential threat to political unity—Korean rulers early imposed a remarkable measure of political and cultural homogeneity. Customs, behavior, dress, and even folklore have usually borne the standardized stamp of the capital as a result of the ruler's policy, which frequently included regular rotation or exile of court officials to all parts of the country. The basic belief of the North Asian population, shamanism—still widespread today—was carefully overlaid with higher religions from China, first Buddhism and then Confucianism, which were also used to support centralized control.
Although the systematic introduction of Confucianism as the court philosophy caused some friction with the vested interests of Buddhism when a new dynasty took power in the 14th century, it never led to any serious division of the country. Confucianism cultivated a uniform pattern of behavior and the sense of belonging to a homogeneous, if hierarchal, family of all Koreans. Many Buddhists continued to practice their faith in peace, as much later a small but rapidly increasing minority of Christians could, after an initial period of fierce official persecution. As in China and Japan, the people of Korea have been generally tolerant of all religions except when they appeared to be linked to the political ambitions of foreign powers.
The Confucian code had the most profound impact of all the aspects of Chinese civilization borrowed by Korea. Not only did it serve to provide the pattern governing Korea's relations with China but it also produced the ethical foundation and the hierarchic framework for Korean society. Korean etiquette came to be rigidly molded along Confucian lines, helping to curb and control the boisterous ebullience and rebelliousness of the Korean temperament so that in most circumstances Koreans strove to maintain a staid sobriety or a patient stoicism. Above all, Confucianism served to buttress the claims of the state.
The need of a strong, central authority apparently became manifest very early in Korean history, well before the adoption of Confucianism. It arose from centuries of struggle between the small entities which first contested control of the central and southern parts of the Peninsula. Such contests soon invited the intervention of outside powers. About the third century A.D., three clans of tribal groups, known collectively as Han, shared control of the tip of the peninsula. Their name survives today in the official title taken by South Korea; Taehan Minguk, (Great Han People's Country). One of these clans had close ties to, and probably support from, Japan. It was eventually defeated and incorporated into a kingdom of Silla built up by its rival to the east. When Japanese influence shifted to a second kingdom in the southwest, Silla sought Chinese aid against the kingdom and a third one to the north. During the three centuries of this "Three Kingdom Era" it became clear to the Koreans that their internal rivalries were being exploited to aggrandize foreign powers, a lesson they have not yet forgotten. Silla managed to unify most of the peninsula in the late seventh century with Chinese aid, and then forced CHina to withdraw its armies, allowing Silla to become tributary but autonomous, a Confucian younger brother.
Silla's success inaugurated a golden age with a brilliant efflorescence of art and learning under ​Chinese Buddhist influence. All Koreans look back with pride to this period, particularly the South Koreans who since 1950 see in the unification of the peninsula launched from Silla's original "Pusan perimeter" in the extreme southeast an auspicious augury for our day.
During the Silla dynasty (676-918), Korea was ruled by kings—and frequently by strong queens—assisted by a powerful hereditary nobility legitimized by a rigid system of ranks. The administrative system was organized mainly on the Chinese model, under which officials, military and civil, were chosen through highly rigorous civil service examinations. This system continued relatively unchanged throughout the two succeeding dynasties and has had a marked impact on Korean society. The Silla dynasty was overthrown in the 10th century by a general who established the Kingdom (and dynasty) of Koryo (918-1392), from which the name Korea is derived. Korea soon came to occupy much its present overall boundaries and the peninsula remained united for the next thousand years. It was not divided again into separate states until after World War II. The country, however, was not spared war and devastation during this long period. The later Koryo period was truly a time of troubles. The Mongols, expanding across Eurasia from the Danube to the Yalu, conquered China and invaded Korea. Koryo managed to resist for almost 30 years, but finally capitulated in 1250. Korean kings were married to Mongol princesses, and many court ladies were sent to Peking as hostages or members of the Mongol Emperor's harem. The Koreans were subjected to great cruelty and hardship, especially when they were obliged to assist the Mongols in their two unsuccessful attempts to invade Japan. The Koreans sustained heavy losses in men, ships, and supplies when a typhoon (Kamikaze, the "heavenly wind") largely destroyed the Mongol armadas. The Mongols were diverted from another attempt on Japan by troubles in Indochina and elsewhere, but kept their yoke over Korea intact for nearly another century. Further suffering came to Korea when Chinese forces, rebelling against the Mongol's waning grip, raided across the Yalu, once more laying waste the north. In addition, throughout this period, Japanese freebooters, who developed sea-raids as a way of life, kept up continuing attacks against the coast of Korea, even raiding the island refuge where the Korean kings had long escaped the Mongols, and burning Hanyang (now Seoul) to the ground.
