Unfortunate Brothers: Korea's Reunification Dilemma (2013) - full transcript

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CITY NOISES

After escaping the difficult
conditions of North Korea,

Mr. Lee and more than 20,000
other North Korean refugees

find themselves grossly
unprepared for their new lives.

TRAFFIC NOISE

The stark cultural
and economic differences

make it difficult to integrate
into the fast paced

and modern South Korean society.

TRAFFIC NOISE



Koreans have been victimized
in the 20th century.

They were taken over
by the Japanese,

divided by the United Nations,
and then the Korean War

and they still haven't recovered
from the national division.

And this is termed, this is
expressed in the term "han".

"Han" means this regret or this
angst, this anxiety that...

many times Koreans say
you can't translate "han",

but it's this feeling of being
victimized and it's expressed

very well in the Korean
National folk song "Arirang".

Arirang is a mythical
place, it doesn't exist,

and the line goes, Arirang

SPEAKING KOREAN

They've gone over
the Arirang pass.

Who has gone over
the mountain pass?



SPEAKING KOREAN

"My lover who has cast me aside

has crossed over
the Arirang pass".

And it has a rather whimsical
final line that says,

"may you have blisters
on your feet

before you've gone ten lee".

The conditions that drove
Mr. Lee to leave his home

in North Korea have been over
a century in the making.

Occupied by Japan for
much of the first half

of the 20th century,
Korea was then divided up

by the victorious allies at
the conclusion of World War II.

Five years later tensions on
the peninsula between the South

and North Korean governments
boiled over

leading the North
to invade the South.

Full-scale war resulted
involving the U.S.

and it's allies aiding the South
Korean government,

while the Soviet Union and
communist China

supported the North Korean
regime.

The result was a devastating
three-year war

ending in stalemate
and then an uneasy armistice

that left Korea divided.

Today, Seoul bares little
resemblance to the impoverished,

war torn city it once was.

Rather it stands as a symbol

of the vast economic
and cultural divide

reinforcing the division
between the two Koreas.

After the end of the Korean war,

South Korea was really
struggling economically.

It was South Korea that
was considered to be

the economic basket case,
and it was only through

beginning to industrialize
and pursue export led growth

that they began to grow,

and it wasn't until the late
70s, early 80s, that South Korea

finally overtook North Korea
in terms of per capita GNP.

Having lived in Korea
in the 1950s and '60s,

after the war, when South
Korea was that poor,

it's possible to compare
conditions in the North today

with what South Korea
was like then.

And then you say, well I think
I know how this could unfold

if the North Koreans could have
the advantages

that the South Koreans acquired
in rebuilding their country.

The story of South Korea's
economic success began humbly;

small companies run by ordinary
Koreans, many like Mr. Lee,

refugees from North Korea.

When I first moved to Korea in
1965, I met a friend, Mr. Chung,

who at that time was
working in a tailor shop,

and tailor shops were the
hot business in those days.

It was something that people
could do, labour intensive,

they measure you and fit you
and cut the, the cloth,

you had a tailor-made suit
for very little money.

When I returned to Korea
in 1973,

he was supervising
a wig factory.

Wigs don't sound
like a major industry,

but this was huge in Korea
because it was a great way

to capitalize on a natural
resource Koreans had,

good Korean hair.

It doesn't sound
like a major step

in the economic development,

but the wig industry was
a huge step forward for Korea

in terms of capitalization,
in terms of learning to...

export and learning how the
international market worked.

If you look at South Korea
you see what

with far fewer resources
than the North,

you see the extraordinary,
stunning

economic growth of the South,

and you realize it's the same
people with even better

economic resource base in
terms of natural resources

and other sorts of things, and
it's just an utter disaster.

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North Korean state television
delivers

a tightly controlled message,

displaying only the purported
successes of the regime.

This is in stark contrast
to the stories of deprivation

and oppression from
defectors like Mr. Lee.

Well, everywhere you go,
the country reveals itself

as a very poor place.

North Korea has never
been able to feed itself.

That the plantations,
the broad plains,

the big rice fields have
always been in South Korea.

it has always been
the bread basket

of the Korean people.

Besides that, there
have been some colossal

bad decisions on the North
Korean part about agriculture,

about fertilizer, about
soil and crop use.

If you look at the last decade
and a half,

you know by most estimates,

one if not two million North
Koreans have died by famine.

And no one else in the region
died of famine,

So there's no other reason
than the nature of the regime.

