News Abroad

Korean Collaborators: South Korea’s Truth Committees and the Forging of a New Pan-Korean Nationalism

by Sheila Miyoshi Jager

The year 2005 has particular significance for Koreans concerning Japan: it is the 100th anniversary of the 1905 protectorate treaty (or Ulsa Treaty) which led to Korea’s formal colonization by Japan in 1910. It is also the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Korea from colonial rule and it is the 40th anniversary of the normalization treaty of 1965. The year 2005 has also seen a distinct rise in anti-Japanese sentiments in South Korea. In March, angry swells of

What the Civil Rights Movement Should Have Taught Us About Democracy Building

by Robert S. McElvaine

At a time when the president of the United States has the nation involved in an open-ended War on Terror, a trial now underway in Mississippi takes us back to a time when state-sponsored terrorism existed in the United States.   The trial of Edgar Ray Killen for the 1964 murders of civil rights workers James Chaney, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman focuses attention on an era, only four decades ago, when those employing terror against outside forces they saw as invaders were i

How We Went to War: What the Downing Street Memos Demonstrate

by Tom Engelhardt and Mark Danner

Editor's Note: These two articles appear together on the website of www.tomdispatch.com, a weblog of the Nation Institute, which is run by Mr. Engelhardt. The article by Mr. Danner will appear separately in the forthcoming edition of the New York Review of Books. Smoking Signposts to Nowhere By Tom Engelhardt Imagine that the Pentagon Papers or the Watergate scandal had broken out all over the press -- no,

Can Europe Learn from American Constitution-Making?

by James Banner

With the recent failure of the French and Dutch votes on the European constitution, it's going to be harder than ever to see that we are witnessing one of the most extraordinary developments in recorded history.   Only 60 years after the exhaustion and bitterness of World War II, twenty-five nations of Europe have almost fully yoked themselves together under a single encompassing charter. What's more, the boundaries of the nations so close to placing themselves within a single con

The German-Turkish Solution to Darfur

by Diana Muir

Last week week a group of Turkish academics was expected to gather at the Bo gaziçi (Bosphorus) University to hold a conference on "Ottoman Armenians in the Period of the Empire's Collapse." The day before the conference was scheduled to convene, the Turkish Minister of Justice, Cemil Çiçek, rose in Parliament to denounce it, "This is a stab in the back to the Turkish nation... this is irresponsibility… We must put an end to this cycle of tr

Look, Europe Already Has a Working Constitution

by Jeffrey Vanke

French and Dutch voters have solidly rejected the European constitution, also known as the 2004 Treaty of Rome. As a result, a wave of anxiety has swept European governments and media. What's all the fuss about? Europe has had a constitution since 1951, and the 2004 Treaty of Rome contained only marginal changes in it. So the treaty's defeat will make little difference in European affairs, not to mention European history. To call the defeated document a constitution was only sy

South Korea and the United States: Is the Love Affair Over?

by Charles K. Armstrong

September 8, 2005, marks the sixtieth anniversary of the arrival of US soldiers on the Korean peninsula to accept the surrender of Japanese forces. There will likely be little fanfare accompanying this event. At the end of World War II, Koreans viewed the Soviets and the Americans equally as liberators, and neither occupation force was expected to stay long on Korean soil. The special relationship between South Korea and the United States was forged by later events: the formation of the Republic

What History Shows ... Jihad Is a Form of Offensive Warfare

by Daniel Pipes

In his just-released, absorbing, and excellent book, Understanding Jihad (University of California Press), David Cook of Rice University dismisses the low-grade debate that has raged since 9/11 over the nature of jihad – whether it is a form of offensive warfare or (more pleasantly) a type of moral self-improvement.Mr. Cook dismisses as"bathetic and laughable" John Esposito's contention that jihad refers to"the effort t

Does Islam Condone Beheadings?

by Timothy R. Furnish

Lately, losing one’s head for Islam has most appropriately referred to livid, murderous mobs in Afghanistan and Pakistan who, unfortunately, took at face value Newsweek and its false story of American interrogators’ desecration of the Qur’an at Gitmo. Lest we forget, however—since it hasn’t happened for some months—there is a much more literal and horrific sense in which someone can lose his head for Islam, particularly if he is non-Muslim. Between

Has the Bush Administration Made Nuclear Proliferation Inevitable?

