ANU professor Tessa Morris-Suzuki takes a look at North Korea’s forgotten victims [Nautilus Institute], the Koreans who “returned” to North Korea from Japan between 1959 and 1984. She writes:
As the slow and difficult negotiations on North Korean denuclearisation unfold, one small group of a hundred people or so in Japan are watching proceedings with a unique personal interest. Some are Japanese, others ethnic Koreans. All are survivors of one of the modern world’s most bizarre, tragic and utterly forgotten “humanitarian” projects.
Between 1959 and 1984, these few were among the 93,340 people who migrated from Japan to North Korea in search of the new and better life. There were several particularly ironic features of this migration. First, it took place precisely at the time of Japan’s “economic miracle”. Secondly, although it was described as a “repatriation”, almost all those who “returned” to North Korea originally came from the south of the Korean peninsula, and many had been born and lived all their lives in Japan. Third, the glowing images of life which tempted them to Kim Il-Sung’s “worker’s paradise” came, not just from the North Korean propaganda machine but from the Japanese mainstream media, supported and encouraged by politicians including key members of Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party.
According to Morris-Suzuki, the return of these Koreans involved a high degree of cooperation between Japanese and North Korean authorities backed up by a pretty impressive cast of international characters:
As secret documents from the Cold War era are declassified and testimony form survivors emerges, the true story of this mass movement is now starting to emerge for the first time. We now know that it was the product of a deliberate policy, very carefully designed and implemented at the height of the Cold War by the North Korean and Japanese governments often working in concert, and supported in various ways by the Soviet Union, the United States and the International Red Cross movement. It is a history that sheds important light on the complex background to Northeast Asia’s contemporary conflicts. It also evokes chilling echoes of other coerced or manipulated migrations, including the repatriation of Eastern Europeans to the Soviet Union and other Communist countries in the immediate post-war era.
Initially, the North Koreans weren’t especially keen to accept more mouths to feed, but in ‘58, North Korean leader Kim Il-sung recognized the potential propaganda coup and decided to accept the Korean-Japanese with open arms:
Immediately, propaganda campaigns began to sweep through Japan’s Korean community, orchestrated by a local pro-North Korean organization, but amplified by a flood of articles in the Japanese mass media. A special “Repatriation Cooperation Society”, involving politicians from across Japan’s political spectrum, was set up to distribute information encouraging Koreans to “return” to North Korea. Leading members included former Prime Minister Ichiro Hatoyama and prominent ruling-party politician Junya Koizumi (whose son Junichiro Koizumi was to become Prime Minister in 2001) (emphasis mine).
The U.S. attitude toward the repatriation of the Koreans was hardly any better:
Another disturbing aspect revealed by declassified documents is the United States attitude to the scheme. The US State Department was at that time focussed on renegotiating its all-important security treaty with Japan, a process for which it relied on the enthusiastic cooperation of Japanese Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi (grandfather of the present Japanese Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe).
The US appears to have been unaware of the secret contacts between Japan and North Korea in 1956 and 1957. When it first became aware of the repatriation plan a couple of years later, the Eisenhower administration regarded it with concern, but once the Japanese and North Korean Red Cross Societies reached an agreement on a mass “return” in mid-1959, the Eisenhower administration did not take any practical steps to halt the unfolding tragedy.
US Ambassador in Tokyo Douglas MacArthur II (who played a key role on the US side) told his Australian counterpart in 1959 that the “American Embassy had checked Japanese opinion and found it was almost unanimously in favour of ‘getting rid of the Koreans’”. At this sensitive moment in US-Japan relations, the State Department was clearly cautious of intervening in a scheme that was an obvious vote-winner for the Kishi regime. Besides, MacArthur personally sympathised with the public emotion, commenting (as the Australian Ambassador at the time reported) that “he himself can scarcely criticize the Japanese for this as the Koreans left in Japan are a poor lot including many Communists and many criminals.”
Very interesting stuff. Read the rest on your own.
