Let the controversial Games begin
All eyes will be on Korean peninsula known more for conflict than cooperation
On the one hand: The world gathers for a scripted, globalized spectacle of competition and unity. North Korean athletes and performers stream into the rival South for a display of cooperation that maybe, just maybe, could ease anxiety about a possible nuclear war. The North’s head of state announces plans to visit the South for the first time. The U. S. vice president is stopping by, too.
On the other: Angry South Koreans bump up against riot police to protest the arrivals. The North’s government immediately calls the demonstration a “spasm of psychopaths.” The president of the United States insists that America must become “great again” — and goads the North Korean leader on Twitter.
And outward from there it ripples, across a planet riven by uncertainty and anger.
That the world is a contradictory and quarrelsome place is hardly breaking news. But on the week that the 2018 Winter Olympics begin, tucked away in chilly mountains that loom over one of the planet’s most contentious patches of earth, it somehow seems more so at this moment.
When the torch is lit during the opening ceremonies in Pyeongchang’s Olympic stadium on Friday night, it will become one of many flames being fanned around the world. Few others are anywhere near as uplifting.
“It’s hard to talk about these Olympics without bearing in mind that for all the wonderful ideals that are brought to mind by the Olympic Games, and rightfully so, right now the Korean Peninsula is the most dangerous place on Earth,” says Mark Hertsgaard, author of “The Eagle’s Shadow: Why America Fascinates and Infuriates the World.”
As its organizers often say, the Olympics are an opportunity to sublimate politics into healthy competition and show that the world can come together for a noble purpose: an excellence of body and mind produced by hard work and sheer determination.
And yes, that’s happening in Pyeongchang even before the Games begin, most dramatically with the joint Korean women’s hockey team, which will feature players from the long- divided North and South skating and competing together on the same ice.
But bypassing political bumpiness entirely is a challenge when the other main point of the Olympics — national pride, as seen through the prism of sports — can come with some serious geopolitical baggage.
This is also the first Games to take place since Donald Trump became president of the U. S. in early 2017. And whether you love him or hate him, it’s clear he has changed the global conversation through his willingness to be voluble in ways previous presidents have avoided.
THURSDAY ON TV
• 7 p. m. - 10: 30 p. m.: figure skating and freestyle skiing ( live), Ch. 5. • 7 p. m. - 12: 30 a. m.: curling, Alpine skiing and luge ( live), NBCSN.
FRIDAY ON TV
• 7 p. m., opening ceremony ( tape), Ch. 5.
One of Trump’s hallmarks has been his attitude of America first. That has always played to a mixed audience at the Olympics, and this edition will be no exception. For all its country- specific fervor, the Olympics is a proudly multilateral event taking place this year in a world that, from Brexit to Trump policies, is awash in a burst of unilateralism.
How those two notions mix — particularly with U. S. Vice President Mike Pence and North Korea’s figurehead head of state, Kim Yong Nam, both planning to visit Pyeongchang with clear political agendas — will prove interesting.
On the ground in Pyeongchang, optimism presents itself in remarks like this one a few days ago, from athletes’ village volunteer Go Do Hyoung, a South Korean faced with the possibility of meeting people from the North:
“I just want to say to them, ‘ How are you? Nice to meet you. Welcome to South Korea.’ And just take one picture, something like that. We South Korean people don’t have much chance to talk with North Koreans. So I just want to know who they are and what they want to know about. Just know them in person.”