Miriam Jordan, Wall Street Journal, May 29, 2009
{snip}
Then Mr. Lee [Suk Joon Lee, a South Korean immigrant] stumbled upon a Korean-language Web site that described a way out: a program that the Army was about to launch that offered a shortcut to getting U.S. citizenship. The site was created by another Korean immigrant, James Hwang, and it explained in minute detail the steps required to qualify.
“James knew everything about the program, and he wasn’t even in the military,” says the 27-year-old Mr. Lee. In February, Mr. Lee, along with hundreds of other Korean immigrants who had learned about the pilot program from Mr. Hwang, descended on Army recruiting centers in New York to enlist.
The program was authorized without fanfare late last year by Defense Secretary Robert Gates to attract temporary immigrants who speak strategically important languages such as Arabic, Farsi and Korean. The bait: The soldiers could immediately apply for U.S. citizenship, skipping the sometimes decadelong process of securing a green card first.
So many Koreans have applied, however, that the Army doesn’t need them all.
Koreans form the largest group among the 8,000 applicants for the program, launched on Feb. 23. Many have excellent credentials, including degrees in medicine and engineering. Almost all are veterans of South Korea’s own compulsory military service.
{snip}
The promise of America lures thousands of South Koreans to the U.S. each year. Korean students enroll in U.S. colleges. Others start small businesses in order to get temporary visas.
But many get tied up in bureaucracy.
{snip}
Immigrants who are permanent residents, such as Mrs. Hwang [who arrived on a student visa in 2001], have long been eligible to join the U.S. military. In May 2007, she enlisted so she could quickly secure U.S. citizenship and sponsor her dying father to remain with her in the U.S.
{snip}
In November 2008, Secretary Gates approved a one-year pilot program that the Army would unveil in New York City within months. Mr. Hwang, who was eager to enlist, felt obligated to share his research with other Koreans in the same bind.
{snip}
He created a free site (cafe.daum.net/USmilitary). He specified the eligibility requirements for the program: Applicants must have lived in the U.S. for at least two years and have a valid temporary-resident visa. Enlistees with language skills must agree to a minimum four years of active duty, which could very well be in Iraq or Afghanistan, and four years in the Reserves.
Mr. Hwang started leading free study sessions live online to prepare applicants for the standardized military entrance exam. {snip}
{snip}
As word spread about the Army pilot program, recruiting offices across the U.S. were inundated with calls and visits from Koreans. “They knew about the program before we did,” says Sgt. Joshua Cannon, who runs an Army recruiting center in Los Angeles.
{snip}
The Army recently expanded the pilot program to Los Angeles, home to the largest Korean community in the U.S. Koreans accounted for 20 out of the 22 applicants who had shown up at a recruiting station in a suburban mall by the second afternoon.
{snip}
The Army continues to process applications from Koreans, but it is unlikely to accept all those who qualify. “The Army also needs speakers of Pashtu, Urdu and Arabic,” says Lt. Col. Badoian.
Mr. Hwang says he is committed to maintaining his site, which now includes tips from fresh enlistees. One recent post recommends a particular recruiter in Long Island City, N.Y.; another complains about the long wait for a physical exam.
{snip}
Original article
Email
Miriam Jordan
at miriam.jordan@wsj.com .
(Posted on June 4, 2009)
Comments
I’ve said it a million times, we have so many traitors in this nation at every level, as to be mindblowing. The military taking chances, sensitive defense industries taking chances, and China and other foreign powers, often not at all friendly with the U.S., just licking their chops, thinking of all the possiblities of syping and subversion. We have so many traitors to this nation.
If this is supposed to be the Asian Century then why are so many of these people, including people with professional degrees, trying to get into the West?
This is an interesting development and one which I’m quite sure the US Army is rather pleased with. Koreans are very tough and combative people, as anybody who’s ever operated alongside the ROK troops can testify. I was in a couple of joint operations with the ROKs in Vietnam, and it’s not overstatement to assert that the NVA and VC probably feared them above all others. Their aggressiveness and courage was impressive, to say the least, and no communist troops wanted to tangle with them or, especially, risk capture by them.
I’ve been trying to get another citizenship, but try as I may, I can’t find any other country that hands out passports in exchange for military service like the U.S. does. The only option I have found is to get accepted to the French Foreign Legion, a difficult undertaking in itself, and serve for five years.
