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By Paul Liem | March 3, 2025 | Originally published here by the Lee Yueng-hui Foundation * Professor Lee Yueng-hui invited by Korean American students to lecture at UC Berkeley, 1987. In the years since Professor Lee Yueng-hui taught his course on contemporary Korean history at UC Berkeley, 1987, prospects for the peaceful reunification of Korea have gone through many ups and downs.  Regretfully under the administrations of Presidents Joe Biden and Yoon Suk-yeol the foreign policies of the U.S. and the Republic of Korea (ROK) lurched to the far right, upending the hope of Professor Lee’s students that Korea with two differing social systems, socialist and capitalist, could thrive in a confederated republic in a state of peace.  How did this come about and what is now the path towards the peaceful reunification of Korea?   Under President Biden the Democratic Party became the party of war.  Billions of US dollars and sophisticated U.S. weapons were poured onto the battlefields of Ukraine; his administration provided military and diplomatic support for Israel’s genocidal destruction of the Gaza Strip; and it engineered multilateral military alliances in Asia to contain the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).   Ever ready to please, President Yoon ingratiated himself to the Biden administration by rushing to embrace the Japan-Korea-U.S. trilateral alliance by increasing the scale and frequency of war games; opening up ROK ports and skies to Japanese war ships, U.S. nuclear submarines and B-1b bombers; and providing weapons to Ukraine, by indirectly selling them to the U.S.  In doing so he hitched his fate to a U.S. administration and Democratic Party widely identified by U.S. voters with neo-liberal policies that led to the deindustrialization of America, the decay of its infrastructure, extreme inequality of wealth, and to costly “forever wars.”  Donald J Trump, pledging to “Make America Great Again,” and to end “forever wars” by making U.S. allies pay and fight their own wars, trounced the Democratic Party, winning both the electorate and the popular vote in the November 2024 elections.   The ROK today is without an elected president at a time when President Trump, in his second term, and with the backing of Republican majorities in the House and Senate, is upending the very liberal order that Biden sought to uphold and that Yoon apparently believed was immutable.  Having bought into the Biden administration’s zeal for targeting unfriendly states as “authoritarian,” notably Russia, China, Iran and the DPRK, Yoon, a zealot himself, attacked his adversaries in the National Assembly as if they were authoritarian enemies of the state.  He is now impeached and under prosecution for his ill-fated bid to declare martial law, while in the world outside his detention cell, U.S. patronage of allies is being replaced, everywhere, by “the art of the deal.”   Professor Lee taught his UC Berkeley students that peaceful reunification was contingent upon the end of rule by U.S. backed military dictatorships and the democratization of South Korean society.  His teaching has withstood the test of time.  In the tradition of Korea’s historic democracy movement, the majority of the population resoundingly support their constitution, democratic processes, and the impeachment of Yoon; and the majority has always favored peace over war with their brethren in the north.  There is, nevertheless, a rising far right movement of Yoon supporters calling for a holy crusade against “communist” conspiracies in civil society, and for regime change in the north.    Democracy in society polarized by rising inequality of wealth, where working people cannot begin to see their way out of debt, has proven to be fragile.  This is so in Korea, as in the U.S. and elsewhere.  If martial law in Korean society is to be averted going forward, the pro-democracy movement must present a way forward for working people.  Forty years ago, when the south Korean people toppled the Chun Du Hwan dictatorship, advocating for an equitable distribution of wealth was considered subversive.  But today politicians, bankers as well as labor unions acknowledge that the prospect of incurring unsustainable household debt is a major factor contributing to Korea’s declining birth rate, and must be reversed.    Sovereignty in international affairs is also a matter to be addressed by a pro-democracy movement.  The ROK economy, dominated by a handful of chaebols, is export driven.  While the greater portion of the profit of trade accrues to the chaebol, loss of market share hits working people the hardest in terms of labor repression, extended working hours, job loss and increasing debt peonage.  Therefore, as a matter of achieving a more equitable distribution of wealth in society, it is incumbent upon a pro-democracy movement to also advocate for a foreign policy that aims to diversify Korea’s trading partners, even if that may require developing economic relations with countries deemed undesirable by the U.S., principally the PRC.   Last but not least a pro-democracy movement must have a policy for peaceful reunification.  Of a national budget of $510 billion proposed for 2025, $45.5 billion are set aside for military spending. Alternatively, if the ROK were to take responsibility for its own security by negotiating peace with the DPRK, it would not be burdened with the cost of its military alliance with the U.S., and neither would the U.S. be burdened with the costs it incurs.  The ROK can maintain good relations with the U.S., based on mutually beneficial trade and other common interests, without having to house U.S. forces on its territory, and it would have a sizeable peace dividend to invest in the well-being of its citizenry.  The U.S. can likewise be encouraged to make peace with the DPRK, just as it seems to be doing with Russia, a recently recommitted ally of the DPRK. The Korean War, in a state of cease fire for 72 years, is America’s longest forever war.    To take the first step towards peaceful reunification, a pro-democracy movement must lead the society in letting go of the long-held belief, put forward by Syngman Rhee, that the territorial boundary of the ROK encompasses the entire Korean peninsula. Peaceful reunification is not possible as long as one side claims the territory of the other.  Aside from this stumbling block, and once the ROK assumes control of its security, there is nothing to stop the ROK and DPRK from normalizing relations and finding a way to thrive on the Korean peninsula in a state of peace.    I may be completely wrong, but I believe that if Professor Lee were teaching at UC Berkeley today, he would consider the normalization of relations between the ROK and DPRK, as separate states, not as a repudiation of previous reunification proposals, but simply as reunification in the most practical manner given the changed circumstances of the times.   Paul Liem is the Chair of the Korea Policy Institute Board of Directors. * The Lee Yueng-hui Foundation was founded to memorialize the life of journalist Lee Yueng-hui (1929-2010), Professor of Hanyang University, and widely regarded as a doyen of Korea's democracy movement.

