Omnes Sancti et Sanctæ Coreæ, orate pro nobis.

Now Blogging Afresh at Ad Orientem 西儒 - The Western Confucian



Friday, May 19, 2006

5.18
This is a day late and a dollar short, but yesterday was the 26th anniversary of the event Koreanologist Antti Leppänen called "the Kwangju rebellion/democracy movement/uprising/insurgency/massacre etc (pick your own)" in his pictoral history: Kwangju May 1980 photographs.

These photos show that the Citizens' Army, which took over the city, was not exactly preparing a Gandhian Salt March:
As an American, I believe in the right to take up the armed struggle against an unjust government, and Catholicism has a long tradition of support for Tyrannicide. But were the gentlemen pictured above freedom fighters or part of a mob? I don't know.

Whatever the case, once a side takes up arms, and loses, it seems it also loses the right to wallow in victimhood. Of course, many innocents were also killed, which is why "serious prospects of success" are a part of Catholic Just War Doctrine. It is these innocents I mourn.