That's not to say that we should
invade North Korea,

that we ought to destabilize it

and pursue unification
now, but that said,

whenever we weigh these issues,

that we need to be
very cognizant

that it is not
a value free equation.

There are costs here,

and they're very real costs
in terms of North Korean people.

The dramatic disparity
between the two Koreas

is so great that one of the
primary concerns of South Korea

is how to stem the tide of North
Korean refugees they expect

to spill over the border should
there be an abrupt unification.

Early on, a lot of researchers

tried to figure out
what level of...

standard of living would you
have to have in North Korea

where North Koreans
wouldn't feel the desire

as mass floods of refugees
go into South Korea.

And to do that back in 2000,
that would have cost you

something about
four trillion dollars.

How do you take two remarkably
disparate economies,

keep people in place,
and improve the one

without everybody
getting on their bicycles

and riding south.

That is not a laughable idea,
but an offensive idea,

I think it would throw them back
rather seriously on their heels

if you said,

well, when unification comes
you'll have to adjust to

what the South wants you to do.

I don't think they have
that in mind.

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It was just a year ago

that authorities
in communist Germany,

appalled at the numbers who are
fleeing to the west

throughout the wall.

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I served in the state department

during the first
Bush administration

and in that capacity,
immediately got asked to

work as the legal advisor
to the U.S. delegation

on German unification.

When I left the government
I was asked to lead

a large-scale study,
seeing if there were

any insights
from the German experience

that might be relevant
in terms of planning for,

and thinking about potential
Korean unification

and it was really an interesting
exercise because there are many

there are many differences
that are important.

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The gulf between the East
and West German economy

was far less than the gulf

between the North
and South Korean economies,

and yet that was incredibly
expensive for the Germans,

so you can just imagine
the expense

that's going to be involved
in the case of Korea.

The simple fact is that Koreans
could never even begin to dream

of a unification scenario
as relatively inexpensive,

as smooth, as peaceful as
you had in the German scenario.

So the costs in the Korean case
are going to be much higher,

and the Koreans know that
and as a result,

that's why you've seen some
real reticence

on the part
of Korean policy-makers.

There were also differences in
terms of flow of information.

I mean, most of the East Germans
knew a lot about West Germany.

They knew product brands, they
saw West German television,

that doesn't exist
in North Korea.

You've got virtually
no information that

has crossed the border.

No sense of what democratic
institutions look like

or what the debates or
the political parties are like,

very little experience now
after all these years with a...

market oriented economy,and all
that that means in terms of

personal initiative
and personal sacrifice.

To visit North Korea is to...

encounter a very
human situation,

to see people trying to get to
work, kids getting to school,

being friends, laughing,
holding hands,

walking down the street,

it's a real environment.

I mean that the North
Koreans are regular folks,

that they, they have, they
think they're normal.

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Getting permission to film

in the Hanowan Resettlement
Center is extremely difficult.

It is not allowed under
any circumstances

to show images of refugees.

There is a justified fear
of North Korean reprisals

against defectors
and the Hanowan staff

takes great care
to make sure

defectors identities
are not exposed.

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While Mr. Lee and his wife,
also a defector,

have struggled to adapt
to South Korean life,

his children
are fully integrated.

Yet despite his hopes that his
kids will see a united Korea,

they are part of a growing
younger generation

that does not necessarily share

their parents' desire
for unification.

It's a generation gap
that could hold

profound consequences
for both Koreas.

South Korea is becoming
a dominant cultural force,

not just in Asia,
but internationally as well.

Its growing young population has
created a vibrant youth culture

that is vastly different
than the traditions

of their parent's generation.

These days, I think kids,
they're exposed to like,

everything and they can access
to every kind of culture

and cultural phenomenon.

So that makes it a whole lot
different from the past.

After the Korean war, Korea,
Korea's main concern was

economic development.

Korean society
became more open.

So youngsters had more
freedom to create

the kind of films they wanted,
the kind of [music] they wanted,

and since then it was
just a major change

in culture in general.

KOREAN HIP HOP MUSIC

Something that is really
interesting

to watch pop culture in Korea

is to watch the thing called
the "hanyu".

The "hanyu" is the Korean wave,
this wave of culture

that is sweeping across
all of China and Japan and Asia.

There is a very interesting
cultural mix

between the kind of western,
the arts, popular culture

and traditional Korean arts
and popular culture.