By Heewon Kim   | March 2, 2025 | Originally published in Hankyoreh Supporters of Yoon Suk-yeol protest outside the Seoul Western District Court in the city’s Mapo District on Jan. 18, 2025, on the day that a detention warrant was sought for the president. (Kim Young-won/Hankyoreh) Many scholars have long held that capitalism inevitably spawns fascism. On the other end of the spectrum, some argue that capitalism inevitably ends in revolution. As capitalism routinely faces crises, the question then becomes which extreme it will career toward each time it falters. If history has taught us anything, it is that the former theory tends to prevail. Unfortunately, this grim prophecy seems like it will remain applicable for a long time to come. Fascism returns, rebranded, whenever capitalism hits a wall. It arrives hand in hand with the haunting sense that it will, somehow, alleviate us of our pain and frustration. In reality, it will only allow those who exploit such crises to feast, yet again, on the pain and sorrow of others. The foundation of modern-day fascism is, without a doubt, neoliberalism. In that regard, South Korean soil is fertile enough to enable fascism to flourish. Every administration has had a shoddy track record when it came to public spending, meaning that Koreans have been forced to fend for themselves while at the mercy of fierce competition. Even before the invocation of martial law, the Yoon Suk-yeol administration had been hacking away at the lives of ordinary Koreans at an alarming speed. Its insistence that relying on the free market will always facilitate the best outcome betrayed its neglect of the safety of Koreans and their livelihoods. The lives of young and old Koreans are becoming more strained by the day. The number of unemployed young people who are not actively seeking a job has reached a post-pandemic high of over 420,000. Those who are employed are working low-level jobs, forcing them to be categorized as “underemployed.” South Korea’s elderly poverty rate is the highest out of all members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.  Neoliberal policies always destabilize people’s livelihoods. This instability is the foundation that fascism thrives on. A world in which one is continuously made to feel small and unfulfilled, even when one continues to put in endless hours of honest work, will spark in people a sense of deprivation. They will say, “I should have a place in this society, economically and socially. Why isn’t it being given to me? What has been taken away from me?” Full of indignance at the state of the unjust world, threatened by a sense of status anxiety, and propelled by rage, these people then set out to save the world by saving themselves. Violence wielded against scapegoats during this process is not only necessary, but justified, as they are considered the evil forces ruining the world. In this context, political scientist and philosopher Alberto Toscano describes fascism as a phenomenon borne from when the “times threatening economic value” and “times which bring identity crises” converge. Yoon Suk-yeol may have declared martial law out of self-absorption, spite and self-interest, but his rogue behavior has opened the door for fascist incitement and violence to spike in South Korean society. Far-right YouTubers, far-right online communities, and far-right Protestantism attract followers in throngs. Their sworn enemies are the North Korean sympathizers of the far left, North Korea, China, “the evil belief of feminism” and “forces promoting homosexuality.” From their viewpoint, China is behind Yoon’s impeachment, which means that keeping Yoon in power is the only way to stop communism from storming the gates of the country.  At the same time, preventing Yoon’s impeachment is a mission of utmost importance as it is crucial for protecting liberal democracy and defending conservative values. These people pray for a country that provides them with stable lives by worshipping an idealized version of such a country that only exists in their minds. That imagined country is frighteningly violent and exclusionary, a place where “outsiders” are permanently expunged. The conspiracy theories, hate speech and violence propagated by far-right forces have reached dangerous new heights as South Korean society continues to crumble. Even after witnessing the shocking, unprecedented scene of an angry mob ransacking a courthouse, many remain blinded by fake news and distrustful of the Constitutional Court, choosing to place their faith in those justifying the declaration of martial law. Some politicians are latching on to fascism — namely, those attempting to resuscitate their political career by leeching off far-right forces and those so obsessed with gaining power that they have no qualms with fascism.  Making Korea a livable country for all is the only way to topple fascism where it stands. A country where everyone is given the equal opportunity to spread their wings, where no laborer is discriminated against or exploited, where the gig economy gives way to a stable system that allows people to breathe, where the playing field is leveled by effective public spending and redistribution of wealth. Policies catering to the whims of major conglomerates, focusing on providing tax cuts to the wealthy, and only revolving around growth will worsen anxiety and inequality, spurring more to associate themselves with the far-right. Let us keep a sharp eye when we inspect upcoming election campaigns. Who will be the ones to capitalize on fascism? Heewon Kim is an Associate Professor at Arizona State University

By Gregory Elich | April 14, 2008 North Korea, it is often said, is a criminal state. One of the more persistent stories supporting that allegation is that the North Koreans are counterfeiting U.S. currency. Through repetition, the claim has taken on an aura of proven fact. This in turn has been cited as justification for everything from imposing punitive measures against North Korea to suggesting that the nation cannot be trusted as a partner in nuclear negotiations. The evidence against North Korea is widely regarded as convincing. “The North Koreans have denied that they are engaged in the distribution and manufacture of counterfeits,” says Daniel Glaser of the U.S. Treasury Department, “but the evidence is overwhelming that they are. There’s no question of North Korea’s involvement.” 1 There is no denying that North Korean citizens have been caught passing counterfeit currency in Europe and Asia, and some defectors from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK — the formal name for North Korea) claim to have first-hand knowledge of state-run counterfeiting operations. In Western media reports the case is treated as proven. Yet the closer one examines the matter, the murkier the picture becomes. Counterfeit currency attributed to North Korea raises deep concern due to its extremely high quality. Dubbed supernotes, their production process closely matches that of the genuine article, and the engraving is so fine it rivals that of the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing. 2 Unlike most of the world’s counterfeit currency, which is printed on offset presses or through digital processes, supernotes are printed on an intaglio press. