Why do South Koreans tend to dislike the US, while many Japanese people seem to like Americans more?
Even in close allies like South Korea, there has long been a deep strain of anger among ordinary people at supposed American arrogance, bullying and high-handedness. Whenever I pass through Seoul’s City Hall plaza, I’m transported back to 1987 and a pro-democracy demonstration where a group of radical students made a bonfire of an American flag. The crowd of more than 100,000 cheered thunderously. This in a country whose soil had been well fertilized by American blood in the Korean War. And that is where the Korean experience comes in. While anti-Americanism has risen in many parts of the world, it has declined here in South Korea, and a once-dangerous undercurrent of anger has partly dissipated. There are, I think, some lessons that we can usefully apply to our relations with Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other countries. To discuss those lessons I tried to look up an old friend, Woo Sang Ho, whom I had inadvertently helped send to prison in 1987. Mr. Woo was then a top student leader, and