by Lawrence S. Wittner

On May 27, the 2005 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) review conference, designed to shore up the international commitment to creating a nuclear-free world, concluded in shambles. According to Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the gathering accomplished “absolutely nothing.” He added: “We are ending after a month of rancor . . . and the same issues continue to stare us in the eyes.”Originally signed in 1968 and enter

Why Stop at Boycotting Israel?

by Mark A. LeVine

With the recent vote by the British Association of University Teachers to boycott some Israeli academic institutions and scholars who support the Occupation, it is becoming increasingly difficult for scholars of the Middle East, and especially Palestine/Israel (or Israel/Palestine, or Israel and Palestine, or Palestine and Israel—there are historical-chronological reasons to put either one first depending on how far back one goes) to avoid publicly taking sides in this often acrimonious

The Pope and Hitler Youth: An Interview with Michael H. Kater

by Rick Shenkman

Mr. Kater is Distinguished Research Professor of History, York University, Toronto and author of the book, Hitler Youth (Harvard University Press, 2004). The following interview was conducted by email.

Did the Media Accurately Report on the New Pope's Membership in the Hitler Youth?

by Stephen A. Bowden

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger’s recent elevation to Pope Benedict XVI has sparked a firestorm of controversy regarding his membership in the Hitler Youth and later the Germany military as a young man during World War II. Indeed, the day following his selection, one British tabloid ran a headline stating, “From Hitler Youth to…Papa Ratzi,” while another remarked that “God’s Rottweiler is Pope.” 1 A third British public

Benedict XVI: The Man and the Novel

by Paul Wiebe

My April 19 surprise, that the newly-elected pope had chosen Benedict XVI as his papal name, was doubtless surpassed by the shock of the many believers, reporters, and the merely curious who, on hearing the news, had rushed to their computers, googled the name, and were instantly confronted with the offer of a PDF download of the op

Why The Boycott Is So Offensive

by Judith Apter Klinghoffer

"In every generation someone rises up against us to destroy us . . . .” That is the truism we Jews remind ourselves of every Passover. This year as the world commemorates 60 years since the defeat of Nazism, the British Association of University Teachers (AUT) made sure we hear that message loud and clear by scheduling a meeting calling for a boycott of Israeli academicians on Passover eve. The timing was but one aspect of a carefully laid victory plan: Others included limiting th

The UN: Oh, But It Was Such a Great Dream!

by Richard Jensen

Some thoughts on American unilateralism. As far as the UN is concerned, let's recall to the original vision of Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt regarding what a League/UN could accomplish. Their idea was that a world body could transcend parochial national interests and bring greater wisdom to a crisis. That dream failed. They never envisioned that states could simply walk out (Germany, Italy, Japan and the Soviet Union), be excluded (Germany and China at different times) or game the system

What If Saudi Arabia Did the Unthinkable and Blew Up Its Oil Wells?

by Daniel Pipes

Investigative writer Gerald Posner reveals something most extraordinary in Secrets of the Kingdom: The Inside Story of the Saudi-U.S. Connection, his book to be published by Random House later this month: that the Saudi government may have rigged its oil and gas infrastructure with a self-destruct system that would keep it out of commission for decades. If true, this could undermine the world economy

Why I Favor a Boycott of My Own University

by Ilan Pappe

Mr. Pappe presented this appeal to the British Association of University Teachers in support of a resolution to boycott the Israeli universities, Haifa and Bar-Ilan.I appeal to you today to be part of a historical movement and moment that may bring an end to more than a century of colonization, occupation and dispossession of Palestinians. I appeal to you as an Israeli Jew, who for years wished, and looked, for other ways to bring an end to the evi

Why an Academic Boycott of My University Is Wrong

by Joshua Schwartz

Bar-Ilan University (BIU), founded in 1955 and located in Ramat-Gan, a suburb of Tel-Aviv and part of the greater "Gush-Dan" metropolitan area, was probably not well known to many readers of History News Network. The 140 acre campus, with its 6 Faculties (Exact, Life and Social Sciences, Humanities, Jewish Studies, and Law), 38 departments, 66 research centers, 18,000 students and 1,600 faculty members, was gearing up for the celebrations of our Jubilee Year. We had, in our view at

Why China Was So Worried About Those Student Protests

by Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom

Western reports on the recent anti-Japanese protests by Chinese students have ofte