Dai Kodato
Aug 26, 2017 · 2 min read

It's same as in South Korean, South Vietnamese and every Central and South American dictators that US had backed, US cares more about leader’s loyalty to US than to their leadership abilities. Oppositions may start out similarly, as in their leaders may be chosen for their loyalty to China, USSR or Islamic faith but unlike US which attempts to minimize coups and assassinations in the “legitimate” government, oppositions frequently fights internally so incompetent leaders end up dead. As US keeps supporting the incompetent and corrupt, but US-loyal leader, the opposition rapidly rallies around the competent (frequently brutal) leader who could use “American support” of incompetence to convince people and military to switch side.

A good example is South Korea. Its first president, Syngman Rhee was chosen by US because he was a Christian and had strong ties to US politicians including President Roosevelt. None of US politicians or government officials cared that he had no economic or military knowledge, had been out of Korea for about 30 years, and was even impeached by a Korean exile group over misuse of power. US could have chosen a Korean bureaucrat or military personnel (such as Paik Sun-yup) who had served Japan or Prince Yi Un (who could have been the Emperor of Korea) but didn’t because US couldn’t trust anyone who had any tie with Japan. Naturally, President Rhee almost lost the Korean War until a massive military intervention by US, drove South Korean economy to the ground by corruptions and antagonizing Japan (which had been the biggest importer of Korean products) and repeatedly massacred South Koreans to “stop communism” (which were actually protests against his corrupt government). After he was ousted, multiple incompetent presidents ruled until Park Chung-hee, a former Manchukuo military officer, launched a coup and then used his personal friendship with Japanese politicians (some had been bureaucrats in Korea) to secure economic aids, investments and restart trades with Japan. US could have prevented the Korean War and 17 years of mismanagement of South Korea by simply requesting Japan to submit a list of competent leaders and having them rule but the desire to do it the “American way” created disasters after disasters that was stopped only by the “Korean/Japanese way”.

Bluntly put, American politicians, government officials, political institutions AND media have no idea how to convince competent foreign leaders to work with US but not for US. They cannot accept any leader who does not repeat every American policies without a question even those that destabilize his government and look away as their incompetence destroy people’s confidence and support of those leaders.

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    Dai Kodato

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    Not liberal, not conservative