THE PEOPLE'S FORUM
THE PEOPLE'S FORUM Solution for Korea Dear Sirs: As a Korean, I wish to submit two basic principles toward the solution of the Korean unification problem. One—The application of the...
...India, not Eisenhower, is responsible for ending the bloodshed in Korea, and what irony and ugly ingratitude on Korea's and our own part it was to deny India her rightful place...
...They seem to differ only on method...
...How could peace possibly ensue in that way...
...As with Houses for Hiroshima, we hope to do this in a spirit that helps to rebuild faith and understanding as well as homes and institutions...
...Thus the Korean people have never had a fair chance to practice the principle of self-determination...
...A million people are living in huts and hovels not adequate or healthful for farm animals...
...Dear God and Father of all mankind, give us the wisdom to seek and pursue and keep peace in the world...
...We have been offered the fullest cooperation and material aid...
...I vote against our current extreme emphasis on military solutions for problems which have their origin in political and economic inequality...
...It is also a proven fact that as long as Korea has been dominated by any foreign power, there has been no real peace in the Far East, and there can be no durable world peace if Korea is to be dominated by a foreign power...
...The internal reason, historically, was the conservatism of the Confucian state system...
...The American people could, therefore, with clear conscience plead "not guilty" to the charge of having endorsed such a policy on the part of our government...
...Because of the geographical location of Korea, she has been considered one of the most strategic areas in the Far East...
...In this respect, Dr...
...How can any nation, any delegate dare to falsify and distort the very meaning of the United Nations by proposing to divide them into two hostile camps as we proposed for the Korean conference...
...That is good, but the aftermath of war hangs heavy over the land...
...Today, however, we ordinary Americans can not plead "not guilty" to the next use unless we protest against it...
...My vote goes firmly against its use...
...of Public Information Interim Government of South Korea Smear Dear Sirs: The article, "Hucksters of Hate" by Gordon D. Hall, in the August Progressive, only goes to prove what Sen...
...They don't like it, and neither would we in their position...
...There they put a greater value on the latter, an example being the frail Mahatma Ghandi's superhuman strength in freeing his country of about 400 million people, without warfare and atomic bombs, from British rule...
...Is it possible that our creative political and economic genius is dead, and that now we must conceal this tragedy behind a smoke screen of radioactive death...
...Please be the first magazine to understand this...
...To me it is unthinkable that anyone, let alone mere clergymen, would base their case on the low level of effectively combating Communism...
...B. Hayden Freeman President Texas Youth for America Dallas, Tex...
...Forgiveness with political implications is immoral...
...Elwood Cronk Pleasantville, N. Y. Prayer Dear Sirs: While Mr...
...Therefore, it seems to me that the only practical and wise political technique for the solution of the Korean problem is to agree on neutrality of Korea by the UN...
...This idea has been enthusiastically received by both UN and ROK officials...
...Theirs is a rich and pleasant land...
...Mercy should never be used as a political weapon...
...Long lines of armed troops, trainloads of prisoners, overflowing hospitals, square miles of refuge hovels, feeding stations, orphanages built on garbage dumps as a means of survival, colonies of widows, mutilated and emaciated children begging in the streets...
...The neutrality of Korea means: to guarantee independence and neutrality of Korea by all members of the UN including the big powers and that Korea would not be involved either militarily or politically in the game of power politics in the Far East...
...I hasten to add that Communist propaganda has fanned the flame vigorously...
...Mary Stamm Plumsteadville, Pa...
...Harold E. Fackert Jersey City, N. J. Safeguards Cut Dear Sirs: It is gratifying to learn from "Guilt by Marriage-—With A Happy Ending" in your July issue that the Army Loyalty-Security Appeals Board decided in the case described that there was neither reasonable doubt as to the citizen's loyalty nor reasonable grounds for the belief that his suspension was necessary in the interests of national security despite the fact that his wife championed the Progressive Party and various peace movements...
