Shortly after the "Yun Byung-se-Kishida agreement," an official from the U.S. State Department explained the position of the U.S. government in the form of a teleconference on condition of anonymity. The expression of the U.S. government, delighted over the agreement between South Korea and Japan, could be felt over the phone. One reporter asked, "They say it is a final and irreversible agreement. Will this affect civic groups and the victims when voicing their argument on the international stage?" I thought the State Department official would simply answer, "That is for the governments and the citizens of the two countries to decide." But surprisingly, he continued to reply.

"Nothing agreed upon by two democratic governments can jeopardize the universal human right of freedom of expression and freedom of assembly. However, the citizens of the two countries should not neglect the significance of this monumental agreement, and should help remove provocations that can distract concerned parties from encouraging and seeking reconciliation." Although he did add a condition, he expressed the wishes that the citizens of the two countries refrain from raising an issue with this problem on the international stage in accordance with government policy. Mindy Kotler of Asia Policy Point criticized, "This is a statement that does not conform to the values advocated by the U.S."

That the U.S. presented a guideline for the citizens of South Korea and Japan despite the risk of limiting the freedom of expression and the value of human rights, which the U.S. has so cherished, shows how serious they view the latest agreement. After all, it was the U.S. that pressured the two countries to reach an agreement. For the past few years, the U.S.--from the president to the secretary of state and the secretary of defense--has encouraged South Korea and Japan to reconcile. The U.S. had not been happy since it could not obtain full cooperation from the two countries on sharing defense intelligence and in its missile defense strategies because South Korea and Japan were caught up in this issue. For the U.S. frigid hostility between South Korea and Japan was an obstacle in effectively responding to the rise of China and in maintaining its military influence in Northeast Asia. It was not a U.S. priority to understand the negative effects of history from the perspective of the victims.

Such calculations were similar half a century ago when South Korea signed the basic treaty with Japan. Although memories of Japanese colonial rule were vivid among the Koreans, their emotions were not an important factor to be considered. When the negotiations made no progress after thirteen years since they first began, the U.S. pressured the Park Chung-hee and Eisaku Sato government to sign an agreement in 1964. According to a research into the "Background of the Normalization of South Korea-Japan Relations" by Victor Cha of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the U.S. encouraged reconciliation between South Korea and Japan because of the strategic position it was in--the burden on the U.S. in Asia was increasing due to the threats of a communist China and the deadlock in the Vietnam War.

The agreements in 1965 and 2015 were signed by the governments of South Korea and Japan, but in both cases, the U.S. played the role of the director. In that sense, it may be difficult to resolve problems of the past born from the Second World War and the handling of its aftermath including the comfort women, as long as the U.S. continues its military-oriented approach in Northeast Asia and South Korea and Japan continue to live in a building built by the U.S. Furthermore, Pentagon may not welcome a complete solution to the comfort women issue involving the state acknowledging its responsibility. In Embracing Defeat, John Dower, an American authority in Japanese history, deals with the U.S. occupation of Japan shortly after Japan's defeat. The book contains details that the U.S. government may not feel comfortable about.

Immediately after the occupation of U.S. Forces, the Japanese interior ministry secretly sent a message to its police nationwide and ordered that they set up special comfort facilities exclusively for those soldiers. The U.S. and Japan created a Recreation and Amusement Association (RAA) and operated a comfort women system for the U.S. military. One woman in the RAA recalled that she had to serve 23 U.S. soldiers a day. Considering the wars that the U.S. military has fought since World War II, this may not be an incident limited to just Japan. In this regard, some assessments that the latest agreement was "the best agreement that the governments of the two countries could reach under the given circumstances," may not be incorrect. Perhaps, "we" were naive to believe that the country would solve this problem.