The Koryo dynasty did not long outlive the collapse of Mongol rule in China in 1368. An anti-Mongol Korean general, Yi Song-gye, set up his capital on the site of Seoul, overthrowing the Koryo king in 1392 and establishing the Yi Dynasty, which reigned until the Japanese annexed Korea in 1910. The Yi revived the ancient name of Choson for Korea, which is the official name used by the North Koreans today. During the Yi dynasty, Confucianism replaced Buddhism as the state religion and Confucian political and social ideals became the national standard. As in China, good government was regarded as possible only under a virtuous, paternalistic ruler and his morally and intellectually excellent scholar-officials. As in the two earlier dynasties, the civil service was recruited on the Chinese pattern of rigorous competitive examinations. Successful candidates, known as yangban, entered either civil or military service. In theory, as in China, the examinations were open to all aspirants, but in the later Koryo and Yi dynasties they became limited in practice mainly to the affluent, who could afford the leisure to master the Confucian classics. The term yangban came generally to stand for the landed nobility, and today has become roughly synonymous with "gentlemen."
This small elite group of scholar-officials set the pattern of administrative authoritarianism which has characterized so much of the Koran political experience. The claims of a rigid and increasingly sterile orthodoxy left little room for flexibility or mobility of bureaucratic in-fighting, the most obvious form of the factionalism which seems to be endemic in all Korean activities.
Despite Korea's internal and external woes, the very high level of artistic expression achieved during the Silla dynasty was revived and developed in both the ​Koryo and Yi eras, during which Korea made some noteworthy contributions to world culture. In ceramics, Korean artists elaborated on Chinese styles and techniques, passing them on to Japan, and made an original contribution to coloring in the blues and greens of Korea's unique celadon ware. In painting a similar development took place, with Korean artist-scholars carrying calligraphy in Chinese characters to perfection unmatched—and widely admired—by their Chinese masters. Even where the Koreans did not add distinct contributions, they preserved and passed on to the modern age arts which died out in China, such as the ancient classical court music. In technology and learning there were also some remarkable achievements. Along with skill in metal casting came the use of moveable metal type for printing well before it was known in the West. Shortly thereafter the Koreans invented a phonetic system of writing which, however, did not come into general use until modern times because the yangban wished to preserve their monopoly of learning in the much more complicated Chinese ideographic script. Despite such occasional blighting of native Korean innovations by the overwhelming prestige of Chinese civilization, the Koreans developed a rich, vigorous, and quite distinct culture of their own.
In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, Korea experienced renwed foreign invasions. In 1592 the Japanese launched a full-scale invasion as part of an ambitious plan to conquer China. The Koreans suffered great reverses and the country was ravaged, but Chinese aid and the death of the Japanese ruler, Hideyoshi, saved them. The war produced one of Korea's great national heroes, Admiral Yi Sun-sin, who defeated the Japanese fleet in an engagement in which he used the world's first iron-clad vessel, a tortoise-shaped warship. The abortive Japanese invasion was followed by the successful Manchu conquest of Korea in 1627 and of China in 1644. Korea was to remain a Chinese vassal state under the Manchu dynasty until the end of the 19th century when Russian and Japanese power displaced Chinese influence.
