History as an Arena of Sino-Korean Conflict and the Role of the United States

During 2009–2011, Chinese writings on South Korea and the history of the Korean nation grew more somber in tone. They widened the national identity gap at the same time the gap was being widened with the United States and Japan. Views of successive periods grew more negative. Chinese authors wrote that Koreans should took back with gratitude rather than resentment at having been China’s neighbor in premodern times. They sided with North Korea and Roh Moo-hyun in their stress on insufficient South Korean vigilance in dealing with collaborators and the legacy of Japan’s occupation. Mainstream Chinese coverage of the Korean War ignores who invaded and why in order to emphasize the US entry into the war as an imperialist aggressor and China’s just involvement. The legacy of the anticommunism of the Cold War era is deemed to persist after both the democratization of South Korea and the normalization with China that followed. Thus, history pervades Chinese writings on South Korea. North Korea fares much better by comparison.