(HT to reader)
PS: Obviously, this whole affair, if true, is not exactly analogous to Operation Keelhaul [Wikipedia], when thousands of anti-communist Eastern Europeans (many of whom were Nazi collaborators) in Allied-occupied Europe were handed over to the Soviets and Yugoslavs after the war. But it’s a tragedy nevertheless. One famous survivor of the repatriation, of course, is defector Kang Chol-hwan [Wikipedia], the author of The Aquariums of Pyongyang who spent his first years in Japan before his parents returned to North Korea. He spent much of the rest of his childhood in Yodok Prison Camp [Wikipedia], thanks to North Korea’s humane practice of incarcerating entire families [New York Times].
31 Comments
Was this something the United States could have stopped? My recollection is that the zainichi wanted to go to Korea (or at least leave Japan) and at the time the DPRK had great nationalistic appeal in contrast with the decrepit Rhee regime in Seoul, with its lackey-to-the-U.S. image and its unsevered links to Japanese collaborators. Pyongyang also looked attractive economically for most of that period.
For the record, let it be noted that Douglas MacArthur II (1909-1997), the US ambassador to Japan mentioned above, is NOT the son of the famous General Douglas MacArthur, but his nephew.
General Douglas MacArthur had an older brother (Arthur MacArthur III). This brother had a distinguished career as a naval officer, reaching the rank of Captain; he died at age 47, of appendicitis, in 1923.
Douglas MacArthur II was the son of this naval officer brother.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C.....hur_family
“…Was this something the United States could have stopped?”
When I go to read it, I’m going to approach the paper (the author’s employer,”ANU”, is Australian National University) as probably another modern example of finding a way to blame the all-powerful and all-seeing US (the great Satan) for everything that happens in the world.
Similar to the modern left-wing “spin” put on the Taft-Katsura agreement, another bit of my personal historical education for which I owe thanks to this website.
The Marmot evidently keeps an eye on the products of the Nautilus institue, since I now recall that I took some time to look them up when he cited a paper sponsored by them, a couple of years ago.
If I recall correctly, they’re located in San Francisco; I think I read something about their members appearing periodically on Pacifica radio, an extremely left-wing radio network located across the bay in Berkeley. I can get Pacifica radio regularly on the local campus public radio outlet, here in far northern California.
Nothing wrong with all that, of course. However, I suppose somebody could publish a paper documenting how the US could have “prevented this tragedy” by expanding the war in Korea in 1951 (after the Chinese counteroffensive attack against UN forces), and gone on to finally liberate North Korea (as MacArthur evidently was trying to force Truman to do).
Then what these poor Korean expats imagined they were coming back to in the North would have actually existed. Yes indeed, there could be such a paper out there somewhere, but it’s my distinct impression you’re not going to find it being sponsored by the Nautilus Institute. ‘Nuff said.
Of course, this situation was none of America’s damn business.
It is not America’s job to save people, even American people, from themselves.
To call this “coerced” or forced repatriation is completely off-base. It was voluntary. Just because someone has been mesmerized by propaganda does not mean that they were coerced.
MacArthur expressed his personal opinion, and the US gov’t correctly surmised that this had nothing to do with US. Good God, after how much we did for Korea in the fifties, how much more were we supposed to do? Save them from propaganda? Anyone dumb enough to buy it, when even at that time the evidence was there that this whole Communism thing doesn’t do a whole lot except kill people and put them in labor camps.
Comparing this to Operation Keelhaul is like comparing a defenseless murder victim to a suicidal pop-starlet.
While not surprising, what strikes me is the US passive connivance with Tokyo to cleanse Japan of Koreans.
As we know, most of Korea’s radical socialists and communists resided south of the 38th Parallel prior to 1945. And due to their proximity to Japan, they made up the bulk of Koreans who emigrated to Japan.
Much less recognized is that due to social discrimination, many turned to organized crime. So that a good part of Japan’s yakuza today — the paragon of romantic, self-justifying thugs of pure, traditional Japanese working class values — are in fact largely ethnically Korean — as are many of the related enka (the Japanese approximate equivalent of country & western) singers, including some of the most famous kimono-clad crooners of all time.
They were not forced to leave, and 5 of 6 Koreans in Japan at the time stayed, to go by the Nautilus author’s stats. It is a travesty to call that “cleansing” and a serious leap to accuse the U.S. of connivance here.
To singers of Korean descent, you could also add athletes, even sumo wrestlers.
Slim wrote:
“It is a travesty to call that “cleansing” and a serious leap to accuse the U.S. of connivance here.”
