The Role of the United States in the Comfort Women Controversy between South Korea and Japan

Abstract

On April 30, 2015, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, became the first Japanese prime minister to deliver a speech to a joint session of the U.S. Congress. Critics hoped to see Abes acknowledgement on the coercion and involvement of the Japanese government in the comfort women issue, but Prime Minister strayed away. The Korean media took it as a failure of the South Korean government in the zero-sum game to get Americas support. As such, in a recent occurrence, the comfort women issue between South Korea and Japan has taken place in the U.S. soil by Korean-American communities erecting monuments and statues commemorating comfort women. The U.S. Congress also passed bills and resolutions regarding the comfort women issue, perceiving the issue as a violation against womens rights, intertwined with the universal values and norms that the United States advocates. President Barack Obama and government officials have also revealed their concerns on the issue that is becoming an impasse between South Korea and Japan. In this context, this paper looks at the role and stance of the United States in comfort women issue, which it it perceives a human rights issue and an impediment against cooperation between its two most important allies in Northeast Asia. The goal of this paper is to scrutinize (1) U.S. stance along the lines of South Korea-Japan relations regarding the comfort women issue and (2) the dynamics between the U.S. government and the U.S. Congress in order to analyze the United States official role in the comfort women issue that does not directly involve the United States and is not exactly a national security issue.