...We hope this will open the road to peace to such an extent that no nation will have an excuse for continuing this ugly armament racing, or building of war's destructive terror-weapons any longer, and that the stockpiles of cruel A and H bombs, wherever they may be, can be beaten into plow shares...
...if and when it does are we going to be ready or are we going to be so preoccupied with the insignificant that we pass up the significant...
...The genius of Americans can design constructive solutions for the economic, political, and psychological problems which poison international relations today...
...Would you kindly let me clarify one point where you say: "They [the Norwegians who contributed to foreign aid] shrewdly chose India as the place they could do the most good, and even more wisely chose Travancore-Cochin, where communism has made great strides . . ." Those who started this campaign for Norwegian assistance to a technically underdeveloped land may have done it from all kinds of motives...
...there are many natural resources...
...Now another external reason has been the artificial division of the country by the wartime Allies, the U.S...
...Diderich H. Lund Quilon, Travancore-Cochin India Self-Criticism Needed Dear Sirs: The holier-than-thou attitude of our UN representative regarding India emphasized our need for what Robert Burns called "the faculty of seeing ourselves as others see us," and more self-criticism...
...The Korean Armistice has shown that it is possible for two groups of people with radically different views to work out a set of rules satisfactory to both...
...And this without any regard to political power on one side or the other...
...Today it is a postwar authoritarian regime under the disguise of democracy...
...The climate is wholesome and the water abundant...
...and the U.S.S.R...
...Checks should be made payable to Houses for Korea, and sent to 580 Minnesota Ave., San Jose, Calif...
...Therese H. Moore New York, N. Y. Korea Today Dear Sirs: Korea today is no longer "the land of morning calm...
...We would be glad to receive contributions for this project from your readers...
...What makes one fear for citizen Grzelak is the knowledge that the new Eisenhower "security" program does not contain the previous safeguard against individual injustice (or against decisions which endanger the nation...
...Road to Peace Dear Sirs: We all welcome the good news of no more killing in Korea...
...They do not expect elaborate houses—a ten by twenty cabin is a dream house to a homeless evacuee...
...It should be executed without the slightest concern for the symbolism it may create...
...Now it seems to me that while the McCarthys, Jenners, Veldes, Stokes, and Schlesingers are busy ridding America of the Communist threat, our foreign policy under the irresponsible bungling of Secretary of State Dulles is causing more and more of the peoples in other lands to turn to Russia for leadership and help in their needs...
...But one cannot help wonder, in times like these, how citizen Grzelak will fare under the reopening of his case and similar cases ordered April 27 by President Eisenhower...
...We might pray for the present occupant in the White House in this manner: "God save us from a short-tempered, tall man with an atom bomb in one hand and a hydrogen bomb in the other, and with 40 years of military training behind him...
...In our great country there is room for a difference of opinion without all the name-calling and smears...
...K. S. Menon, then chairman of the U.N...
...Bong Youn Choy Former Deputy Director Dept...
...Two—Guarantee the neutrality of Korea by the UN...
...Temporary Commission on Korea, well expressed the cardinal principle for the solution of the Korean problem in his report to the Interim Committee of the UN General Assembly...
...It may come our way again...
...It is an historical fact that the main cause of the three major wars (The Sino-Japanese war, the Russo-Japanese war, and the recent Korean war) was the problem of Korea...
...away from over-emphasis on our assumed strategic needs...
...Yet hardly had the dust settled in Iran than we were promising financial aid to the Shah, a dictatorship also installed by force...
...No one starves in the country, but millions in the cities survive only because of direct relief...
...I do not believe this...
...The potential is there—it needs only the chance to survive and develop...
...We can not prepare for atomic war, maintain bases in 47 countries overseas, continue to arm ourselves and half the world, perpetually insult and denounce the governments we call our "enemies," insist that our views of vital international problems must prevail, and hope—despite this—to achieve stability and constructive progress toward the goals our government affirms and Americans desire...