Yes, indeed. At worst, the US simply aquiesced on a deal already made between Japan and North Korea.
As I recall from reading Kang Chol-hwan’s Acquariums of Pyongyang, his grandmother, an ardent socialist, was especially keen to live under a government whose professed ideals she embraced.
“For the record, let it be noted that Douglas MacArthur II (1909-1997), the US ambassador to Japan mentioned above, is NOT the son of the famous General Douglas MacArthur, but his nephew.
General Douglas MacArthur had an older brother (Arthur MacArthur III). This brother had a distinguished career as a naval officer, reaching the rank of Captain; he died at age 47, of appendicitis, in 1923.
Douglas MacArthur II was the son of this naval officer brother.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C.....hur_family”
He was the boss’s nephew.
Although the author of the article describes the existence of Japanese supporters of the repatriation, including former PM Koizumi’s father, their support was in response to lobbying by ethnic Koreans in Japan. The organisation most responsible for this is Chosen Soren, the North Korean fifth column in Japan.
Addition: Many of these people that were repatriated to North Korea are used to control the relatives of the repatriated that remain in Japan. They are hostages that the regime uses to extract money from ethnic Koreans in Japan, and to ensure they stay loyal to Chosen Soren. A Korean that leaves Choson Soren will never hear from their relatives in North Korea again.
Chosen Soren should be disbanded.
If you actually read the whole article is comes across as most critical of North Korea for screwing these people over and also of the Japanese right-wingers who sponsored their own version of a “Back to Africa” program. Everyone knows that in those days (still?) there was broad-based racist sentiment against Koreans in Japan and it is more than a bit naive to think that Japanese politicians were just responding to Chosen Soren’s lobbying efforts. Koreans of all political persuasions were not even considered Japanese citizens then so this was hardly a benign response on the part of political leaders. Remember how Koreans were massacred after the great Kanto earthquake in the 20s? How benign was that?
MacArthur got his views about Koreans where, from the helpful Japanese government? And were ALL of these Korean migrants from SK hard core Socialists and Communists? That seems an extreme stretch of interpretation. The article actually treats the US role pretty lightly. Given that the US had just lost 10,000s of soldiers in a war in Korea against the North it strikes me a little inconsistant that the American ambassador would think it a swell idea to send so many innocents back to their doom - or maybe you guys think that all those women and kids - families of those who chose to return - deserved what they got? The point is the hypocrisy of those Japanese and Americans who decry human rights abuses by others while turning a blind eye aiding and abetting such abuses when it serves our baser desires.
Kunsanpcv,
“And were ALL of these Korean migrants from SK hard core Socialists and Communists?”
Well, the article says that most were from the Southern part of Korea, so if they were going to the North then it is likely that they ideologically identified with the North. They wanted to go to the “workers paradise on earth”.
My impression from reading Kang’s memoir was that his parents _wanted_ to emigrate to North Korea. The accounts in your post, as you say, do not seem to indicate the existence of coercion.
Given the levels of pride many South Koreans and Zainichi feel in regard to North Korea, it is not a stretch to conclude that ethnic Koreans felt the same in the ’50s and ’60s, when, we are told, North Korea’s future prospects vis-a-vis South Korea were not so grim as they are today.
In any event, it is astounding the lengths some will go to blame the U.S. for things such as this.
I agree with colontos. It was not the job of the U.S. to save third country national idiots from themselves. Any more than it is to save U.S. citizen idiots from themselves. Sadly, the returnees may not have gotten what they deserved, but they did get just what they signed up for. Be careful what you ask for, for ignorance can be fatal.
Kunsanpvc wrote:
“The point is the hypocrisy of those Japanese and Americans who decry human rights abuses by others while turning a blind eye aiding and abetting such abuses when it serves our baser desires.”
The US did not aid or abet any abuses by North Koreans or even the plan to send ethnic Koreans to North Korea. “Aid and abet” is legally defined as “procuring, counseling, or commanding” someone to commit a crime. MacArthur and a few other US officials expressing a positive view of the plan did not constitute “aiding and abeting.” The Japanese had already hatched the plan and persuaded the North Koreans to cooperate. The two nations carried out the expatriation without any assistance from the US. A real example of aiding and abeting North Korean abuses is putting millions of dollars directly into North Korean bank accounts.