American citizenship, like American currency, is becoming increasingly diluted and devalued. Needless to say I don’t expect either trend to stop.
When the US military becomes majority nonwhite it will be all over for Native Born White Americans.
The alternative to the Republican party has to be fundamentally about opposition to the race replacement of Native Born Americans.
The US miltary is an utterly corrupt organization. It has nothing to do with defending Native Born White Americans. The US miltary is about imperial conquests and the race replacement of Native BornWhite Americans within the borders of America. America is a joke nation.
If you are thinking about running away to Montanna and Idaho forget it. The glaciers in the mountains ae melting rapidly. Water is going to be very scarce very soon in States. America is truely joke Nation.
If you supported the Iraq war 1 and 2 and the 60 year occupation of Korea, you foolishly gave your “support” to the race replacement of Native Born White Americans in the US military. This will result in the end of Native Born White America. It is happening right before your eyes. The war mongerers are responsible for the demise of Native Born White America.
Just like the Asians who were lured by the Northwest gold rushes of the 1800’s. Word spreads quickly when there are vast riches to be had.
We should be outraged that our government is giving away the country. Citizenship in the U.S. is worth much more than a opportunist mercenary’s pay.
If they need Korean speakers, professional Korean servicemen can do it on temporary exchange. That’s how allies are supposed to operate.
Koreans now have a fairly modern society, but, more importantly, they have a homogeneous one. How foolish of them to want to relocate here in a chaotic multicultural mess of constant squabbling where black and mestizo high crime dominates nearly every large urban area and, in many areas, the suburbs as well.
In time, I think the vast majority of them will rue the day they every decided to come here.
Personally, I’d rather live in a less modern country among my own kind than live a bit higher in a multicultural mad house.
I wonder how many whites are in the Asian militaries? Hmmmm….
I started working on an army base 6 months ago. I was pleasantly surprised that maybe 85% or maybe more of the troops are white. That is higher than the current white percentage of the US population and much higher than the white percentage of the 18 to 35 age group which comprises almost all US troops except officers.
I attribute this to the requirement of deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan. Minorities don’t want to really protect our country. If they thought they were going to Germany , for example, there would be a larger percentage of minorities. Another factor is the US Army still uses that “racist” test the IQ test. When troops are fighting in a war, deficient levels of intelligence will cost other troops their lives.
So the US Army must use a real test of intelligence and the NCAA can’t sue the army since even blacks feel the need for protection provided by the US military.
I started working on an army base 6 months ago. I was pleasantly surprised that maybe 85% or maybe more of the troops are white. That is higher than the current white percentage of the US population and much higher than the white percentage of the 18 to 35 age group which comprises almost all US troops except officers.
I attribute this to the requirement of deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan. Minorities don’t want to really protect our country. If they thought they were going to Germany , for example, there would be a larger percentage of minorities. Another factor is the US Army still uses that “racist” test the IQ test. When troops are fighting in a war, deficient levels of intelligence will cost other troops their lives.
So the US Army must use a real test of intelligence and the NAACP can’t sue the army since even blacks feel the need for protection provided by the US military.
it may not be of a big surprise, but a similar program has been open to Africans for a while.
“I’ve been trying to get another citizenship, but try as I may, I can’t find any other country that hands out passports in exchange for military service like the U.S. does.”
Actually, I’ve heard that Korea does this. If you serve in the Korean military for a two year conscription, you can become a Korean citizen. I might be wrong though, because I live in Korea and I never see any non-Korean soldiers.
John at 6:24
US intervention and attacks on other nations always results in mass population transfers from these natins to America.Vietnam posed no threat to America-just as Iraq posed no threat to America. Post www2 American foriegn policy is inseparable from post-1965 immigration policy.
High ranking US miltary offocers-generals,admirals and colone strut around in fnacy uniforms,but they are nothing but hitmen for the corporations who are the major force behind the race-replacement of Native Born White Americans. High ranking military officers are knowlingly carring out the agenda of big business which is:race-replacement and wage slavery. They are evil.
9 — Joe Hamilton wrote at 11:17 PM on June 4:
You made some good points, Joe, but many blacks are made officers in the US military and they just aren’t competent enough to really qualify, and I can tell you firsthand that they are going to cause unnecessary deaths because of their AA positions.
The US military brass are as politicized as the private sector, and are too spineless to come right out and tell the NAACP, the Congressional Black Caucus and others before all this AA rush to appoint unqualified blacks officers, that blacks are underrepresented as officers because they just aren’t smart enough to effectively fill the positions.
