American Legion George W. Benjamin Post 791, a small storefront on Shermer Road in Northbrook, was packed with vets on Thursday, the Fourth of July. Brianna Owen, 18, read her essay that won a $1,500 scholarship toward tuition next fall at Ithaca College, where she will play volleyball as an outside hitter.
“This planet that we are on together is a beautiful one,” she began. “We are all very lucky to be on it. However, this planet is also dangerous …”
After she finished, the assembled said the Pledge of Allegiance. Thomas Mahoney, post chaplain, led the opening prayer.
“Please uncover,” Mahoney said. He thanked God, “source of all our freedom,” then added: “We humbly request a special blessing on those individuals in this room tonight who in serving both God and country preserved our freedom and the freedom of the people of the Republic of Korea.”
The Republic of Korea — what we think of as “South Korea,” when we think of it at all — doesn’t get name checked much in prayers at American Legion halls. But there were three guests from the Consulate General of the Republic of Korea in Chicago: Consul Taesu Yeo, resplendent in his police uniform, Vice Consul Jongyun Ra and cultural coordinator Eojin Shin.
They brought along two Ambassador for Peace medals, given to service members who fought in the Korean War. The medals were presented to Salvatore Casali, 95, an Evanston resident and, posthumously, to the family of Mario Faldani.
“We honor the courage, sacrifice and selflessness of those who answered the call of duty and served,” vice consul Ray said. “We remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice, laying down their lives during the Korean War. On behalf of the Korean people, I extend my deepest gratitude. Your service and sacrifice have secured the blessings of liberty for generations to come.”
That last line summarized the reason I was there. While not a regular attendee of honorary ceremonies, South Korea is a lesson worth reminding Americans of, as we struggle to to shore up freedom around the world, in general, and support Ukraine as it fends off Russia, in particular.
Liberty seems to bore us. Freedom draws a yawn. Look at the news. North Korea is frequently there. Kim Jong Un, the supreme all-powerful dictator son of the previous supreme, all-powerful dictator, Kim Jong-il. Who in turn was the son of Kim Il Sung, president when the country was created in 1948. In a totalitarian state, only death tends to change leadership, which is why North Korea has had three rulers in 76 years.
That might seem a sign of strength. But Kim Jong Un’s ceaseless threats and sabre-rattling — or, more precise, missile-rattling —is a sign of weakness. His constant barrage of garbage — verbal garbage, mostly, though lately they’ve taken to floating actual garbage over the South and releasing it from balloons — is a junkie scramble for undeserved attention. Dictatorships make mistakes, because being surrounded by cringing underlings, it’s easy to blunder. Ask Vladimir Putin.
The constant showboating of the North is so weirdly fascinating, it’s almost possible to forget there is a South Korea. Its population is 51 million, with a capital, Seoul, that’s triple the size of Chicago. It’s a true economic miracle. Maybe the best way to understand the difference between the two Koreas: South Korea’s GDP is 40 times larger than the North’s, where citizens periodically starve to death.
South Korea is also a vibrant democracy — maybe more vibrant than our own. In 2016, South Koreans protested in the streets, and President Park Geun-hye was impeached on charges of corruption and abuse of power. She ended up in jail. We impeached a now-former president twice — the second time, for inciting the mob that attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 — and he seems headed not to prison but back to the White House.
In Korea, it all was possible was because in 1950, when North Korea invaded the South, the United Nations and United States responded, pushing the Communists out of the country after three years of brutal warfare that cost about 36,000 American lives. Fifty million people don’t live in a totalitarian hellscape because we made a sacrifice.
I’d say it was worth it. But many Americans seem to be taking their eye off the ball. We aren’t concerned with preserving liberty in our own country, never mind defending it anywhere else. We need to rethink that, not only for ourselves, but for our young people.
“That’s how I intend to make the world a better place,” Owen concluded. “By having an open mind and being willing to work.”
I’d say our work is cut out for us.