“And were ALL of these Korean migrants from SK hard core Socialists and Communists? That seems an extreme stretch of interpretation. “
Socialism gained many followers among Koreans inside and outside the peninsula during the Japanese colonial period. Korean and Japanese socialists collaborated in Japan to oppose the right-wing government, and of course, Korean, Chinese, and Soviet Communists fought together against Japan. After Japan’s surrender, Korean socialists moved swiftly to set up local People’s Committees throughout the entire Korean peninsula; the ones in the South were extinguished by the Rhee government with help from the US.
As Slim noted, only 1/6 of the Zainichi actually immigrated while the rest, who were not blinded by socialist ideals or the propaganda campaign, stayed put in a country that did not accord them full citizenship status. Better a green card holder in Japan than a citizen of the DPRK.
“Dear Pyongyang” is a documentary detailing the struggles and regrets of a Korean (and, if I remember correctly, Chosen Soren member) living in Japan who sent his own two sons to North Korea in the 50’s or 60’s, but himself stayed behind with his wife and daughter. I saw the film in Myeongdong last year, and highly recommend it. Originally premiered in the U.S. at Sundance, and should be out on video now.
QUOTE It was not the job of the U.S. to save third country national idiots from themselves. Any more than it is to save U.S. citizen idiots from themselves. END OF QUOTE
Lirelou, cannot agree more! Frankly, I would not compare it with the infamous Operation Keelhaul since those people badly wanted to go to the worker’s paradise. The Japanese establishment did not went at great length to discourage them, but did not really push them either. And, of course, there were dissenting voices which warned them, and Seoul government simply went ballistic about the entire scheme. They chose not to hear and go, and the rest is history (a very sad one). Kang Chol-hwan’s grandmother nearly drugged her somewhat reluctant husband to the socialist motherland.
P.S. I wonder when Tessa will publish on illegal movement of people between Jeju and Japan in the late 1940s. She recently told me about her new research - also great stuff.
I have been researching this topic as well. Morris-Suzuki’s article is absolutely correct in its facts and should find sympathy from those of you concerned for human rights in the North. Her succinct work linked above omits other details that should also be known. For example, SCAP sent over a million Koreans to the South in just a few years, but many Zainichi who stayed did so because of postwar laws that severely limited what they could take back on the ships, including the levying of taxes on wealth. SCAP followed Japan’s lead in creating these rules. Zainichi who stayed began lobying for a better deal—that is in part how Chongryun (aka, Chōsen Sōren) was formed.
A better deal from SCAP, the Japanese, or the South never came. All Chongryun members I have interviewed freely admit repatriations were a mistake (after all, their parents stayed), but it also needs to be pointed out that the South lost the propaganda war in many people’s hearts because constantly bad news flowed freely from it, in contrast to the North (one exception below). In effect, Koreans could choose a dictatorship aiming at paradise… or a murder-torturing dictatorship… under foreign “occupation.” Important too is that the North’s Soviet subsidized economy still appeared better the ROK for years. Han Duk Su was certainly Kim Il Sung’s man in Japan, but to reduce Chongryun to a “Fifth Column” overlooks the legitimate battle Koreans have had to fight for human rights in Japan and the Japanese government’s complicity in the repatriation drive. Morris-Suzuki understands this. Most Japanese do not even understand why there are Koreans in Japan and why they just don’t go “home.”
Today the abduction issue is being pushed ad nauseam by the LDP, but few people remember even the Japanese wives of Korean men who were sent off to the DPRK, much less does the public show interest or sympathy in the plight of former “Japanese” stuck in the North. And the propaganda battles of the cold war now seem like… well, a thing of the past. Important in this context: in 1974 “The American Committee for Human Rights of Japanese Wives of North Korean Repatriates” (your guess as to their real funding) published a book titled If I Had Wings Like a Bird (I Would Fly across the Sea): Letters from the Japanese Wives of North Korean Repatriates, apparently translated from Japanese into English. For more on these issues see Okonogi Masao’s book Why Did North Korean Residents in Japan Return Home? (2004 in Japanese); Chang Myŏng Su’s book The Scheme of the Japan Red Cross: Deep into Its North Korean “Repatriation Project” (2003, in Japanese); “Repatriation of Koreans in Japan” Korea Journal, 44/4 (Winter 2004, 60-84, and for the story of one of those who made it back to Japan from North Korea, see Shin Su-Gok’s book Ghastly Lamentations: The Repatriated of My Family to “Paradise” (in Japanese 2003).