Our next big scandal……if we go to war against a well-armed enemy……is a military defeat of huge proportions.
When it occurs, count on the media to lie about the causes, and it will take some unbiased or conservative investigative reporter to bring out the scandalous truth.
Having blacks in anybody’s society is a recipe for disaster 24/7 in so many different ways it’s criminal to appoint them to anything.
I was a student for a year at a major military training center in the South during the early seventies . We had a lot of foreign students , especially South Vietnamese , who they were training to fly and also in electronics . There was a photo there of a supposedly South Vietnamese who had learned to fly at the base , posing by his North Vietnamese Mig 21 . I hope the US military is not getting into some more of that . Another point of interest , the Iranian students (this is before the fall of the Shah) I talked to actually considered themselves to be Persian . I saw this as a longing for their ancient glory days , I suspect this might be significant in dealing with them today , very much complicated now by their devotion to Islam .
“High ranking US miltary offocers-generals,admirals and colone strut around in fnacy uniforms,but they are nothing but hitmen for the corporations who are the major force behind the race-replacement of Native Born White Americans. High ranking military officers are knowlingly carring out the agenda of big business which is:race-replacement and wage slavery. They are evil.”
I don’t know if this is true or not but those overseas bases are responsible for alot of the “me so hony, me love you a long time” crowd getting into this country. These women are prostitutes/bar maids who who are just looking to jump in bed with a serviceman to get a greencard or get pregnant and extract child support payments for her half-breed. The same oriental women were picking up quarters with their body parts the night before or putting on a show for a few dollars.
A much better idea would be for the USA to just LEAVE South Korea. Then there would be no NEED for Korean translators. South Korea has TWICE the north’s population, FORTY times its GDP and a huge technical lead. The north is bankrupt and starving. Google a picture of the Korean peninsula at night to see the astonishing difference between the two states. America SHOULD have left South Korea a LONG time ago. It only stays because of the military-industrial-congressional complex.
Ice: “Personally, I’d rather live in a less modern country among my own kind than live a bit higher in a multicultural mad house.”
Ice, I am a White Christian female. Emigrated to North America from my small European country about a decade ago. Back home, in the early 90s, a high school teacher with university degree and a professional engineer (with university degree as well) would be making a total of an equivalent of 5 deutche marks per month - hugely insufficient to pay mortgage, bills, food of a 4-member family (new clothes and shoes on regular basis could be only dreamt of, other than once in every 2-3 years). Life (for the highly educated and not criminally inclined) was very hard. Here in North America I can afford many things that I believe people with my IQ and educational level should be able to have without making an enormous sacrifice (comfortable and secure housing, good clothing, good food etc). I miss my hometown every day, but I also enormously appreciate what this North American country made possible for me to have. Back home - I lived with my own kind (it is a quite homogenous country). Here I live in a “diverse” world that I am still a bit puzzled by. After a decade - I still walk in a bit of daze. But I can afford to rent a 2000 sq. ft. house and live comfortably on my earnings. And I am not hungry every day for half a day. I chose emigration, and I consciously choose to live my life here, far from my ethnically homogenous homeland.
When I hear this, I ask myself why? South Korea, less modern? I’d have to say its a step ahead of the rest of the world. Where else do you get the crazy download speeds, the superior computers with graphics cards that make the ones in the west look like stuff that came from the 80s? Its absolutely unbelievable that these people would want to emigrate, a little less income is made up for by MUCH cheaper prices, that much I can tell. I’m sure that before these people start to regret the fact that they came to a non-homogeneous society, they’ll regret the lack of internet cafes and the fact that trains don’t always run on time.
Anon at 7:30
You hit the nail right on the head. We should have gotten out of Korea years ago. The main reason for the ending of the Korean War was that Americans got had their fill of young Native Born White teenagers being slaughtered in Korea. When the price for participating in the Cold War becomes too high for Native Born White Americans, they see through the Cold War propaganda. Now this was in the fifties when the Cold War hysteria was at its height.
America never have never sent troops to Korea and Vietnam. If America had stayed out of these conflicts….there would be far fewer asians in OUR AMERICA. The evil military-industrial complex required massive Cold War propaganda to scare Americans. It only works up to a point..then Americans start to see that it was a lie all along.
War is a racket.
