Syngman Rhee was the first president of Korea. He had a ph.D. in international politics from Princeton. He lived in the Untied States form 1911 to 1945 and married with an Austrian wife. He was in the Korean temporary government which resisted Japanese colonial rule at Koreaan and was set up by the independence movemnet on April 1919 ShangHai, China. He was full of political ambitions and he was an unworthy president because Rhee was a political fanatic, undemocratic and massacred many people.
Rhee cried for the Korean independence in America but it was easier than others who were in ShangHai. He did not have any job while he conducted campaigns for Korea; he was given money by Korean American. He made speeches and extended his name, an anti-communist, for American politicians; He used the Korean independence movement for his political base.
Rhee was insufficient for national consciousness, before the independence government established in Korea, he petitioned the United Nation for Korea to be under U.S. Mandate. During the Korean War he gave the U.S. military government the rule of troops. After the Korean War, he approved of the ROK under the U.S.
Around 500,000-1,000,000 people were killed by Rhee government during The Korean War, the victims of the government were regarded as communists, the forces of reaction or were socialist intellectuals. Rhee was behind the CheJu March 4 massacre (1948 ¹approximately 80,000people were killed because 1.the CheJu people rose up to protest the rule of the military government and the separate election in South Korea which threatened to divide the nation.), the DaeJon prison massacre (July 1950. ² around 3~4 thousands people, who were connected the CheJu March 4 massacre and the YuSoon incident’s people were killed in the prison of DaeJon, Korea), the SuWon massacre, the blowing up the Han river Bridge (June 28 1950) and seemed Kim-Gu and Lyuh-Woon Hyung who were powerful political men, were assassinated by Rhee or his close associates.
Rhee had the ROK under his despotic rule during 12 years and fraudulent elections. He and the U.S. military government rehired the same pro-Japanese collaborators and instituted the same colonial system. Rhee set the collaborators free because his close associates were almost pro-Japanese. High officials, administration, judicature, the police force and troops were full of pro-Japanese collaborators who restrained the independence movement from crying for Korean independence and under Japanese colonial rule; they helped the Japanese rule come to Korea. on April 19 1960, Rhee was run out of office by students and citizens.
Syngman Rhee created the Republic of Korea. He massacred countless people, made war with North Korea, and did not deal with honest elections. Some people said when he became the president, he was very old so his vice-president KeeBoong- Lee controlled him but if he really wanted democracy and justice, he would not broken the laws of Korea and became second and third president.
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¹,1.http://dailybruin.ucla.edu/DB/issues/97/04.09/view.yuk.html
²http://kin.naver.com/db/detail.php?d1id=11&dir_id=110101&eid=8/eZ1aP5m6/J8jlb9h2AOGEuiuZKtKpT
