SEOUL - It was anticipated that the Japanese government would authorize the publication of eight kinds of revised history textbooks, including the most controversial one authored by a right-wing scholars’ group, called the Association to Make New Textbooks. In order to prevent the Japanese government’s approval of the right-leaning textbooks, the Korean government made its utmost effort, but to no avail.

In the face of Korea’s protests against the publication of the new history textbooks containing distorted accounts of the past, the Japanese government, for its part, did its best, at least officially, to address the misgivings or complaints by the Korean government and the people. In particular, in compliance with the government, the right-wing association revised or supplemented 137 accounts concerned with the Japanese imperialist aggressions into Asian countries, as well as its brutal colonial rule of the Korean peninsula.

As a result, Tokyo has adopted the attitude that it did what ought to be done for the Korean and Asian peoples. In fact, the association toned down its descriptions justifying Japan’s colonial rule of Korea, while adding Japan’s coercion or unjustness in connection with the imperial rule. And it acknowledged the unjust and forceful annexation of Korea based on the unfair and unequal treaty with the Choson Dynasty in 1910.

In the association-authored textbook, the account advocating the support of Japanese rule of Korea by the United States and European nations was changed to the description that these countries did not raise objections to the Japanese move. At the same time, the history book describes that Japan used military force to quell the Korean uprising against the Japanese annexation and that the Korean people had opposed the Japanese colonial policies, such as the land survey program and assimilation.

Nonetheless, the particular textbook failed to address all the requests for corrections or supplementations by maintaining the backbone of the revised books, intending to misrepresent wartime wrongdoings and justify the Japanese invasion of its Asian neighbors, alluding that the Pacific war it launched contributed to the liberation of the colonized Asian nations. Of particular note, the revised history books deliberately omit the sensitive but disgraceful account about the sex slavery of Korean comfort women. What’s more, glorifying Japanese ancient history, the book insists that the Silla and Paekche Kingdoms paid tribute to the Japanese ruler, but Korean historians dismiss this as an untrue assertion.

The problematic question is that not only the history textbook authored by the rightist association, but all the other seven textbooks maintain similar conservative and nationalistic traits. Specifically, only three out of the seven textbooks describe the comfort women, while the rest omitted the account in their original versions. And the word "aggression" was remarkably reduced in these books, reminiscent of the 1982 controversy over the descriptions of Japanese aggression or advancement into Asian countries.

The problematic question is that not only the history textbook authored by the rightist association, but all the other seven textbooks maintain similar conservative and nationalistic traits. Specifically, only three out of the seven textbooks describe the comfort women, while the rest omitted the account in their original versions. And the word "aggression" was remarkably reduced in these books, reminiscent of the 1982 controversy over the descriptions of Japanese aggression or advancement into Asian countries.

In short, despite considerable alterations of the original draft contents, the new history books, to be used by middle schools from next year, are based on a self-centered interpretation of history, steeped in nationalism and conservatism. Such a viewpoint of history may have been fomented by rising national sentiment longing for past glory, fueled by the decade-long economic depression and disenchantment with the political and social establishments.

To cope with the development, the government held a meeting of related officials on April 4 and decided to take countermeasures against the proliferation of the distorted historical facts in Japanese schools. Under study are the renewal of a request for revising the approved textbooks, the dispatch of a protest delegation to Tokyo, the scale-down of bilateral cultural and artistic exchange programs and the cancellation of various cooperative programs, including exchange visits of youths. Nevertheless, the government seems not to be in a position to take any stern actions, like the recall of the Korean ambassador to Tokyo and other aggressive diplomatic steps that are sure to damage the friendly and cooperative bilateral relationship.

On the other hand, the Japanese government will find it difficult to take further actions regarding the matter, in deference to the Japanese people’s current sentiment, notably the supporters of the revised history. With the government’s options being limited, the anti-historical distortion campaign is expected to be spearheaded by civic groups. Naturally, the future campaign may well be targeted against the adoption of the controversial history books by the schools, so that their students will not learn the distorted facts, but instead come to acquire precise views and insights into history.