Dandong Part III: Museum of American Aggression and Aid to Korea

Entrance to "The Museum of American Aggression and Aid to Korea"

I think it's interesting that as students in the United States, we don't really learn that much about the Korean War. It seems like a lot of focus is put on the World Wars, but we don't really see or hear that much about the wars the US has been involved in since then. Or maybe I did learn about it in school but pop culture is so much more focused on WWII I just forgot I knew something about it. Think about how many movies and TV shows were spawned from WWII. How about the Korean War? I know the only one I can think of is MASH (both the series and the movie). It may have to do with my age, but I have to wonder if it has to do with the sketchy, open to interpretation type outcomes of the conflicts/police actions in Korea and Vietnam as opposed to the very clear WOOO USA USA USA!!! outcome of WWII.

Things I know about the Korean War:

• Fought on the Korean Peninsula
• Specifically over the N. Korean invasion into S. Korea
• US backed S. Korea, China/Russia backed N. Korea
• Generally the first proxy war where the US and Russia realized we could duke it out in someone else's back yard. (Also how terrible is that? We (both the US and Russia) figured out that we could destroy another country while sorting out our differences of political opinion.)

Wow, coming into this museum I wish I would have known way more in advance. Not having a deep knowledge about the Korean War left me feeling like the museum was very propaganda-y, but with out a 100% sure feeling that they were always overstating the truth.

Things claimed in the museum:

• No Chinese people died - 0% True
• No N. Korean people died - 0% True
• US used a variety of biological and chemical weapons - 25% True? ( a lot of information on this point, via Google, not much of it totally reliable)
• The Chinese entered the war only due to the US advancing into N. Korea - 50% True? Could argue this either way. We say the North Koreans started it, Chinese obviously blame the US.

Okay, despite the alleged propaganda / truth overstating, this museum was awesome. I have to say I was impressed before we even got into the museum. As you come up this big set of stairs (seems like everything here is at the top of something, I wonder if that is a cultural thing?) the first thing you see is the monument to the Soviet Airmen that died in combat protecting Dandong and in general this region of China. Essentially these guys were sent down by the Russians to protect the North Korean forces and supply lines from US attack. They are the heroes in Dandong. Remember at this point in history both China and North Korea are not really armed like the US and Russia are. We were pounding the Yalu River trying to cut off supplies and before the Russians got involved there was not much N. Korea could do about it except shoot at them from the ground.

This monument has to be one of the best monuments to war heroes ever, look at the expressions on their faces. This monument is one to the emotion and pure brutality of war. As far as I'm aware, we just don't have this kind of monument in the States, ours tend to be more...well more something more awe inspiring maybe? I don't know the word for what ours have more of but they are definitely less violent.

This is the Less Violent Side

Just look at the sculpture above, there is a guy bringing a rock down on someone else. Guy #2 is thrusting a bayonet, the guy below him is breaking someones neck with his freaking bare hands!! The picture below is the back side of the sculpture above. Here a guy laying on a log is about to be on the relieving end of a rifle butt.

The Worse Side

This particular part of the monument was probably the most violent, but the other three corners still aren't far behind in what they are trying to portray.

Implied Violence

MIG's Overhead

 I have to wonder what the reaction would be if we built a monument like this somewhere in the US. Is it possible to build something like this here (in China) because of the lack of cultural diversity? I just don't think it would go over very well with the Japanese community (among lots and lots of other people) if we had a monument in the park depicting Marine's on Iwo Jima using Napalm to flush Japanese soldiers out of their tunnels. For the record I am not suggesting this as an actual idea for a monument purely hypothetical.

After a little while of exploring the monument and taking in all of the overt violence depicted there we decided to head into the museum. First we had to stop and read the rules. If you are disheveled or alcoholic keep out!

Serious Rules for a Serious Museum

Then immediately upon entry there was a huge statue of Chairman Mao along with what amounts to a very concise purpose statement for China's involvement in the war.

Why China Got Involved: The Short Version

Once inside the museum, wow. That place was amazing. They had the entire history of the Korean War according to China laid out piece by piece and the whole story was in both English and Chinese. It seemed like a lot of the museum was directed at foreigners and this is their big chance to tell what really happened.

Among other things, it described how the Korean War was the real beginning to a new culture of directed "despise and hate" toward Americans.

Paragraph About Educating Hate Toward America

There were also a lot of accusations Americans were deliberately killing civilians and generally making life miserable for everyone. This particular storyline even came with a painting.

Civilians Feeling the Wrath of America

While I am 99% sure the US was not killing civilians on purpose, this is one of the perceived (by the nations supplying the fighting power) benefits of fighting a "proxy war". You can have your battle of superiority while someone else's things, lives and homeland are destroyed. It is pretty sad that our tensions with Russia devolved to this, not once but multiple times.

As we neared the end of the museum I had mostly gotten over the violence of the monument outside as the inside of the museum was mostly filled with normal war museum artifacts: medals, weapons, notebooks, maps, diaries, etc. One of the last few rooms we entered was labeled something like "Monument to Our Leaders" or something close to that. There was a room with a statue of Mao and a more standard (by US standards) looking war monument. It was a few big pieces of stone with the names of the officers who may or may not have (as far as I could tell this museum did not officially recognize any Chinese or N. Korean casualties) died during the war, pretty much it look like any number of war monuments in any small town in the US. Except it had this in the middle of the room...

More Violence!

Last but not least, another example of awesome stuff you can do in other countries that you can't do in the US because of lawyers (no offense Uncle Greg). Woooo the Chinese Military experience where you can go play on old Cold War era tanks and artiliery!

Wooo Big Guns!

After learning all about the Chinese view of the War, we hopped back in a cab and headed down to the Yalu River Bridge for a view of the North Korean city of Sinuiju.

Beyond the Bridge is the City of Sinuiju, N. Korea