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing uses Giori intaglio presses for the engraved portions of its bank notes, and an offset press for the background colors. Supernotes use the same technology. An intaglio press operates by applying ink on its plates and then wiping them clean, leaving ink only in the engraved lines. The plate is then pressed against the paper, depositing the ink in ridges. The result is raised printing that ordinary counterfeits can’t duplicate. Supernotes have the same look and feel as U.S. currency. North Korea purchased an intaglio press from the Swiss firm Giori in the mid-1970s. 3 This fact is regarded as an indication that the nation has the technology available to print supernotes. Yet there have been significant advances in the field since the time of its purchase. Because certain auxiliary equipment is lacking, the model owned by the DPRK is considered by experts to be incapable of achieving the level of quality seen on supernotes. Not long after purchasing the Giori, North Korea defaulted on its loan after having made just two payments. For that reason, as well as due to U.S. pressure, Giori ceased shipping spare parts to North Korea many years ago, and according to one expert the North Korean printing press now stands idle. 4 One striking feature of supernotes is the composition of the paper. Throughout the world, currency is printed on cotton-based paper. But U.S. currency is different, being composed of a mix of 75 percent cotton pulp and 25 percent linen. Supernote counterfeits rely on the same unique combination. To produce secure paper like that used in U.S. currency requires advanced technology and the cost far surpasses that of manufacturing regular paper. The price of even a small plant can exceed $100 million. To remain profitable, a paper plant would have to produce more than four thousand metric tons of such banknote paper a year. But the quantity of supernotes seen in circulation so far has required only a tiny fraction of that total. It would seem, then, that the only option for North Korea would be to procure its paper from an existing plant outside of its borders. This would be no easy matter. The paper used in U.S. currency is produced on a Fourdrinier machine at a plant located in the state of Georgia. This machine uses longer pulp fibers than the short pulp fibers used by the rest of the world relying on cylinder mold methods. 5 Former director of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing Thomas Ferguson comments on the quality of the paper in supernotes. “They’re not simulating the paper features by printing on the paper. They are not using somebody else’s paper or bleaching the ink off of genuine notes. Someone specifically made paper, which is a pretty big commitment.” 6 Remarkably, supernote paper even incorporates colored microfibers, a thin security thread marked “USA 100” in microprint, and a multi-tone watermark. These features can only be produced through the use of sophisticated technology at substantial cost. One expert who conducted a chemical and physical analysis of supernotes discovered that the cotton originated in the southern region of the U.S. — precisely where the Bureau of Engraving and Printing gets its cotton. Southern U.S. cotton is available on the world market, but this would make it traceable to some extent. The expert conducting the analysis is said to have been warned by “interested parties” not to make the results public. The implication was that these parties worked for the U.S. government. 7 One of the special features of U.S. currency is the use of optically variable ink (OVI) manufactured by the Swiss firm Société Industrielle et Commerciale de Produits Amon (SICPA). This organization is the sole source for OVI. On the U.S. $100 bill, this color shifting ink is employed on the number in the lower right hand corner. Turning the bill one way, the number appears bronze green. Turned another, it appears black. Supernotes duplicate the same color shift. 8 This particular color combination is reserved for the exclusive use of the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing and is manufactured at only one location in the world. A joint venture was established between SICPA and the California-based OCLI laboratory to manufacture this combination of OVI ink. Bronze-green and black OVI is mixed at the SICPA plant in Virginia, which serves only the U.S. market. The rest of the world gets its supply of OVI from SICPA’s main plant in Switzerland. 9 North Korea was at one time a client of SICPA. Each nation is assigned a unique color combination. The DPRK’s combination was green and magenta, which Treasury official Daniel Glazer asserts can be manipulated to appear similar to the U.S. combination. 10 Yet a forensic laboratory has found that the security ink used in supernotes is not similar. It matches U.S. currency. 11 Furthermore, it is probable that North Korea has long ago exhausted its limited supply of OVI. SICPA spokeswoman Sarah Van Horn points out, “We ceased all OVI deliveries in early 2001, and later that year all security ink supplies.” Severing trade with North Korea came at the request of U.S. officials, long before the Bush Administration publicly accused North Korea of manufacturing and distributing supernotes. 12 One South Korean specialist on the DPRK says that interviews with defectors convinced him of the existence of a state-run counterfeiting operation, and that the intent was to fund covert operations and wage economic warfare against the U.S. 13 But the stories defectors tell do not always hold up. In some cases, defectors report hearsay — what they have heard from others. Other times, defectors appear to have first-hand knowledge, such as the two who talked to BBC News. 14 Yet North Korean defectors, eager to please their new hosts, have been noted for a tendency to tell stories that turn out to be dubious. As Raphael Perle, an analyst for the Congressional Research Service, points out, “A lot of defectors or refugees give us information, but they tell us anything we want to know. You have to question the reliability of what they say.” 15 A North Korean defector who claimed that he had helped design the supernote went into hiding after being accused of being paid to lie about the matter. When asked whose picture was on the $100 bill and what building was depicted on its backside, he said he did not know. A U.S.-based activist interviewed the man, intending to have him testify before Congress, but the activist came to the conclusion that his stories were implausible. “He lost credibility with me. I found him mentally unstable.” The activist said that many defectors tell stories that they think journalists and intelligence agencies want to hear. “He was expecting money.” Defectors “think the U.S. government will give them hundreds of thousands of dollars.” Another defector who initially claimed to be involved in the decision to print supernotes later admitted he had not seen the operation, nor did he learn any details of how it was being done. 16 The 2004 U.S. indictment of Sean Garland, leader of the Irish Worker’s Party and Official Republican Army, on charges of distributing supernotes is considered the centerpiece of the evidence against North Korea. “In or about October 1997,” the indictment reads, Garland met North Korean officials in Poland “to arrange for the purchase of a quantity of supernotes.” Then for the next three years, Garland is said to have distributed the counterfeit currency in Ireland and Great Britain. As leader of the Irish Worker’s Party, he often travelled abroad for “ostensibly legitimate business and personal reasons.” But, the indictment reads, in his travels he met with North Koreans who were involved in the “transportation and sale of supernotes.” Garland also visited Russia, where he is alleged to have purchased more supernotes, although the transactions did not complete until a later time in Belarus. Six codefendants were indicted along with Garland, one of whom was said to have informed law enforcement officials of the location in Moscow of $70,000 in supernotes “that he had obtained from the Sean Garland supernote organization.” 