State Department Backs Away from Controversial Comments By Wendy Sherman On Northeast Asian Historical Issues
This speech was probably not a good idea:
Washington said on Monday that there has been no change in U.S. policy, part of an attempt to rectify controversial remarks made by an American diplomat that seemed to position the United States with Japan on historical issues with its neighboring Asian countries.
On Monday, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf expressed surprise over how Seoul had interpreted comments made by Wendy Sherman, the undersecretary of state for political affairs.
“We were, frankly, a little surprised to see that some interpreted her remarks as being directed at any particular leader in the region,” she said.
On Friday, Sherman stated in an address at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington that, “It’s not hard for a political leader anywhere to earn cheap applause by vilifying a former enemy,” words that seemed to be directed at South Korean President Park Geun-hye or Chinese President Xi Jinping, though the Asian leaders were not specifically identified.
Sherman’s remarks, which appeared to trivialize sensitive historical issues, were met with strong backlash in Seoul over the weekend, namely her claim that Seoul and Beijing “have quarreled with Tokyo over so-called comfort women from World War II.”
“There are disagreements about the content of history books and even the names given to various bodies of water,” she continued, likely referring to the dispute over the name of the body of water between Korea and Japan, designated as the East Sea in Seoul and the Sea of Japan in Tokyo. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link, but publicly calling out leaders like this is sure to backfire and entrench their positions. Something as sensitive as the comfort women issue I think requires more quiet back room diplomacy. The Chinese government is never going to stop using historical issues to drum up anti-Japanese sentiment to turn attention away from major domestic issues when needed. The South Korean government does this as well, the best example is when former President Lee Myung-bak was plagued by scandals so he took a trip to Dokdo to bash the Japanese and his poll numbers rose. However, if the Japanese right wing would stop making provocative statements in regards to this issue more traction in regards to reconciliation between Korea and Japan could happen.
