Koreans on the “right” side of history can be included in that history

The War Memorial of Korea is a sprawling museum complex in central Seoul dedicated to the military history of Korea, and the loss of military lives over that history. The main exhibit begins in the ancient kingdoms of Korea and ends with the Korean War. I recently visited the memorial to look for signs of Koryo Saram history. They were few, but significant.
Mentions of Koryo Saram history were integrated into the overarching history of Korean nationhood. Starting from ancient times, the memorial traced the presence and development of civilization on the Korean Peninsula. In the late 1800s period, this history departed from the fixed geography of the peninsula to describe the movement of ethnic Koreans beyond South Korea’s modern state borders.

For example, Koryo Saram predecessors were mentioned as “activists fighting for the national independence movement” who happened to be located in the Russian Maritime Province (Primorsky Krai). The migration north out of the peninsula and into Russia was described as a political act directly tied to the independence movement. A bust of General Hong Beom-do recognized his leadership in opposition to the Japanese, but did not mention his life and afterlife in Kazakhstan.

Another allusion to Koryo Saram was 1919, following the Independence Movement, when “Koreans both inside and outside the country” labored to create a government representative of Korean interests. This implies that Koreans across the globe are inherent to the Korean national project, as they have been historically. By integrating diaspora history into the exhibit, the memorial demonstrates that South Korean nationalism is built on diaspora activism.
But the memorial’s recognition of diasporic Koreans was not complete. North Koreans were inherently excluded from the exhibit because the memorial itself is dedicated to the fight against them. Likewise, Koryo Saram’s role in Russian and Soviet history were excluded because they were irrelevant, and at times contradictory, to the South Korean side of history through the Korean War.

The underlying message of the memorial is clear: Koreans on the “right” side of history can be included in that history. What, then, for the Koryo Saram, whose history has fallen on both sides of that invisible line?

One of the opening lines of the exhibit asserted that “preserving the wholeness of a nation” is the plight of a people. Koryo Saram history exemplifies just this plight: migrating north to pursue opportunity, persevering in the Soviet Union after deportation, returning to South Korea to build a new life again. Cultural and national preservation is a defining trait of the diaspora. But borders, and the politics that come with them, inhibit the supranational recognition of honoring a truly supranational idea of “Koreans.”