17 In 2002, three of Garland’s codefendants were jailed in Great Britain, as a result of an investigation into the activities of a large-scale counterfeiting ring. Garland himself was not arrested until three years later, and then only in response to the U.S. indictment. Released on bail, he eluded extradition to the U.S. by going to Ireland. The most striking thing about the indictment is its vagueness. No North Korean is identified, and meetings with North Koreans are mentioned without any actual transaction being described. Sean Garland himself states, “I have no associate named Corcoran [one of the codefendants] nor have I any associates in jail in Britain.” 18 The impression one gets is that Garland was indicted because of his political and business contacts with North Koreans, and that tying him to an actually existing counterfeiting ring would make for a persuasive sounding case against North Korea. In contrast to the lack of anything definite concerning Garland, the indictment is more detailed when describing the activities of the codefendants. Garland writes that “neither myself or my legal team have had as yet received any information from the U.S. authorities to set out the nature of the allegations against me.” As for the indictment, “No evidence is offered of any crime or wrongdoing,” and Garland “strenuously” denied the allegations. 19 Having political and business contacts with North Koreans does not in itself indicate involvement in the supernote trade. Counterfeiting allegations against North Korea provided the pretext for harsh economic measures. As the September 2005 six-party nuclear disarmament negotiations were taking place in Beijing, Stuart Levey, under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence in the Department of the Treasury, issued a press release designating Macao-based Banco Delta Asia as a “primary money-laundering concern.” The bank, Levey reported, “has been a willing pawn for the North Korean government to engage in corrupt financial activities.” By providing financial services to the DPRK for over twenty years, it “has facilitated many of that regime’s criminal activities, including circulating counterfeit U.S. currency.” 20 In a matter of days, U.S. financial institutions were instructed to sever relations with Banco Delta Asia. By December of the same year, the Treasury Department had issued an advisory in which it warned that the DPRK “may be seeking banking services elsewhere” following the action taken against the Macao bank. U.S. financial institutions were told to “take reasonable steps to guard against the abuse of their financial services by North Korea.” Tellingly, it added, “We encourage financial institutions worldwide to take similar precautions.” 21 U.S. intelligence officials knew Banco Delta Asia was one of the primary means for North Korea to conduct normal foreign commerce. The effect of the Treasury Department’s announcement was immediate. In the six-day gap between the announcement and the bank’s closing, panicked depositors had withdrawn $132 million, more than a third of the bank’s total funds. 22 Banco Delta Asia was quick to deny the charge, saying that its business relations with North Korea were entirely legitimate and commercial, but the Macao Monetary Authority assumed management of the bank and froze all of North Korea’s accounts. 23 The action against Banco Delta Asia deprived North Korea of a portion of its foreign trade. More importantly, it also served as a means of magnifying the effect of sanctions. By blacklisting Banco Delta Asia, the U.S. set off a chain reaction, and the campaign soon took on global significance. The U.S. Treasury Department sent warning letters to banks around the world, resulting in a wave of banks shutting down North Korean accounts. International financial institutions feared U.S. retaliation, and felt it prudent to close North Korean accounts rather than risk being blocked from access to the U.S. financial system. A blacklisting would in effect mean being driven out of business. Stuart Levey observed with satisfaction that sanctions and U.S. threats had succeeded in applying “huge pressure” on the DPRK, and that this had led to a “snowballing avalanche effect.” U.S. actions undermined the prospect of a peaceful settlement of the nuclear issue. “Squeeze them,” a senior Bush Administration official said, “but keep the negotiations going.” Talks, the official continued, would serve as nothing more than a means for accepting North Korea’s capitulation. A second U.S. official described the goal of talks as a “surrender mechanism.” Even before the signing of the September 19, 2005 nuclear disarmament agreement, the U.S. had already decided “to move toward more confrontational measures,” claimed a former Bush Administration official. 24 Daedong Credit Bank, a majority foreign-owned joint venture bank operating in Pyongyang and primarily serving importers, was immediately affected by the U.S. action, as it had several million dollars in Banco Delta Asia. As general manager of Daedong Credit Bank, Nigel Cowie was in a position to witness the effect of the Treasury Department’s letters. “We have heard from foreign customers conducting legitimate business here, who have been told by their bankers overseas to stop receiving remittances from the DPRK, otherwise their accounts will be closed.” To illustrate the lengths to which U.S. officials were prepared to go, Cowie described an operation that involved his own firm, from which, he said, “you can draw your own conclusions.” An account was opened with a Mongolian bank. Arrangements were made for legal cash transactions. But when the Daedong Credit Bank’s couriers arrived in Mongolia, they were detained by Mongolian intelligence officials, and their money confiscated. Accusations were made that the couriers were transporting counterfeit currency from North Korea. A leak to the news media from an unidentified source led to reports charging that “North Korean diplomats” had been arrested for smuggling counterfeit currency. After two weeks, the Mongolian “intelligence officials in a meeting with us finally conceded that all the notes were genuine; the cash was released.” In the final meeting, Mongolian intelligence officials “appeared rather embarrassed that they had been given incorrect information.” It was the U.S. that had provided that information and set in motion what was in effect harassment by proxy. 25 U.S. actions had widespread repercussions. “For our part,” Cowie explains, “we are only conducting legitimate business, but have nonetheless been seriously affected by these measures. A large amount of our and our customers’ money ­ not just in USD, but in all currencies ­ has effectively been seized, with no indication of when they’ll give it back to us.” The fate of Banco Delta Asia served as an object lesson, as did the freezing of Daedong Credit Bank’s $7 million deposits at Banco Delta Asia. “Banks with any kind of U.S. ties are just terrified to have anything to do with any North Korean bank,” Cowie said. After the majority interest in Daedong Credit Bank was purchased by British-owned Koryo Bank, the new owner, Colin McAskill, asked U.S. officials to examine the bank’s records in order to prove that its funds were legitimate and should be unfrozen. “They’ve had it much too much their own way without anyone questioning what they are putting out,” he said. 26 Warning letters to banks were often followed by personal visits from U.S. officials. Bankers and American officials said that the messages contained a mix of implicit threats and explicit actions. Unsurprisingly, it was not long before nearly all of North Korea’s accounts in foreign banks were closed. The DPRK’s international trade was being choked. Quite often, no pretense was even being made that the actions were related to illegal transactions. U.S. officials were openly pressing financial institutions to sever all economic relations with the DPRK. “The U.S. government is urging financial institutions around the world to think carefully about the risks of doing any North Korea-related business,” Levey said. By September 2006, the U.S. had sent official dispatches to each UN member state, detailing plans for harsher economic sanctions. The planned measures were so strong that several European nations expressed concern, and it was said that the plans aimed at nothing less than a total blockade on all North Korean trade and financial transactions. 