Sexual Economy of War and Base: The R&R Program and the Global Black Market during the Korean War (1950-53)

This paper examines the Rest and Recreation (R&R) program and its connection with the global operation of the wartime black market during the Korean War. Launched in December 1950, the R&R program sent over 800,000 UN servicemen from Korea to Japan for their five-day leave from Korea, and this program led to the further growth of the base economy and military prostitution in Japan. The MPC (Military Payment Certificate) played an important role in the formation of the R&R economy across Japan and Korea. While the MPC was a military note whose use was restricted within U.S. overseas bases, this military currency created its own economy through the transnational black market channels in and around the bases in different regions. A large amount of MPC was circulated as a black market currency for the R&R-related transactions, most of which involved sexual exchange between GIs and local women in Japan and Korea. By exploring how the R&R economy and the MPC market spanning across Japan and Korea facilitated each other’s growth, this paper illuminates the mutual formation process of war, base, and U.S. militarism that was mediated through unequal sexual exchange during the Korean War, and reveals how U.S. military expansion in East Asia was built on and sustained by the gendered utilization of the geographical and human resources in the region.