Researcher ORCID Identifier

0009-0009-2713-7406

Graduation Year

2026

Document Type

Open Access Senior Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

History

Reader 1

Harmony O'Rourke

Reader 2

Albert Park

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Terms of Use for work posted in Scholarship@Claremont.

Rights Information

© 2026 Robinson P Lee

Abstract

Little more than a decade after being victimized by the devastating Korean War, South Korea fought in another devastating civil war in Asia, the Vietnam War. How is South Korean nationhood and political identity understood and articulated in the face of existential national questions presented by the Vietnam War? This thesis uses social and oral history approaches to put a myriad of primary and secondary sources in conversation with one another, building on the existing, limited English-language literature on South Korean military involvement in the Vietnam War. These approaches include examining narratives of Vietnam War atrocities, of an organized group of South Korean veterans and their supporters, and of civic truth and reconciliation campaigns that have sought to empower Vietnamese victims. Ultimately, this thesis argues that the collective memory of South Korean military involvement in the Vietnam War is a political struggle. The actions, experiences, and recollections of South Korean veterans of the Vietnam War serve as a prism through which different visions of South Korean national and political identity can be viewed, broadly aligning with ongoing left-wing and right-wing political movements in South Korea. It is through how South Koreans remember and forget the South Korean veterans’ actions in the Vietnam War that South Korean national identity is conceptualized either as a democratic political project of reconciling atrocity and war or as securing national prosperity for South Korea through military strength and economic development.

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