27 Selig Harrison, director of the Asia Program at the Center for International Policy, visited the DPRK and reported on what he saw. “I found instances in North Korea authenticated by foreign businessmen and foreign embassies in which legitimate imports of industrial equipment for light industries making consumer goods have been blocked. The North Koreans understandably see this as a regime change policy designed to bring about the collapse of their regime through economic pressure.” 28 The U.S. also imposed sanctions on several North Korean import-export firms, on the unsubstantiated charge that they were involved in the arms trade. Yet more sanctions were then announced, this time against several Indian and Russian firms doing business with the DPRK, along with several North Korean companies. 29 Russian Ambassador to South Korea Gleb Ivashentsov called for the U.S. to offer proof to back its accusation of counterfeiting. “The side that raises the suspicions should present evidence,” he said. “Russia has not received any concrete evidence. There is rumor-level talk on the issue.” 30 Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao was equally skeptical, saying that his nation knew nothing of North Korean counterfeit currency flowing into China. 31 On December 16, 2005, U.S. officials finally briefed a number of nations on the evidence against North Korea. But South Korean officials noted afterwards that all they heard was a lot of circumstantial evidence but no concrete information. 32 At the request of the Bush Administration, a conference was organized by Interpol and held in Lyon, France, in July 2006. There the U.S. Secret Service presented its case to more than sixty international bankers, police officials, and banknote producers. No evidence was offered on that occasion either, and the attitude was that the audience should accept the Secret Service’s assertions on faith alone. “I can’t remember if I was laughing or asleep,” remarked one attendee afterwards. 33 A survey of the participants taken at the end of the conference showed that not one person had been fully convinced of the U.S. position. 34 U.S. Treasury officials also met with a North Korean delegation in New York in March 2006, but provided no information to back the charge. DPRK delegation head Ri Gun remarked afterwards, “There was no evidence. There were neither comments nor discussion” relating to evidence. During the meeting, Ri Gun proposed creating a joint U.S.-DPRK consultative body to “exchange information on financial crimes and prepare countermeasures.” The North Koreans said they would respond to evidence of counterfeiting and arrest those who were involved and seize the equipment. “Both sides can have a dialogue at the consultative body through which they can build trust. It would have a very positive impact on addressing the nuclear issue on the Korean peninsula,” Ri said. The delegation also suggested that a North Korean settlement account be opened at a U.S. financial institution and placed under U.S. supervision, so as to allay suspicions. The North Korean offers were ignored. 35 In a conciliatory move, the DPRK enacted a law nearly a year later that banned transactions based on illegal activities, including counterfeiting. 36 It took a year and a half, but when the U.S. Treasury Department completed its investigation into the matter, it decided to finalize the rule prohibiting U.S. financial institutions from dealing with Banco Delta Asia. The Department determined that not only were its earlier allegations accurate, but that the bank had also engaged in “additional illicit financial conduct.” 37 Stanley Au, the founder of Banco Delta Asia, responded that his bank did not knowingly do wrong. “We have sent evidence to prove our innocence to the U.S. government several times.” 38 Au charged that the Treasury Department had acted unfairly in punishing his bank without offering any evidence. 39 Because the bank was a small family-owned firm, it lacked the most recent advanced technology for screening cash for counterfeits. Therefore, as a matter of routine the bank sent all large deposits to HSBC in New York to be analyzed before the amounts would be credited to accounts. 40 In the aftermath of the Treasury Department’s initial accusations, the Macao government hired the accounting firm Ernst & Young to investigate operations at Banco Delta Asia. In its final report, Ernst & Young indicated that there was room for improvement in some procedures. But “the procedures in place at the Bank for handling large value (wholesale) deposits of U.S. currency notes ensured that, to a material degree, the Bank did not introduce counterfeit U.S. currency notes into circulation over the relevant period.” For smaller deposits, the accounting firm found that Banco Delta Asia was using a counterfeit banknote scanning machine, as well as doing manual checking. “To this end the Bank passed most U.S. currency notes to HSBC for validation. NK entities were not given value for their deposits of currency until after HSBC had confirmed the deposit to be genuine.” Ernst & Young found that in relation to the total value of U.S. currency sent to HSBC for checking, “the value of counterfeit notes detected was minor. Once detected the counterfeit notes were withdrawn from circulation.” 41 It appears that the Treasury Department’s charges against Banco Delta Asia were motivated strictly by political considerations. Certainly the charges were found to have had no connection to reality. No doubt this is why U.S. officials failed to furnish any evidence to back their accusations. Banco Delta Asia was chosen to serve as an example to other financial institutions dealing with the DPRK. As former State Department official David Asher put it, “We decided to kill the chicken to scare the monkey.” 42 By targeting one of North Korea’s primary external financial partners, the Bush Administration had succeeded in shutting off much of that nation’s foreign trade. That the charge lacked substance was of no import. It had served the purpose of furthering political aims, as had the Bush Administration’s earlier claims about Iraqi chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs. In both cases, media saturation ensured that the lies would be firmly implanted as truth in the minds of the American public. The freezing of North Korea’s funds at Banco Delta Asia violated the recently signed nuclear disarmament agreement and halted its implementation. North Korea justifiably insisted that its funds be released before it would proceed with its obligations under the agreement. In time, the issue became enough of a political embarrassment that the Bush Administration was compelled to relent. North Korea got its money back, believing that this would enable it to regain its limited toehold in the international financial system. But the damage was done. Banco Delta Asia remained blacklisted and most banks continued to be wary of doing business with the DPRK, not wanting to risk U.S. retribution. The Banco Delta Asia story was a fabrication. But what about the main charge — that North Korea is producing supernotes? It is true that on occasion North Korean officials have passed supernotes while abroad. But then so have citizens from dozens of other countries. Indeed, U.S. Secret Service investigations have involved more than 130 countries. 