Young Japanese think
young Koreans are cool,

and they are cool because they
have these wonderful pop music

videos and songs and great
high energy performances,

great TV actors,
and great stories that young

that young Japanese
just really enjoy.

So we've had a sea change in
Japan in attitudes toward Korea,

and this is a measure of how
different the younger generation

in Korea is from the older
generation in Korea.

The younger generation
is more focused

on the United States, on Europe,
on the world writ large,

they're very wired in,
they're very

international in nature.

If you look at club scenes
in big cities of Korea,

then you tend to think that
this the gap between the South

and North bigger and bigger,
and you wonder if this

generation really wants
reunification of the country.

Only few people have
had the experience

of the Korean war and post war,
it's a whole different matter

for this generation.

Anybody who is under
50 years of age is

is very unlikely to have
an immediate brother or sister,

father or mother,
or even grandparent

living in North Korea.

So the personal level ties
that would make this

a personal issue, not
a broader cultural one

aren't going to be there.

So understandably, there is
going to be a gap between

those with direct experience,
the older generation

and the younger generation.

The contrast, people
say stark contrast,

but I'll just say contrast,
between North

and South Korea is huge,
and you don't really see

how they could ever get
back together again.

The people of those
two countries

have been educated since birth

in two different
national stories.

Who are their heroes?

Who were the winners and losers,
the good and bad guys?

Aspirationally, on an
emotional level, of course.

Every class,

every family narrative is
a narrative of the tragedy

of the division of this nation.

They are one people.

One language, one history,
and they are artificially

divided by the Cold War.

And so clearly every South
Korean wants unification.

but, if you then dial
that down to much more

specific questions like,
do you support unification now?

Those numbers drop
dramatically.

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Mr. Lee does not let
the generation gap

or South Korea's reluctance
to pay for unification,

should it ever come,
deter his efforts.

He devotes all his working time

to help his brothers
in the North.

Several times a year,
he launches balloons

that carry humanitarian items
and messages of hope

across the heavily
guarded border.

[music]

Mr. Lee's cross-boarder
humanitarian operation,

decried by North Korea
and tolerated by the South,

faces a sizeable, almost
impenetrable physical roadblock.

The southern boundary fence-line
running around here

is the defendable
territory of the DMZ.

It was originally intended to
be two km south, two km north.

Due to the fact that we can't
support some of the area

as defendable Republic of Korea,
they built a fence-line

along the defendable area.

The DMZ, the demilitarized
zone, is an oxymoron,

it's not demilitarized.

It's the most heavily
militarized

place on the planet these days.

It's a two and a half mile
strip that goes across

the whole peninsula, cutting
right across its waist,

separating North Korea
from South Korea.

Since the armistice agreement
was signed in 1953,

the 38th parallel has been
a bloody barrier

between two nations
still technically at war.

After 60 years of tension,
security still remains high

with the constant threat
of renewed conflict.

Since 1953, North Korea has
violated the armistice agreement

over 200 times, creating a cycle
of provocation and retaliation

between the two Koreas.

In recent years the North
has tested nuclear devices,

long range missiles,
launched artillery attacks

against South Korean islands

and sunk the South Korean
naval vessel, the Cheonan.

The North Korean perspective
is that the provocations

come from the other side.

When they sank the
Cheonan, nobody much

nobody much mentions
the joint manoeuvres

that were going on
in those waters

with U.S. and South Korean
naval forces at the time.

The North Korean side would be
totally, well, we were trying

to make a statement, you
can't just bring a corvette

into our territorial waters
and roam around at will.

We're going to control that.

Of all the North Korean
provocations,

there are some that stand out
for their audacity.

One of the most remarkable
is simply known as

the Blue House raid.

In January of 1968 I was in
Korea living in a place called

Cheongun-Dong which is very
close to the Blue House,

the presidential mansion.

And that night we were just
folding up getting ready

to go to bed when we heard this
pop, pop, pop stuff going on.

And we thought oh, there's
some kind of exercise.

And then we saw
machine gun fire.

MACHINE GUN FIRE

We could see the tracers,
and if you can see the tracers

you know those aren't blanks.

It was a James Bond style
squad of highly trained

North Korean commandos
who had come down and had run,

marathon runners, so
they, the South Koreans

and the Americans knew they
had come through the DMZ,

but they didn't realize they
had come down so quickly.

To show you
how dangerous it was,

there was an older gentleman

two doors down from our
gate

who stepped out
to see what was going on

and one of the squads came by
and shot him right there.

