He has lived in Japan since his release, and has been fighting for compensation for the Koreans forced to serve in the Japanese army. He had his group of Korean ex-collaborators sued the Japanese government in 1991, but the case was thrown out. From a Japan Times article from August of this year, "I will continue our activities until the government shows sincere remorse. This problem will not end even after all of us die," Lee said. "Our following generation will keep raising this issue."
I was reminded of last year, when the "Republic of Korea’s Truth Commission on Forced Mobilization Under Japanese Imperialism" cleared 83 of the 148 Class B and C Korean war criminals of any wrongdoing and responsibility for their actions during World War II.
He receives pretty sympathetic treatment in the Hankyoreh:
"I cannot deny that the prisoner camp conditions were deplorable," said Lee. Food, medicine, and clothes were not properly provided, and many forced laborers lost their lives due to wounds and diseases that went untreated. In the month of March 1943 alone, a full quarter of the 800 Australian prisoners were hospitalized. One hundred died. For good reason, the Australian military prosecutors could not forgive the Japanese for putting their men through hell on Earth. They were eager to pursue those responsible for the deaths of their comrades, but in their fury were not about to lend an ear to the plight of a youth caught up in the gears of the imperial war machine.
I suspect many who lost their lives in this and other wars were youths caught up in a war effort well beyond their control. Whether you believe them or not, most Japanese accounts of the time will tell you the same thing. Hell, the whole business of reconstruction sought to avoid the responsibility question by placing the blame squarely on an out-of-control military machine. But not before millions died as a result. I'm not being an apologist by any means, and I find the denial of responsibility by the Japanese quite repulsive. Moreover, this issue speaks to the plight of non-Japanese in Japan, and racism was a huge part of the Empire's push to unify Asia. Let's not forget, though, that war is a repulsive thing that annihilates entire generations of people. Very few would find glory and honor in being mutilated were it not for books, movies, epic poetry, and life insurance policies telling us this is the way to go.
The article continues:
Lee served as a supervisor of the prisoners at Hintok. As a civilian hired by the Japanese military, he was lower down on the chain of command than a private.
However in the trial proceedings, he had somehow been transformed into the "Camp Commandant." The reason for this was that the military prosecutors took the testimony of the prisoners at their word, without an objective investigation into the situation. Most of the Australian prisoners did not know Lee’s Japanese name. Instead, they gave the various guards nicknames, which in the case of Lee was "lizard." The origin of this name is unknown.
And:
According to testimonies of prisoners at the time, Lee was often at odds with the Australian army surgeon and Lieutenant Colonel E. E. Dunlop as he tried to meet the demands of the Japanese engineer corps to deploy laborers. Dunlop insisted that wounded soldiers not be used. The prisoners soon developed an animosity toward those Koreans directly overseeing them. Soldier Austin Pipe recounted that "lizard" was responsible for sending prisoners to work on the railroad, and others recalled that Lee had assaulted Dunlop. But other prisoners testified that Lee was among the gentler of the guards and had not assaulted Dunlop. For example, Captain Richard Allen testified that he could not recall Dunlop ever having been attacked by Lee, and that Lee was less brutal than the other guards. However, the vast majority of the testimony was unfavorable toward Lee. In order to sort out the war criminals, Australian investigators took pictures of the prison guards and showed them to the POWs. Those suspected of war crimes were then arrested and put on trial. There were no cross-examinations. Lee admitted to slapping those who disobeyed the rules, but denied taking any other harsh measures. It was difficult to gauge just exactly how much authority was granted to the Korean youth.
Lee was 20 years old when he was put on trial, and fearful of what lay before him. He feigned ignorance before the judge, and damaged his trustworthiness by insisting that daily labor was limited to five-and-a-half hours. Though his lawyer insisted the charges be dismissed on account of his not being Japanese, the judge rejected this argument - also backed up by the testimony of a Japanese colonel named Ishi - that as a Korean civilian, Lee’s actions were merely the product of his Japanese superiors’wishes.
The Hankyoreh article talks about a few other Korean men sentenced to death, and ends with this paragraph:
There were few who welcomed him upon his release. His homeland viewed him with suspicion as a pro-Japanese collaborator, and the Japanese ostracized him for his Korean ethnicity. Thus, his struggle continues to this day. "If only for the sake of my fallen comrades," he said, "I hope that our honor will be one day restored." Beneath the sunlit sky, his moderate Jeolla Province accent was as distinct as ever.
I find the whole business of "truth and reconciliation" ridiculous, because it's just a bunch of nonsense aimed at discrediting the political enemies of the day. You'll notice a lot of these committees come to the same conclusion: "It wasn't me." But, especially when we remember his life was spared on appeal and his sentence greatly reduced, Lee comes off as an especially large piece of shit for his insistence for being paid . . . for something he didn't do . . . was forced to do . . . volunteered to do . . . wait.
From the Japan Times:
When Japan signed the 1952 San Francisco Peace Treaty, restoring its sovereignty, Koreans were stripped of the Japanese citizenship they had been forced to adopt during Japan's colonial rule."Japan forced Koreans to participate in the war (as Japanese) but then refused to pay us compensation because (we were suddenly no longer Japanese citizens). That's irrational," said Lee, who now runs a taxi company in Tokyo. "The government's attitude is unforgivable."
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't Korean citizens lose the right to sue the Japanese government for compensation when Park Chung-hee normalized Korea-Japan relations in 1965? I can't find a link now, but if I remember correctly the lump sum Park and his government were paid preclude individual claims?
Anyway, after googling around I see Japan Probe picked up the story in August. One commenter had a nice quote:
It’s interesting how articles of this sort always refer to Koreans having their citizenship “stripped” in 1952. Isn’t that a bit similar to, say, “After the War of Independence was won, General Washington and his troops were stripped of their British citizenship”? It definitely implies forceful removal, generally removal that goes against the wishes of the stripped person (this may not apply to pole dancers, however). Why do so few articles say “Koreans had their citizenship restored”? Am I paranoid to suspect that the wording is chosen to make Japan look bad? The article quoted here is a classic case: “stripped of the Japanese citizenship they had been forced to adopt” - can’t win.
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