43 It should be noted that much of North Korea’s trade is conducted on a cash basis. The U.S. designation of the DPRK as a “terrorist nation” mandates its exclusion from contact with the U.S. financial system, and for the most part the international system follows suit. Only a handful of banks such as Banco Delta Asia have been willing to do business with North Korea. Nigel Cowie, general manager of Daedong Bank, points out that North Korea’s currency is not convertible, “so imported goods are bought and sold for hard currency.” One of the reasons Cowie gives for North Korea’s reliance on cash transactions is “the absence of the normal system of reciprocal correspondent bank accounts that exists in other countries which enables transactions to be settled by electronic book entry.” The bottom line “is that people tend to transact largely in cash, which in itself is not illegal – in this market, it is in fact often the only way.” 44 That very reliance on cash transactions ensures that supernotes inevitably make their way into the local economy. For someone looking to unload a quantity of supernotes, where better to move them than by trading with North Korea? With a population reluctant to deposit money in bank accounts and with banks lacking the kind of counterfeit detection equipment that would flag a supernote as fake, North Korea makes an inviting target. And sooner or later, those same supernotes are going to find their way outside of the North Korean economy. This does not necessarily mean that North Koreans passing the notes would be aware of it, although it is possible that there may be some corrupt individuals in North Korea who are knowingly involved in the trade. There is much that is odd about supernotes. Banknote specialist Klaus W. Bender points out that experts regard the print quality as “simply superb.” In some ways, Bender continues, “the supernotes are even better than the authentic 100-dollar bills of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. Under the microscope, for example, the supernote shows an especially fine execution of lines on the facing side, which cannot be found on the real note. The complicated seal of the Department of the Treasury on the facing side is copied with absolute perfection, but just below it, one finds in the banknote numbering a marking compound that should not be there. And then, missing from this excellently copied supernote, of all things, are the magnetic and infrared security features that would prevent banknote examining systems from bouncing it. Every surveillance device of an American bank or the Fed recognizes the supernote immediately as a counterfeit and spits it out. Do the counterfeiters perhaps intend that the supernote be recognized immediately in the United States?” 45 A report issued by the Swiss police concurs that the makers of the supernote seem to have deliberately introduced subtle errors into the process. Extra strokes have been added. When placed under ultraviolet or infrared light, stripes can be seen or numbers vanish on supernotes. 46 The most perplexing aspect of supernote production is their low quantity. By 2006, the Secret Service had seized $50 million in supernotes, an average of just $2.8 million per year since the first one was discovered. And since supernotes are usually detected the moment they enter the international banking system, the total quantity produced is probably not significantly higher. Supernotes make up a small percentage of the total counterfeit dollars in circulation. “To provide a point of reference,” said Michael Merritt of the U.S. Secret Service, “during fiscal year 2005, the Secret Service seized over $113 million in counterfeit U.S. currency.” Not only is the amount of supernotes small relative to less sophisticated counterfeits, but it is insignificant compared to the $760 billion in genuine U.S. currency in circulation. 47 The Swiss police observe, “What defies logic is the limited, or even controlled, amount of ‘exclusive’ fakes that have appeared over the years. The organization could easily circulate tenfold that amount without raising suspicions.” Yet a printing press “like the one in North Korea can produce $50 million worth of bills in a few hours.” 48 During the 1970s, Giori replaced its standard model printers in a phased approach with its new “Super” series. The standard model was capable of printing three thousand sheets per hour. Each sheet held 32 notes. If North Korea purchased one of the older standard models, it would have taken just over five hours to produce $50 million. And $2.8 million a year would have required running the press for less than half an hour. Production would be done for the year. The newer Orlof press can spew out 12,000 sheets per hour, each sheet containing sixty notes. Only two and a half minutes would be needed to generate $2.8 million in notes. 49 Clearly, supernotes are being produced for a very specific purpose. Also difficult to explain is the speed with which supernotes have kept pace with the numerous modifications made to U.S. engraving plates since 1989. This in itself is a prohibitively expensive process. German banknote specialist Klaus W. Bender remarks, “The counterfeiters immediately implemented each and every change to the 100-dollar bill. The pace at which they put out their revised fake notes made observers even wonder whether they had access to information concerning to the speed with which the Fed replaced its old notes.” 50 The microprint in U.S. currency sometimes measures only 1/42,000 of an inch. “This microprint is considered unique in the world of banknotes. It was reproduced so perfectly by the counterfeiters that even under a microscope no difference is distinguishable. The gravure of an intaglio printing plate requires many months of hard work and eats up many tens of thousands of dollars per plate. For security reasons, the craft is always taught in-house only. So where do the counterfeiters get this specialized knowledge?” 51 Just who is producing supernotes? Initially, the U.S. accused Iran and Syria, even though the latter country did not have a banknote press of its own. Then North Korea was identified as the culprit. While it cannot be ruled out that North Korea is producing supernotes, that prospect raises the question of motive. By the reckoning of the U.S. Secret Service, supernotes pose a low threat, given the small amounts in circulation and the preponderant distribution outside of U.S. borders. Furthermore, supernotes are identified the moment they hit the U.S. banking system, which would seem to rule out the motivation of “economic warfare” that has been attributed to North Korea. Nor does the production of supernotes make sense as a profit-making venture. A single new Giori printing machine now costs more than the $50 million in supernotes found so far. To give some idea of the expense, when Nigeria opened its second printing plant in Abuja, it cost more than $135 million, and that does not take into account property costs. 