Of the 31 commandos that
came down 29 were killed.

They refused to surrender.

They shot their way
till they died.

Finally he realized
everything they were telling him

in the North was false,
and that he was misled

and he could go through
South Korea, see the markets,

see the houses and realize
that South Korea had a better

way of living and thus
he converted and changed.

Kim Shin Jo paid a steep price
for his betrayal of the North.

Upon receiving citizenship in
1970, his parents were executed

and the remaining members
of his family were purged.

SHOUTING ORDERS IN KOREAN

The North Koreans have this
wonderful pattern of basically

doing something quite terrible
and then there's a negotiation

and they exact some price
to promise

not to do
the terrible thing again.

There's not a lot of evidence
conciliation has worked much,

and there's not
a lot of evidence

that a hard-line
has worked very much.

And I think it's also fair
to say that if you've reached

your hand out and tried and
it kind of gets bitten

or slapped every time, why
continue with that policy,

at least try something else.

It's important when there's
an eruption of trouble

on the Korean peninsula
to remember that

there's a logic
to both sides behaviour.

The North Koreans have
some reason

for doing what they're doing.

It may be an internal reason
and maybe inscrutably local

and hard for us to divine
with the information that

we have from the outside, but
they are doing it for a reason.

The secret to what's going on
in North Korea

is to understand,

that whatever they're doing,
it's for domestic consumption.

They don't really care that
much about their relations

with South Korea or
with the United States,

they're primary concern is
maintaining their control

on society.

The passing of Kim Jong Il
and the succession of his son

Kim Jong Un has ushered
in a new era

of North Korean sabre rattling.

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Two of the biggest obstacles
to reunification right now

are North Korean arms
developments, in two ways:

one is launching missiles,

the second is developing
a nuclear bomb.

And of course,
they've done both.

Then when you look at broader
regional and global issues,

and you start asking
questions about

denuclearization, that's where
the problem becomes,

you know, more difficult.

We have this problem
that North Korea now

has tested a nuclear weapon

and they've declared themselves
a nuclear power.

So how do you engage
North Korea

without recognizing them
as a nuclear power.

For the North, this is
a huge step forward.

This is a validation that the
socialist system is working,

that they have scientists
and technologists that

are joining the advanced
countries of the world

that can launch a satellite
and can develop a nuclear bomb.

For a country that sees
itself surrounded

by enemies on all sides, being
picked on, being isolated,

this is tremendous benefit for
them domestically

and it's a huge barrier
to unification.

SPEAKING KOREAN

Missile launches and threats to
continue testing nuclear weapons

are suspected to be
the result of the new leader

out to prove himself and
further consolidate power.

Imagine the situation that
Kim Jong-Un is in.

A young man, raised for this
job, pruned for this job,

and yet surrounded by some
men that are old enough

to be his grandfather,
in uniform

with stars on their epaulette,

and he is their commander.

It was almost impossible
to imagine this scenario

while Kim Jong-Il was alive,

where North Korea
would begin to open,

or even have real instability

at that level of power,

but now with the transition,

there's an opportunity
for change.

We've got a rogue regime
that has the capacity for

developing nuclear weapons and
selling fissionable material,

While it may not use it itself,
selling it to people who are

less reticent to use it.

If we were in the effort
of trying to solve

the Korean peninsula
problem, ignore that,

ignore everything they've done,
we would de facto recognize them

as a nuclear power,

SHUTTER SOUND

and the question then becomes,
if a country that is poor,

starving, backwards, a pariah
regime that abuses human rights,

you know, smuggles drugs,
counterfeits currencies,

has never met
a weapons system that

it wasn't willing to export to
the worst people in the world,

if that kind of country can be
recognized as a nuclear power

and as a negotiating
counterpart as a nuclear power,

who can't?

[music]

Despite continuing threats
and provocations

by the North Korean regime,
Mr Lee remains dedicated

to his mission of providing
humanitarian aid

to his former countrymen,
and retains hope

there will someday be
a peaceful

and diplomatic path
towards unification.

[music]

There is a concern
on the part of China

that if you have a unified Korea
that's very heavily armed,

it's got West-leaning
orientation to be sure,

and at the end of the day
you might find that

the political dynamic to keep
U.S. troops kind of goes away

in which case you have
a heavily armed Korea

staring at
a heavily armed China,

[music]

That concern is diminished
dramatically,

given the deeper integration
of their economies now.

