Err... I don't think your second point necessarily follows the first point. For a country to become "angry an belligerent, with massive chip on shoulder," it needs (1) angry, desperate people, and (2) someone who would gain politically by fanning the hatred (often in a self-reinforcing cycle).
I think the anti-Japanese sentiment didn't really took off because, once you start looking into the matter, you'd rapidly realize that half of the country's ruling class was national traitors, at which point the question will become strictly verboten. By the time the country became democratic enough so that people could actually raise these questions, there was no point in becoming a "freedom fighter." Sure, everybody loves to hate Japan (especially when there's a soccer match), but nobody with half a brain would want to, say, visit Tokyo and blow up stuff ... it makes zero sense!
You're right, thanks for the nuanced view. I guess my impression here is that modern Korea, with its own cultural identity: dress, food, language, literature, history ... would not have been if the US hadn't entered WWII. I don't mean to create indebtors, it's an observation on how a country+culture could survive or disappear on a turn. And given what tenuous a beginning it had, it's amazing that South Korea is the entity it is now.
Well, it's fun to speculate about "what if" - East Asia would look very different if the US had never entered the war, but I don't think the Korean culture would have just disappeared (not sure if that's what you mean).
Do you know Korean has more speakers than Italian? It's very hard to eliminate the identity of dozens of millions of people, and Japan was definitely not planning to kill off Koreans even at the height of its madness. We enjoyed the dubious honor of being the "secondary citizen", close enough to be "civilized" (= assimilated) into the Japanese culture, unlike those other, savage Asians. "内鮮一体", as the Japanese Empire said: "The inland (Japan) and Chosen (Korea) are one body."
I think the "worst case" result would have been something like Brittany or Scotland, having a shared identity but largely becoming a part of a bigger, dominant culture.
I think the anti-Japanese sentiment didn't really took off because, once you start looking into the matter, you'd rapidly realize that half of the country's ruling class was national traitors, at which point the question will become strictly verboten. By the time the country became democratic enough so that people could actually raise these questions, there was no point in becoming a "freedom fighter." Sure, everybody loves to hate Japan (especially when there's a soccer match), but nobody with half a brain would want to, say, visit Tokyo and blow up stuff ... it makes zero sense!