[Zhang Fei]

For example, before Vietnam was literally a Korean reading of the Chinese characters for Vietnam; now, I believe it’s a Korean reading of the English word Vietnam.

Minor as it sounds, I think this is the kind of thing that Korea has to do in order to wean itself (and China) off the idea that Korea is part of the Chinese realm. That is, if Korea continues to be interested in remaining a sovereign state.

[joey703]

Heh, I don’t know if that was meant to be deliberately provocative or not. I’m of the position that losing Chinese loan words is a bad thing. But, I’m a bit confused as to what you mean in the Chinese realm.

Korea won’t be part of the Chinese realm — I’m not sure what you mean by this, Korea was never a part of China (unlike Vietnam) and Korea is one of the few places where you don’t have an ethnic Chinese places in East Asia (Japan is the other).

But, yes, there’s no way Korea will be part of the Chinese realm. Unification will only bring either (1) continued U.S. troops or (2) a unified and nuclear Korea... I don’t think the PRC would want either one ...