"To Korean cultural mindset, it's better to tell a face-saving white lie. It's better for all involved. This is because that face-saving white lie allows all involved to maintain the illusion of comity, of kibun. The "realignment" and "exhausted all options" lines would be expected to be understood for their true meaning, but give a way for the "losing" side (in this case, us) to preserve their own public harmony by accepting that all that could be done was tried and moving on, while preserving the harmony of the side with the power to make the decision by allowing them to not have to state flatly that they don't want to cooperate."
I really appreciate the effort you're taking to explain the cultural context. But to be honest, it feels to me like the mindset of medieval Europe before the Colonial revolution, the multiple French revolutions and so forth, like the Koreans are still living in Shakespeare's time when the rest of us are post-Hugo. And now the Korean overlords used to hearing "God save the king" are getting a little taste of "give me liberty or give me death" and "viva la republique!"
Yeah, this would be consistent with a country that lived quietly under Imperial Japanese rule for fifty years until somebody else managed to liberate 'em.
What did they expect?! What flag is flying over Paragon's City Hall? Here's a hint, Mr. Kim: it doesn't have a flowery harmony-preserving symbol on it. It's the flag of the folks who fought two wars to ensure you live in a country with Internet access.
"Rage... taking... over...."
Yup! The PC police are gonna pull me over again, aren't they?
"...our devs are number one...."
Yup yup.
