My Take | South Korea’s Yoon back-pedals on firing bazooka in knife fight
If there is anything worse than going after a hated opposition that enjoys a parliamentary majority, it’s having to back down almost immediately
What could have been a tragedy quickly became a farce in Seoul. As a Chinese-Canadian who recently lived through a declaration of national emergency, I am probably familiar with how many Koreans must have felt – confused, bewildered, angry.
These days, it seems some elected politicians around the world are rather trigger-happy. Still, there is a difference between firing a gun and launching a bazooka. With no prior warning, President Yoon Suk-yeol had tried to fire the latter. And in doing so, he has most likely ended his political career.
Come to think of it, Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did something similar, back in 2022. And for what?! In both cases, it was complete overkill. The only difference is that unlike Yoon, Trudeau got away with it.
By comparison, Hong Kong endured more than six months of riots, arson and violent protests back in 2019, but it still didn’t declare an emergency or martial law. And yet, it earned constant condemnation from Western governments. Talk about double standards!
Yoon had barely finished his broadcast in declaring martial law before reversing himself. Apparently, South Korea’s constitution allows for a majority vote in the National Assembly to overturn the president’s martial law declaration, and the opposition did exactly that. It soon became clear the military leadership had no stomach for what looked like a return to the country’s dark recent past.
Be that as it may, Yoon’s martial law address to his nation makes for fascinating reading and says a lot about his state of mind. It may still be worth examining for educational purposes.
His first line was: “Honourable citizens, as president, I appeal to you with a feeling of spitting blood.” Cantonese has a similar expression, which is literally “vomiting blood”. Both denote a state of internal turmoil and suffering when confronted by something intolerable. What is this something? It’s “the legislative dictatorship of the Democratic Party”, which, according to Yoon, “is paralysing the judiciary by intimidating judges and impeaching a number of prosecutors, and it is paralysing the executive branch”.