And ultimately it's going to
have to result

in some serious reassessment
on the part of China

of its relationships
to North Korea.

But nevertheless I think there's
a little bit of concern there.

[music]

The prevailing narrative
for the last 30, 40 years

has been that the Chinese want
North Korea as a buffer state.

I'm not convinced that it's
entirely because they are afraid

of having a South Korean
regime on their borders,

and that they want a buffer,

but they're afraid of
the process instability.

I think that the Chinese
are rather annoyed

by the North Koreans.

I think they see the North
Koreans as a giant step

backward on the socialist
progression that the communists

in China have achieved,
the refugee case

is a huge thorn in China's side

because you've got
all these refugees

that are sneaking over
the border into China,

not into South Korea,

they can't get there
directly through the DMZ,

not to Japan by the ocean,
but by land into China.

[music]

China's shared border with
North Korea and its large

ethnic Korean population along
the border have facilitated

escape for thousands
of North Koreans over

the past six decades.

China's large ethnic
Korean population

closely follows relations
between the two Koreas.

Many sympathize with the plight
of North Korean defectors

and help them once
they arrive in China.

However, while many defectors
like Mr Lee successfully escape,

others are not so fortunate.

Alright gentlemen, welcome
to Conference Row,

the official meeting place
for the UN Command

Command and the UNZ for the
North Koreans and KPA.

All the blue buildings here
belong to the UN Command

while the grey/tan buildings
belong to the KPA.

The large grey building
on Conference Row

is the North Korean's visitors
centre or the Panuon dock.

There is one soldier
out on the stairs,

the other soldier sits
inside with a camera

taking our pictures today...

The U.S. genuinely
supports reunification,

our hope obviously,

is that we can handle
the process of unification

well enough that we would
still have an alliance

with a unified Korea,

that it would be a unified Korea
under an open democratic regime

that is a market economy and is
an ally of the United States.

I think that North Korea
will change.

But is there a scenario

for the Korean peninsula that
doesn't involve

millions of people
getting killed?

That's what I really care about,

because there are
lots of scenarios,

and most of them,

including some pretty likely
ones, are very violent.

You look at Seoul,
they would never risk this.

You know what,
they're risking it.

and the North Koreans as well.

[music]

While security concerns
and regional rivalries dominate

thinking at a national level,
and younger generations

of South Koreans feel
and know less

about their northern neighbour,
Mr Lee's activism has drawn

hundreds to his cause and seeks
to keep the suffering

of North Koreans
on the public agenda.

The truth is,
the greatest obstacle

to unification is Koreans.

South Korean doesn't want
to pay the price of unification

and who can blame them?

It's an astronomical
cost in that process.

The North Koreans
don't want unification

because they don't want to be
absorbed like East Germany was.

They are the weak system,
they will lose everything.

The privileged elite
in N. Korea

will not be the same
in S. Korea,

in a unified Korean peninsula.

In terms of the broader
question of unification.

China, Russia, Japan,
the United States, South Korea

all decided that we did not want
a precipitous unification,

we did not want
a collapse of North Korea,

because it was too risky,

and we didn't want to pay
the price of unification.

That's still our position today.

That makes sense, and
I still support that position,

but we need to be very cognizant
with ourselves,

or very honest with ourselves

that there is a price that
is being paid in terms of

the horrific human rights
situation in North Korea.

[music]

There are significant challenges
facing Korean reunification.

For now Mr Lee continues his
mission to help the people

of North Korea and keep
the hope of unification alive

in a South Korea that is growing
further apart

from its North Korean
brethren every day.

[music]

Mr Lee's balloon launches
are meticulously planned

and executed.

However, despite
careful preparation,

launches are often aborted
or delayed due to weather,

security concerns
or other circumstances

beyond his control.

The prospects for Korean
unification

balance on similar
unpredictable events.

South Korean opinions, change
in North Korean leadership

and Chinese support
of the regime

are all factors that could push
the peninsula closer

or further from being unified.

Ultimately, Koreans
and the world will have to wait

for what most see as a difficult
but inevitable reunification

of a people long divided.

CHEERING

You know the question
of unification,

it could happen any time.

It could happen by the
time this film is aired.

Something could happen in the
north,

an adventuresome
military commander

could decide to
take over and sue for peace

with the South and say, Hey,
we want to be part of this,

not part of this failed
economic system in the north.

That could happen tomorrow...

and it could take another
30 or 50 years.

It's really hard to say.

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