Richard C. Allen - Koreas Syngman Rhee: An Unauthorized Portrait

Bibliography

DOCUMENTS

McCune, George M., and Harrison, John A., eds.: Korean-American Relations:
Documents Pertaining to the Far Eastern Diplomacy of the United States, University of California, 1951

R.O.K. Office of Public Information: The Constitution of the Republic of Korea, Seoul, 1954

, ed.: Korea Flaming High (speeches and addresses by Syngman Rhee during the years 1953-55), 2 vols., Seoul, 1954-55

Rosenman, Samuel, ed.: The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1942, New York, 1950

Tewksbury, Donald G., ed.: Source Materials on Korean Politics and Ideologies, Institute of Pacific Relations, New York, 1950

U.S. Department of State: The Conferences at Malta and Yalta: 1945, Washington, 1945

: The Korean Problem at the Geneva Conference, Washington, 1954

U.S. Senate: The Korean War and Related Matters, Washington, 1955
The United States and the Korean Problem, Washington, 1953

MEMOIRS

Clark, Mark W.: From the Danube to the Yalu, New York, 1954

Hull, Cordell: Memoirs, 2 vols., New York, 1948.

Millis, Walter, ed.: The Forrestal Diaries, New York, 1951

Pyun, Yung-tai: Korea My Country, Seoul, 1954

Ridgway, Matthew B.: Soldier, New York, 1956

Truman, Harry S.: Years of Decision, New York, 1955

: Years of Trial and Hope, New York, 1956

Yim, Louise: My Forty-Year Fight for Korea, New York, 1951

GENERAL STUDIES

Berger, Carl: The Korea Knot, Philadelphia, 1957

Chung, Henry: The Russians Came to Korea, Washington, 1947

Chung, Kyung-cho: Korea Tomorrow, New York, 1956

Dennett, Tyler: Roosevelt and the Russo-Japanese War, New York, 1925

Feis, Herbert: The China Tangle, Princeton, 1955

Goodrich, Leland M.: Korea: A History of U.S. Policy in the United Nations, New York, 1956

Grajdanzev, Andrew J.: Modern Korea, New York, 1944

Harrington, Fred H.: God, Mammon, and the Japanese, Madison, Wisconsin, 1944

Hulbert, Homer B.: The Passing of Korea, New York, 1906

Kolarz, Walter: The Peoples of the Soviet Far East, New York, 1954

Latourette,Kenneth S.: A Short History of the Far East, New York, 1946

McCune, George M.: Korea Today, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1950

McCune,Shannon: Koreas Heritage , Rutland, Vermont, and Tokyo, Japan, 1956

McKenzie, F. A.: The Tragedy of Korea, London, 1908

Meade, E. Grant: American Military Government in Korea, New York, 1951

Nelson, Frederick M.: Korea and the Old Orders in Eastern Asia, Louisiana State University, 1946

Oliver, Robert T.: Syngman Rhee: The Man behind the Myth, New York, 1954

Osgood, Cornelius: The Koreans and Their Culture, New York, 1951

Poats, Rutherford: Decision in Korea, New York, 1954

Rhee, Syngman: Japan Inside Out, New York, 1941

Treat, P. J.: The Far East: A Political and Diplomatic History, New York, 1928

Voorhees, M elvin B.: Korean Tales , New York, 1952

PERIODICALS

Baldwin, Roger N.: Our Blunders in Korea, The Nation, August 2, 1947

Deane, Hugh: The Death of Lyuh Woon-hyung, The Nation, September 6, 1947

Hodge, John R.: With the U.S. Army in Korea, National Geographic Magazine, June, 1947

Gibney, Frank: Syngman Rhee: The Free Mans Burden, Harpers, February, 1954

An Interview with Syngman Rhee, U.S. News and World Report, March 7, 1952

: Syngman Rhees
Korea

GEOGRAPHICALLY, Korea is a mountainous peninsula jutting out from the Asia mainland, slightly larger than the state of Minnesota. Politically it has long been a weak nation surrounded by powerful neighbors, a focal point for the rivalries of China, Japan, and Russia. In recent years Korea has taken on a third, ideological dimension, for in 1950 it became a symbol of the sacrifices the Free World wasand was not prepared to make in order to contain Communist aggression.

The key to Koreas history, like that of Poland and Belgium, has been its geographic location. A buffer between Japan and the Asia mainland, Korea has borne the brunt of repeated invasions and encroachments by its neighbors. It has been Koreas lot to have its destiny determined by others.

The Koreans themselves are a Mongoloid people numbering about thirty-two million; hence they are about the twelfth largest ethnic group in the world. Today there is little about the Koreans to suggest that theirs was once a flourishing civilization, yet in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries Korea enjoyed a golden age comparable to any in the East. With the advent of the Yi dynasty came the earliest astronomical tower, the first use of movable metal type, and the successful employment of ironclad warships. Korean influences made themselves felt in the arts and crafts of Japan.

Koreas internal development saw a gradual evolution from separate tribal groups to feudal kingdoms, and finally to a united Korea under the Silla (57 B.C.A.D. 935) and Yi ( A.D. 1392-1910) dynasties. But the lot of the Korean peasant changed little with Koreas entry into modern times. He works his land today with tools little different from those of his ancestors, and lives in the L-shaped thatched hut which evolved over centuries. While Seoul periodically seethed with intrigue, the Korean farmer generally stuck close to his task of earning subsistence from an overcrowded land. Only recently has he felt the encroachments of a central government; for centuries he had only to tolerate the tax collector who came to take his rice and cloth. Even today the farmer leads his oxcart to market over the same dusty road traversed by his ancestors.

Culturally, the Koreans are notable if only for having successfully resisted cultural assimilation by the Chinese. Almost from the dawn of Korean history China played a major influence in the peninsula, first bringing Buddhism to Korea and later the classical literature of Confucius. But although Korean literature and ceramics were strongly influenced by the Chinese, the Koreans retained their own language and a national identification apart from the Asia mainland.

The flowering of the Yi dynasty ended with the Hideyoshi invasion of1592, during which the Japanese laid waste to the peninsula before being turned back by a Korean army and its Chinese allies. The Korean court never truly recovered from the shock of Hideyoshis invasion, and it shortly fell prey to a Manchu invasion from the north. The Korean people suffered patiently the ravages of war, pestilence, and taxation, but peace brought little relief. Corruption became rife in the royal court in Seoul, with Koreas neighbors alternately bribing their way into favor.

Koreas becoming a hermit kingdom was a natural result of successive invasions by the Japanese and the Manchus, compounded by a historical distrust of foreigners. Until late in the nineteenth century, Koreas isolation, interrupted as it was only by a few missionaries and wandering voyagers, was even more complete than that of Japan or China. To a greater extent than the Chinese or Japanese, the Koreans came to distrust their neighbors as well as the West, and xenophobia was a strain which would periodically recur throughout Koreas history.