BTW, Yang Yonghee’s documentary “Dear Pyongyang” is not out on video yet. It is still screening here in Japan.
When I linked to this post on Far Outliers, I called these repatriates “self-abductees.”
Uri Onara wrote:
“In effect, Koreans could choose a dictatorship aiming at paradise… or a murder-torturing dictatorship… under foreign “occupation.”
The dictatorship “aiming at paradise” has been torturing and murdering political rivals, opponents, dissidents, and innocents since its inception more than sixty years ago.
“P.S. I wonder when Tessa will publish on illegal movement of people between Jeju and Japan in the late 1940s. She recently told me about her new research - also great stuff.”
Everything she wrote in that article is old news. So is the movement of people from Jeju to Japan. All this “research” is already available in the Japanese language to those that can read it.
“Her succinct work linked above omits other details that should also be known. For example, SCAP sent over a million Koreans to the South in just a few years, but many Zainichi who stayed did so because of postwar laws that severely limited what they could take back on the ships, including the levying of taxes on wealth. SCAP followed Japan’s lead in creating these rules. Zainichi who stayed began lobying for a better deal—that is in part how Chongryun (aka, Chōsen Sōren) was formed.”
Geez, and here I thought that the Koreans in Japan were forced laborers or slaves. How were they able to amass wealth to the extent that it would prevent them from leaving Japan?
“A better deal from SCAP, the Japanese, or the South never came. All Chongryun members I have interviewed freely admit repatriations were a mistake (after all, their parents stayed), but it also needs to be pointed out that the South lost the propaganda war in many people’s hearts because constantly bad news flowed freely from it, in contrast to the North (one exception below). In effect, Koreans could choose a dictatorship aiming at paradise… or a murder-torturing dictatorship… under foreign “occupation.” Important too is that the North’s Soviet subsidized economy still appeared better the ROK for years. Han Duk Su was certainly Kim Il Sung’s man in Japan, but to reduce Chongryun to a “Fifth Column” overlooks the legitimate battle Koreans have had to fight for human rights in Japan and the Japanese government’s complicity in the repatriation drive. Morris-Suzuki understands this. Most Japanese do not even understand why there are Koreans in Japan and why they just don’t go “home.””
Whatever Chosen Soren was when it started, it is a fifth column now. It also spreads a hateful racial ideology. I have met graduates of the Chosen Soren run schools, and many of them are very angry people, and have racial views about the Japanese. Lets not forget Chosen Sorens illegal activities, either.
Uri Onara wrote:
“Most Japanese do not even understand why there are Koreans in Japan and why they just don’t go “home.”
Most? Care to support that generalization?
#18 Uri Onara:
Quote: “…In effect, Koreans [in Japan, after the Korean War] could choose a dictatorship aiming at paradise… or a murder-torturing dictatorship… under foreign “occupation.”
Comment: So — did Truman do wrong to intervene in July 1950, Uri? The US occupation or ROk had ended in April 1949, when the last US combat unit was withdrawn from ROK; only a several hundred man advisory group remained, and these were successfully rescured by MacArthur in the week or so following the North attack on 25 June 1950.
If, after that, Truman and the US should have “let this cup pass” — then don’t beat around the bush, come right out and say so. You’ve got plenty of American eyes here on this blog; it’s an opportunity to “speak truth to power”, if you were concerned for human rights under the various ROK governments from the 50’s to the 90’s.
Maybe it’s indeed all the Americans fault that “paradise” was averted on the Korean peninsula.
I’ve caught a few hints of this viewpoint here on this board, and I’m still waiting for an elaboration from an intelligent advocate of the viewpoint.
(I suppose this Cumings chap may have said something in his work along those lines, one of these days I’ll seek out his stuff at the library and take a look. Feel free to refer me there, if you concur).
This is an all too common misconception. Japan is willing to accord anyone full citizenship if they’d just apply for it.
