hs would not have been registered it has been estimated that 20-30,000 people were killed. (“Traveling through Autonomy and Subjugation: Jeju Island Under Japan and Korea,” The Asia-Pacific Journal, May 30, 2007, link.) Others have suggested higher casualties, cf. Wikipedia’s estimate of 14,000 to 60,000 (link). Once again, the agent is obscure: but we know that the major killings were carried out by ROK forces together with rightwing vigilantes. The article goes on to relate the fact that a North Korean documentary about the Jeju Island clash was aired in 2003, explaining this as “a time when Ko Young Hee’s political influence was growing.” However, the Jeju Uprising was (and is) a longtime staple of nationalist historiography in North Korea, which had no need for Ko’s political rise to record the events.
After presenting Ko as a drunk, the article allows that, in 1956, he “started his own professional wrestling group.” Why? “ . . . perhaps because he was having difficulties making a living solely from judo.” In a land in which entrepreneurship is routinely praised, Ko’s endeavor is painted in desperate colors.
The article is, in short, indicative of the difficulties that lie ahead in restoring North Korea-Japan relations to normalcy in the wake of the political movement to make Korean kidnapping of Japanese nationals in the 1980s the pivotal issue of Japanese diplomacy, and the eradication of consciousness of Japanese crimes against Koreans over the half century of colonial rule.
Mark Selden is a coordinator of the Asia-Pacific Journal. His most recent books are Japan's Wartime Medical Atrocities: Comparative Inquiries in Science, History, and Ethics and China, East Asia and the Global Economy. Regional and Historical Perspectives. His home page is www.markselden.info
Recommended citation: Kokita Kiyohito, Tessa Morris-Suzuki and Mark Selden, Ko Tae Mun, Ko Chung Hee, and the Osaka Family Origins of North Korean Successor Kim Jong Un, The Asia-Pacific Journal Vol 9, Issue 1 No 2, January 3, 2011.