These great invasions reinforced the Koreans' long-standing desire to avoid all unnecessary foreign contacts. Much earlier their kings had supplemented Korea's natural barriers by a small version of China's Great Wall across the peninsula's narrow neck near the 39th parallel. In the 17th century Korea preceded Japan in closing its door to foreigners, and it even discouraged commercial activity and the mining of precious metals to avoid arousing the avarice of foreign interests. Korea tried to remain the "Hermit Kingdom" even after Japan itself applied Perry's tactics, Korea succumbed and in 1876 signed a treaty opening Pusan, and subsequently two other ports to foreign trade. There ensued growing pressure from Western nations—especially from the United States, France, Russia, and Great Britain—which evoked considerable internal dissension over how much contact should be allowed, and with whom. Powerful and bitterly hostile factions aligned themselves either behind Korea's traditional patron and protector, China, or one of the rival neighbors, Russia or Japan. China hastened to have the Koreans open relations with other Western powers to offset Japanese predominance, at the same time seeing that China's suzerainty over Korea was recognized.
In 1894 an antiforeign rebellion led to Chinese and Japanese intervention and subsequently to the Sino-Japanese war. Victorious Japan forced China to abandon any claim to a special position in Korea. Conservative, anti-Japanese forces within the country then turned to Russia for support, and helped the Russians gain concessions for raw materials in northern Korea. The Russians helped Korea reorganize its finances and its army and then moved to acquire naval bases on the southeastern and southwestern corners of the peninsula. Although the British and Japanese, fearing the establishment of Russian control of the Korea Strait and the entrance to the Yellow Sea, jointly blocked the Russian move, Russia continued to pursue its ambitions. The Japanese ultimately responded by launching a surprise attack in February 1904 on the Russian fleet. Engagements were fought off the Korean coasts and Japan made full use of Korea as a base of operations, despite Korea's declaration of neutrality. After Russia's defeat in 1905, Korea became ​a Japanese protectorate, and in 1910 it was annexed and became part of the Japanese Empire.
To 20th century Koreans, their country's subjugation as a colony of Japan seemed the cruelest of the many blows Korea has suffered. The efforts of all prior governments to preserve Korean autonomy had failed. Korea lay supine and subject to harsh Japanese rule. Nevertheless, something remained of the past heritage and some gains were made under the Japanese. Japan did much to modernize Korea even though this was done merely to modernize Korea, even though this was done merely to integrate the area into the Japanese Empire and to make it a strong jumping-off point for the later Japanese invasions of Manchuria and China proper. While Korea served primarily as a source of raw materials for Japan, agriculture and irrigation were greatly improved, lands reclaimed, and roads, railroads and harbors were built. A modern infrastructure was begun, and Japanese rule brought unaccustomed efficiency and a stability that had not been known in the peninsula for almost a century.
Despite economic gains, heavy-handed Japanese rule and subordination of Korean interests to those of Japan produced a chronic discontent that gave birth to a modern nationalist movement. The high point of this largely peaceful movement was a massive demonstration of 1 March 1919—Samil Day—now a great national holiday, inspired by Woodrow Wilson's principle of national self-determination. It was brutally repressed, and henceforth opposition to Japanese rule was largely organized by Korean refugees in the United States, the Soviet Union, and China. One such refugee, Dr. Syngman Rhee (Yi Sung-man), schooled both in the Korean classics and at Harvard and Princeton, became head of a Provisional Korean Government abroad in 1919. He finally returned to Korea in 1945 and became the first President of the Republic of (South) Korea in 1948 under a constitution establishing a strong presidential form of government. He seemed a natural choice as Korea's foremost patriot, being a descendant (distant) of the last reigning family and possessing the proper Confucian credentials.
Unfortunately for the fate of Korean democracy, Syngman Rhee fell too easily into the old monarchical pattern, and after the Korean war he grew increasingly despotic in advanced age. He was forced to resign in April 1960 after arbitrary and fraudulent elections had sparked a nationwide "student revolution" which the military quieted but refused to quell. A caretaker government produced a revised constitution for the "Second Republic" that changed the form of government from the presidential to the parliamentary type and carried through the most democratic elections in ROK history. Under Prime Minister Chang Myon (John M. Chang), the experiment in parliamentary democracy proved short lived. Chang was overturned in May 1961 by a cabal of "young colonels," and Maj. Gen. Pal Chong-hui became head of the junta's Supreme Council for National Reconstruction. In 1963 Pak was formally elected President of the "Third Republic," and South Korea reverted, in theory at least, to civilian, constitutional government.