It was determined by all parties involved that ethnic Koreans in Japan would loose their Japanese citizenship and take the Korean citizenship of their choice. As Japan is not one of the rare countries that gives citizenship to all those who are born in the country, if your parents don’t have Japanese citizenship, you won’t have it from birth either. But there is nothing stopping you from applying for citizenship yourself; and after words all your children will be born with Japanese citizenship.
Today the battle wages on over dual-citizenship and foreigners voting rights. Japan does not allow dual-citizenship and does not allow foreigners to vote. Again, this is true for most places in the world. But that does not mean an ethnic foreigner cannot vote, they just have to be a citizen of the country.
Sorry to get off topic, but to say that Japan will not give ethnic Koreans Japanese citizenship is absurd — those who do not have Japanese citizenship choose to live their life that way through no one’s will other than their own. (Well, their parents have an influence, but once they become a legal adult at 20, they can take Japanese citizenship without permission from their parents.)
Peter Pan wrote:
“This is an all too common misconception. Japan is willing to accord anyone full citizenship if they’d just apply for it.”
in response to my comment:
“stayed put in a country that did not accord them full citizenship status.”
Please note the use of the past tense did. Japanese citizenship laws have relaxed considerably in the past few decades.
Yes they have been relaxed, but not in a way relevant to this case.
All the laws that would pertain to this situation have not changed since May 4th, 1950, which is when they were first instated.
That’s a full year before the signing of the San Francisco Peace Treaty with which people of Taiwanese and Korean decent lost their Japanese citizenship.
The issues of some sort of Mass Relocation did not come up until the 1960’s.
There was nothing stopping someone from taking Japanese citizenship then, or today as far as the Government is concerned. Now there are plenty of moral concerns on the side of the Koreans (I’ve heard that some people won’t because they believe taking Japanese citizenship is pledging one’s allegiances to the Emperor — something that is ridiculous, but if they want to think that they’re free to do so) that influence one’s decision not to take Japanese citizenship, but that is their choice, not the restriction of the Japanese government.
I didn’t list the quote as being from you Songai because I didn’t want it to seem as though I was ‘attacking’ you or something that could be labeled as ‘your thoughts’, but just rather that this is an issue that is commonly misunderstood.
Whoops, and to make matters worse I typed your name wrong. Sorry.
Correcting someone’s factual information is not an attack. Thank you for the information. From your description of the 1950 law and the San Francisco Peace Treaty, it seems that Korean and Taiwanese residents of Japan who did not take citizenship in 1950 lost their chance to do so after the treaty was signed. Could you please clarify?
Any San Francisco Treaty provision on Taiwanese taking Japanese citizenship was probably rendered mute prior to the signing of the treaty by the arrival of Chiang Kai-shek, the remnants of the KMT government, and those nationalist formations which were able to evacuate the mainland.
No, that’s not what I mean to say at all. They never “lost their chance”, they just lost their citizenship. The logic being that these people were Japanese citizenship because they were from Japanese territories lost it’s footing when Korea Taiwan (and Okinawa) stopped being territories with the signing of the SF Peace treaty.
However it was taken into accord that there were all these people who where in Japan, so they were given special resident status.
The laws for naturalization were put in place first, after which citizenship for those from Taiwan Korea and Okinawa was revoked. Taiwanese getting Taiwanese citizenship, Koreans getting Korean citizenships, and Okinawan getting American status (but not full citizenship as I recall).
So, then, same as today, one who remained in Japan could have simply just applied for Japanese citizenship because the laws were in place. However if it was me I wouldn’t have either, and would have been waiting for the two Korea’s to get their things worked out and back together, but my choice for not taking Japanese citizenship would not be because I was being prevented from doing so by the Japanese government in any way.
I know that, and you know that, and I know that you know that. But we both know there are a lot of people who seemingly don’t know that, so I just wanted to be sure there was as little unnecessary confusion as possible.
lirelou:
Wouldn’t the new government have to honor the treaties signed by the old government? For example Russia couldn’t claim that Alaska is hers by undoing the treaty signed by a former government could it?
I think what’s more of an issue for Taiwan and the SF Treaty is what happened to Taiwan. Was it ‘returned’ to China, set to be independent, or just released from Japanese control completely avoiding the issue as a whole.
I don’t know the answer to any of those questions, I’m just speculating. But the discussion should probably remain focused how it pertains to Korea and Korean residents in Japan.