...Although thirteen months of deliberation were expended by conscientious people of unquestioned loyalty in clearing citizen Grzelak, the present Administration has again put in jeopardy the reputation and the means of livelihood of citizen Grzelak and thousands like him...
...But I know that the majority of "The Minute Women" are very, very good American housewives and mothers...
...cannot carry out two totally different policies simultaneously...
...In part he said, "I feel that, if only the Koreans are left to themselves—not merely in name but in reality—they will work out their own salvation and establish their own democratic government...
...In fact, my vote goes firmly against the continued development of atomic weapons...
...Shocked Dear Sirs: Reading Bernard Loomer's "A Mercy Call at the White House" in the September Progressive, I was shocked at the approach used by the three clergymen who called upon President Eisenhower to plead for clemency for Julius and Ethel Rosenberg...
...As a loyal citizen, I wish to protest against such a policy, now, in advance of the event...
...We also hope that truce and armistice can be turned into everlasting peace, so that brotherhood can dominate the whole world...
...As in Japan, shelter lags far behind food and clothing...
...Leadership Dear Sirs: I have written this open letter to President Eisenhower: Numerous items published daily in our press strongly suggest that, should war break out again in Korea, the U.S...
...True, we are a young nation which has accomplished miracles, in a material sense...
...In World War II, ordinary Americans had no chance to register a protest in advance against the use of this new terroristic weapon...
...A few American dollars carefully spent will go a long way...
...We must stop, and the sooner the better, treating other nations as inferiors, or younger brothers, or poor relations...
...The external reason was the Japanese domination of Korea for more than 35 years...
...Yet I dare say that none of those in charge of the project or actually working in it regard it as a fight against communism or any other ideology...
...I vote against our current rigidity of attitude and policy which makes the idea of true negotiation and true solution impossible...
...McCarthy was quoted to have said: "The more you endanger Communists and Communism, the greater will become the smear against you...
...away from inflexible attitudes...
...I have seen 4,000 wounded Korean soldiers in an 800-bed hospital, 300 refugees living in one unlighted room, three-year-old children who weigh less than ten pounds, adults fighting for garbage to eat...
...government is prepared to use atomic weapons in Korea, and probably China...
...Houses for Korea is one of the private agencies which will work with the Korean people, most particularly to help them with reconstruction...
...The Administration was willing to stand up against such forces in the Bohlen case...
...Independence is a nation's birthright and liberty is a God-given right of the people...
...The armistice does not bring peace—only a cessation of killing...
...As a professional military man, who is also our highest civil officer, you, Mr...
...Building materials are terribly short, and the cost is far above the resources of most people...
...I would not say one way or the other about others...
...Both writers seemed to be working under the illusion that the one great crusade today is to hunt out the Communists in all spheres of government...
...To be effective, his deeds must confirm his words...
...But the U.S...
...I am sure this is the spirit of every American...
...Up to now the Korean people have either been totally denied or have not fully enjoyed these rights...
...President, have an unequaled opportunity to prove that for Americans this truism is false...
...Poverty is bad enough without humiliation, and given graciously with no strings attached is an art we have not as yet learned...
...One—The application of the principle of self-determination...
...Otherwise we shall never have peace...
...We are grateful for the opportunity to help, and we have promised to do all that we can with the spiritual and material resources available to us...
...I have traveled from the refugee-glutted port city of Pusan to the burned-out -shell of the capital city of Seoul and back again, and I have seen worse conditions only in India...
...If we have faith in the fundamental principles of our democracy, which I think most of us do, then why do we fear the challenge of Communism...
...How much easier it would be to sit down at a conference table with those of differing views before instead of after both sides have exhausted the best of their youth and natural resources...
...The function of a leader is to lead...
...I can see no great threat from Communism or Fascism so long as we are able freely to elect a representative Congress and so long as no man or group has the power to curtail or suppress freedom of expression, freedom of the press, free assembly, the right of trial by jury, and all other civil rights which we believe are the foundation of our democracy...
