South Koreans still divided over U.S. military presence

SEOUL, South Korea -- It was an unusual spectacle in a nation where resentment toward the U.S. military is on the rise: hundreds of South Koreans, many of them waving American flags, rallying in support of the U.S. troop presence.

The demonstration by 400 elderly people this week in front of a U.S. Air Force base near Seoul was far smaller than anti-U.S. protests that have drawn thousands of people in recent weeks.

But it was a reminder of the conflicting relationship, largely defined along generational lines, between South Korea and the 37,000 U.S. troops on its soil. The soldiers are a comfort to the elderly, and an irritant to young people, though many in the latter group are divided over whether the troops should leave.

The debate comes as South Korea tries to decide how to respond to North Korea's revived efforts to develop nuclear weapons. The U.S. troops are in Korea mainly as a deterrent against the communist North.

Across the South, there are increasing reports of U.S. troops being harassed. In one recent instance, several Korean men assaulted a U.S. military spokesman, lightly injuring him. There are anecdotes of military personnel being cursed in the street, or ignored when they try to make purchases near the main U.S. base in Seoul. One soldier said a side mirror of his car, which has military license plates, was smashed when he left it in a parking lot to go running by a river.

Craig Hurst, a naval petty officer from Dallas, said the attitude of many U.S. soldiers is: '"Hey, they don't want us here, we'll go."'

At the same time, several soldiers said in interviews that they experienced only minor inconvenience from the protests, rather than ill will from the general population.

"They tell us when the protests are going on at the front gate and we make arrangements to go through another gate," said David Rushing, a sergeant at the Air Force base in Osan, south of Seoul.

Rushing, a Detroit native, says he has a good relationship with his Korean landlord off the base and shops downtown without any trouble.

The current wave of anti-Americanism erupted after the deaths of two teenage girls who were accidentally struck by a U.S. military vehicle on a training mission in June. Two GIs were acquitted of negligent homicide charges in U.S. military court.

The depth of resentment toward the United States, which is seen as arrogant and an obstacle to reconciliation with North Korea, has alarmed South Korean government officials and business leaders who believe the economy and credit ratings could suffer.

"It is necessary to resolve excessive outside concerns over an atmosphere of anti-U.S. sentiment in our country," presidential spokeswoman Park Sun-sook said Thursday.

As part of its public relations campaign, the government sent a letter this week to The Washington Post, saying a recent column was wrong to say the protest movement in Seoul was anti-American. The protesters simply want to redress legal grievances, it said.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, one Western ambassador said he had received calls from investors in his country who inquired whether South Korea was a bad place to trade because of the protests.

The ambassador also said several Korean men recently made obscene gestures at him from their car.

A British journalist walking along a main street said a taxi driver lowered his window and shouted: "No SOFA!" -- a reference the Status of Forces Agreement, a legal code governing the conduct of U.S. soldiers stationed in South Korea. Many South Koreans believe the agreement allows GIs to get away with crimes, and say their country should have more jurisdiction in such cases.

During the 1980s, student leaders who led violent protests against the military-led government railed against the United States, but the sentiment didn't take root in broader segments of society. This time, many observers say, it's different.

"Anti-American sentiment is rather abstract ... resulting in an affective, emotional and passive dislike of America and things American," Auh Taik-sup, a mass communications professor at Korea University in Seoul, said at a forum Wednesday. He was quoted by The Korea Times.

The dislike extends to the new James Bond movie, "Die Another Day," which some South Koreans say slanders Korean culture, north and south. However, some viewers said they were less bothered by the depiction of the North Korean villain than a scene with a cow tilling a South Korean field.

The cow horns indicate that it's a Vietnamese cow, not a Korean one, the viewers complained.

North Korea, which wants to disrupt the U.S.-South Korean alliance, weighed in Thursday with a commentary on American soldiers in Rodong Sinmun, the most influential state newspaper.

"They are a group of ruthless hooligans and beasts in human skin steeped in misanthropy to the marrow of their bones," the North Korean newspaper said.