22. Military Parade

Sangcheol's Diary Podcast_상철의 일기

Today is June 20, 2016. Monday. One of the most surprising news I heard on the half of this year was that military parade on Geumnam-Ro, the street of Gwangju, Jeollanamdo, Korea was planned by The Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs of Korea but it was cancelled after strong opposition from the related organizations and opposition party. According to the plan by The Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, they had planned to have an airborne unit responsible for the massacre of Gwangju citizens during the May 18 pro-democracy movement march down Geumnam-Ro after the ceremony commemorating the Korean War. A military band, war veterans, about 150 soldiers of the 31st Division and over 50 soldiers of the 11th Airborne Brigade in Damyang, Jeollanam-do were also to take part in the parade. Geumnam-Ro was the name of streets where numerous citizens were killed due to collective shooting by the airborne troops dispatched by martial law at the time of the pro-democracy movement in May, 1980. The 11th Airborne Brigade, which was stationed in Gangwon-do in 1980, was dispatched to Gwangju by martial law at the time of the May 18 pro-democracy movement. The 11th Airborne Brigade, which was dispatched to Gwangju on May 19, 1980 opened fire at the citizens in front of the former Jeollanam-do office and in Geumnam-ro along with the 7th Airborne Brigade and killed at least 550 people. Even though 36 years have passed since the May Massacre of 1980, a lot of victioms still vividly remember what had happended on that day on Geumnam-Ro and still suffering the pain. Someone said that this is same as Japanese troops are going to march down Nanjing streets of China where the Japanese army had murdered more than 200,000 Chinese civilians. We learn many valuable lessons from the history. One of the lessons to remember is when the government is not afraid of its own people, people also are not afraid of its own government.