...We are merciful because it is the right thing to do, not because our action will be applauded by the anti-Communist world who will be won to our way of thinking...
...Floyd Schmoe Project Director Pusan, Korea Botched Job Dear Sirs: I found the Stokes-Schlesinger debate in the September Progressive interesting but trite...
...But time is running out...
...Three hundred dollars will build a house, or it will provide the materials with which two families can build homes for themselves...
...A leader must lead...
...We are asked to move in quickly, before another winter, and begin work...
...We are only concerned about combating hunger, disease, and ignorance...
...and direct it toward re-establishing a climate of opinion in which world problems can be solved by peaceful means...
...What is perhaps more terrifying—so terrifying that one wonders whether or not it is wise to discuss openly cases like this—is the knowledge that, under the guise of investigation, those who seem bent on destroying the American way of life guaranteed by our Bill of Rights can, by their power over executive purse strings, blackmail the executive branch of our government into dismissing people like Grzelak...
...Our leaders say we can not recognize the present government of China because it was installed by force...
...Also it is time that "liberal" magazines wake up to the fact that there are many good Americans who in good faith oppose UNESCO, and quit smearing them...
...Raymond H. Edwards Baltimore, Md...
...There are two main reasons for this unfortunate situation...
...We are fully aware of the importance it will have for the youth of Norway to obtain a better understanding of the great problems that have to be solved in this part of the world...
...Either we truly have a United Nations—or end it as a failure...
...It is often said of the decline of civilization that once a society gives the professional military their heads, the citizens lose theirs...
...This even after much bitterness and hate were aroused because of the killing and destruction by both sides...
...Helen Mears New York, N. Y. No Political Motive Dear Sirs: I was delighted to receive the June Progressive recently and especially pleased to read your "Note in the News" about "Norway's Example...
...We do not feel this as a one-sided action...
...Traditionally the genius of our country has shown itself in devising peaceful solutions for political and economic problems...
...Your article is exactly the type of smear this great man had in mind when he made this statement...
...I must admit several of the people mentioned in your sweeping smear are not entirely above reproach...
...Our country today claims—and to a considerable degree actually holds—world leadership...
...Won't you take the lead in changing the direction of our policies: away from war preparations...
...How true this is...
...Threat and fear, suspicion and hate, blight the people...
...The Korean people still have vitality and hope...
...Some 600,000 Korean homes were destroyed...
...To offer our assistance to India was very natural for Norway, where the great majority has followed India's noble fight for freedom with the greatest sympathy...
...This is Korea now...
...America had the opportunity, but it seems to me that to date we have botched it...
...but will it be willing to stand up and defend citizen Grzelak and thousands like him...
...By that I mean that every nation should be heard without pressure or coercion to suit any particular nation's interest...
...William P. Weber Wilton, Wis...
...They are striving to practice the principle of self-determination, which is opposition to any kind of foreign intervention and complete political and economic independence in accordance with the majority will of the people...
...It seems to me that a far greater threat to American leadership today is our lack of a consistent foreign policy...
...For more than 50 years, however, the people of Korea have been fighting native feudalism and foreign domination...
...under the new program the decision of the Secretary of Defense will be final in the Grzelak case and there is no provision for appeal to an impartial Loyalty Review Board such as that headed, under the Truman Administration, by that eminently respectable Republican, Hiram Bingham...
...Truman was in office, someone wrote a prayer: "God save us from a short-tempered little man with an atom bomb in his hand...
...The more reason to learn from the older, far greater spiritual ones, such as India...
...Then we would understand more why we have not received more gratitude for the material aid we have given many nations...
...As you say, perhaps this proves that "decent, fair-minded people can overcome injustice...
...Korea is entitled to have these without any conditions or intervention from foreign powers...
...I hope that we shall humbly go on in our effort to build up confidence and friendship between our two nations, and also with the UN, the third participant in our action...
Vol. 17 • October 1953 • No. 10