52 A plant to produce the type of paper used in supernotes is similarly expensive and large quantities of the proper type of paper would have to be manufactured to avoid ongoing financial loss. OVI ink is also quite expensive, even more so since most of the ink is lost when the printing plates are wiped clean just before pressing the paper. Factor in the cost of keeping up with multiple changes to the engravings, and no sane individual would undertake such a daunting operation to produce limited quantities with an eye to making a profit. U.S. officials like to point out that they have seen no evidence that any nation other than North Korea is producing supernotes. True enough, but neither is there any evidence that North Korea is doing so. By all accounts, such an operation would require the resources of a government or governmental organization. Klaus W. Bender suggests one intriguing possibility. “One notices that the supernotes always turn up in small, well-measured quantities, as though their volume were controlled.” This is not how normal counterfeiters behave. “They want to unload their hot goods as quickly as possible. Further, experts believe they have determined that the supernotes regularly crop up in those regions in which U.S. foreign policy is just encountering problems: the Near and Middle East, central African countries, and especially East Africa. Active in these places are opposition politicians, rebelling tribes, and private armies of diverse warlords doing the bidding of the CIA. Could it be that they are being paid for their services in counterfeit dollar notes?” Bender posits that such groups might use the money to purchase arms abroad, including from North Korea, and that from North Korea the money would make its way back to Western nations. “It is not clear how much the U.S. Secret Service knows itself, or is allowed to know.” The CIA is said to have a printing plant located north of Washington, DC, in which the same Giori printing presses are installed that are used in the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. 53 It has also been suggested that limited quantities of counterfeit notes are being introduced into the market in such a way as to assist law enforcement agencies in tracking the movement of funds among criminal and terrorist organizations. 54 Everything is speculation at this point in time, but of all the various scenarios that have been suggested, it is this last one that is the most plausible. It is the only one where all of the pieces fit together into a coherent whole. The U.S. still insists that it has solid evidence against North Korea, even though it won’t reveal it. But U.S. officials also claimed to have proof that Banco Delta Asia was culpable in aiding North Korea in distributing supernotes. Given the Bush Administration’s proclivity for mendacity, some measure of skepticism would seem to be called for. When looking at the facts alone, the only thing that can be said with certainty is that the source of supernotes has yet to be determined. As with all stories that the public is asked to accept on blind faith, the topic should be examined with critical thinking. At a minimum, the expectation of evidence should be the norm when unsubstantiated stories with a political point are told. Too often, credulity and misplaced trust in Western leaders have led to tragic consequences. Gregory Elich is on the Board of Directors of the Jasenovac Research Institute and on the Advisory Board of the Korea Truth Commission. He is the author of the book Strange Liberators: Militarism, Mayhem, and the Pursuit of Profit. [1] Stephen Mihm, “No Ordinary Counterfeit,” New York Times, July 23, 2006. [2] Stephen Mihm, “No Ordinary Counterfeit,” New York Times, July 23, 2006. [3] Klaus W. Bender, Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing , p. 71, Wiley, Weinheim, 2006.    Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und  Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007. [4] Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007 [5] Klaus W. Bender, Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing , p. 109, Wiley, Weinheim, 2006. [6] Kevin G. Hall , “Fake $100 ‘Supernotes’ Have Features Just Like the Real Ones,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 9, 2008. [7] Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007   Kevin G. Hall, “Fake $100 ‘Supernotes’ Have Features Just Like the Real Ones,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 9, 2008. [8] Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007 [9] Klaus W. Bender, Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing , pp. 91-93, Wiley, Weinheim, 2006 [10] Stephen Mihm, “No Ordinary Counterfeit,” New York Times, July 23, 2006. [11] Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007 [12] Kevin G. Hall, “Fake $100 ‘Supernotes’ Have Features Just Like the Real Ones,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 9, 2008. [13] Stephen Mihm, “No Ordinary Counterfeit,” New York Times, July 23, 2006. [14] “What is a Superdollar?”, BBC News, June 19, 2004. [15] Stephen Mihm, “No Ordinary Counterfeit,” New York Times, July 23, 2006. [16] Tim Johnson, “Defectors Offer Stories of Fake U.S. Bills, But They Don’t Check Out,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 10, 2008. [17] United States District Court for the District of Columbia, Indictment, “United States of America v. Sean Garland, also known as ‘the Man with the Hat’, Christopher John Corcoran, also known as ‘Christie’, David Levin, also known as David Batikovich Baitikian, also known as Gediminas Gotautas, also known as ‘Russian Dave’, also known as ‘Doctor’, Terence Silcock, also known as ‘Terry’, Hugh Todd, also known as F.B. Rawing, also known as Peter Keith Clark, Alan Jones, and Mark Adderley, Defendants, September 30, 2004. [18] Sean Garland, Letter to the Irish Times, November 17, 2005. [19] Sean Garland, Letter to the Irish Times, October 17, 2005. [20] U.S. State Department, press release, “U.S. Cites Banco Delta Asia for Money Laundering, Other Crimes,” September 15, 2005. [21] Department of the Treasury, Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, Advisory, “Guidance to Financial Institutions on the Provision of Banking Services to North Korean Government Agencies and Associated Front Companies Engaged in Illicit Activities,” December 13, 2005. [22] Letter by James T. Barnette of Collier Shannon Scott, LLC, to William J. Fox, Director of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, October 17, 2005. [23] Jay Solomon, “How U.S. Used Finance to Pressure North Korea,” Wall Street Journal Asia, April 12, 2007. [24] Christian Caryl, “Pocketbook Policing,” Newsweek, April 10-17, 2006.     Joel Brinkley, “U.S. Squeezes North Korea’s Money Flow,” New York Times, March 10, 2006. [25] Nigel Cowie, “US Financial Allegations: What they Mean,” Nautilus Institute, May 4, 2006.     Jay Solomon, “How U.S. Used Finance to Pressure North Korea,” Wall Street Journal Asia, April 12, 2007. [26] Nigel Cowie, “US Financial Allegations: What they Mean,” Nautilus Institute, May 4, 2006.     “North Korea’s Nuclear Push May be Stymied by U.S. Banking Rules,” Bloomberg, March 7, 2006.     Anna Fifield, “Bankers Challenge US Sanctions on North Korea,” Financial Times (London), September 5, 2006. [27] Steven R. Wiseman, “U.S. Pursues Tactic of Financial Isolation,” New York Times, October 16, 2006.     “North Korean Regime Feeling Pinch from Sanctions: U.S.,” Chosun Ilbo (Seoul), April 3, 2006.     “North Funds Lose Havens in Sanctions,” JoongAng Ilbo (Seoul), August 24, 2006.     “US Targets Business with North Korea,” Associated Press, September 9, 2006.     “US Reportedly Asks for Cooperation with Sanctions on DPRK from UN Member States,” Chosun Ilbo (Seoul), September 13, 2006. [28] Selig S. Harrison, “N.K. Nuclear Test Depends on U.S.,” Hankyoreh (Seoul), October 2, 2006. [29] Jeannine Aversa, “White House Targets N. Korean Companies,” Associated Press, October 21, 2005.     “US Slaps Sanctions on N.Korea, Russian Firms,” Reuters, August 4, 2006.     “U.S. Slaps Sanctions on Two N.Korean Firms,” Chosun Ilbo (Seoul), August 7, 2006. [30] Lee Chi-dong , “Russia Urges U.S. to Present Evidence of N. Korean Counterfeiting,” Yonhap (Seoul), March 7, 2006. [31] “China Unaware of Counterfeit Dollars Linked to North Korea – Spokesman Cited,” Kyodo News Service (Tokyo), October 26, 2006. [32] Kwon Tae-yol, “ROK ‘Does Not Agree 100 Percent’,” Chosun Ilbo (Seoul), December 20, 2005. [33] Kevin G. Hall, “U.S. Counterfeiting Charges Against N. Korea Based on Shaky Evidence,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 10, 2008. [34] Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007 [35] “No Evidence on Counterfeiting, Says North Korean Diplomat,” Agence France-Presse, March 9, 2006.     “North Korea Urges US to Accept Proposal to Settle ‘Counterfeit Notes’ Issue,” KCNA (Pyonyang), March 28, 2006. [36] “ROK Intelligence Agency Says DPRK Enacts Anti-Money Laundering Law,” Agence France-Presse, February 20, 2007. [37] U.S. Department of Treasury, Prepared Remarks of Stuart Levey, “U.S. Treasury Finalizes Rule Against Banco Delta Asia,” March 14, 2007. [38] Ser Myo-ja, “Not Guilty Says Macau Bank Chief,” JoongAng Ilbo (Seoul), March 17, 2007. [39] “Macao Bank Says Scapegoated by U.S. over N. Korea Links,” Japan Economic Newswire, May 9, 2007. [40] William Foreman, “Macau Bank Says HSBC Helped it Authenticate U.S. Dollar Deposits by North Korea,” Associated Press, February 2, 2007. [41] Ernst & Young, “Banco Delta Asia S.A.R.L. Report to the Administrative Committee,” December 16, 2005. [42] Jay Solomon, “How U.S. Used Finance to Pressure North Korea,” Wall Street Journal Asia, April 12, 2007. [43] Statement of Michael Merritt, Deputy Assistance Director, Office of Investigations United States Secret Service, before the Committee on Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Governmental Information, and International Security, “How North Korea Funds its Regime,” April 25, 2006. [44] Interview with Nigel Cowie, “Foreign Bank Feeling the Pinch in Pyongyang,” Korea Herald (Seoul), March 29, 2006. [45] Klaus W. Bender, Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing , p. 263, Wiley, Weinheim, 2006 [46] Kevin G. Hall, “Swiss Authorities Question U.S. Counterfeiting Charges Against North Korea,” McClatchy Newspapers, May 22, 2007.     Kevin G. Hall, “Fake $100 Bills Have Features Just like the Real Ones,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 10, 2008. [47] Statement of Michael Merritt, Deputy Assistance Director, Office of Investigations United States Secret Service, before the Committee on Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Governmental Information, and International Security, “How North Korea Funds its Regime,” April 25, 2006.     Jaroslav Anders, “Counterfeiting Threat to U.S. Currency Low, Report Says,” State Department Documents and Publications, November 28, 2006. [48] Kevin G. Hall, “Swiss Authorities Question U.S. Counterfeiting Charges Against North Korea,” McClatchy Newspapers, May 22, 2007. [49] Klaus W. Bender, Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing , p. 62, Wiley, Weinheim, 2006 [50] Kevin G. Hall, “Fake $100 ‘Supernotes’ Have Features Just Like the Real Ones,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 9, 2008.   Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007 [51] Klaus W. Bender, “The Mystery of the Supernotes,” Düsseldorfer Institut für Außen- und Sicherheitspolitik (Dusseldorf), January 11, 2007 [52] Klaus W. Bender, Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing , p. 80, Wiley, Weinheim, 2006 [53] Klaus W. Bender, Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing , p. 264, Wiley, Weinheim, 2006 [54] Kevin G. Hall, “U.S. Counterfeiting Charges Against N. Korea Based on Shaky Evidence,” McClatchy Newspapers, January 10, 2008.   Gregory Elich is a Korea Policy Institute board member. He is a contributor to the collection, Sanctions as War: Anti-Imperialist Perspectives on American Geo-Economic Strategy (Haymarket Books, 2023). His website is  https://gregoryelich.org    Follow him on Twitter at @GregoryElich .

By Myoung-in Kim | January 22, 2025 | Originally published in Hankyoreh Korea needs to start again from the fundamental principles of liberty, equality and solidarity to build a true democratic, constitutional republic The insurrection that was started on Dec. 3 is still ongoing. This insurrection needs to be swiftly put to an end, but in order to do that, we need to consider the qualities of an insurrection and what it means to quell it.  Legally, the recent incident bears similarities to Chun Doo-hwan’s coup in December 1979. Politically, however, it is closer to Park Geun-hye’s 2017 influence-peddling scandal. The former incident resulted in over seven years of Chun ruling with an iron fist, which was met with desperate civic resistance. In the latter incident, people employed the legal counteroffensive of impeachment to dismantle bygone authority, which makes it more similar to Dec. 3.  Therefore, considerations of how to bring an end to the insurrection and what happens after are inseparable from a proper retrospection on the implementation of Korean democracy following Park’s 2017 impeachment and the inauguration of the Moon Jae-in administration.  In today’s era of neoliberal hegemony, the economic realm, which comprises capital and labor and the distribution of products, has become the inviolable territory of the market; and even social-cultural fields and ideological realms are managed under the premise of market absolutism. What’s known as politics has been reduced to nothing more than a service sector to preserve and manage the structuralized neoliberal system. In this state, the ideological inclination of the ruling faction is nothing more than a meaningless color choice.  From the stance of the neoliberal ruling class that serves financial capital, a right-wing government allows them to openly and easily maintain their privilege. With a moderate or left-wing government, the only difference is that they are slightly inconvenienced and have to pretend to compromise. The “people’s government” era of Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun is the period during which neoliberalism took root in Korean society, while the Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye administrations were determined to be robber barons and flimsy administrations. The Moon Jae-in administration presented a facade of being a democratic administration that actually didn’t accomplish anything. This perspective makes things a little clearer.   The Yoon Suk-yeol administration could be viewed as the most corrupt version of the backward, right-wing, robber-baron governments of the neoliberal era. The right-wing establishment that had its heyday during the Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye administrations was momentarily obstructed from exercising its privilege during the Moon Jae-in administration that followed Park’s impeachment.  To chase away unpleasant memories of having to involuntarily rearrange their power structure during this era of obstruction, they threw in their lot with Yoon, who emerged as a candidate solely as an opposing figure against the Moon administration. He was an unvetted prospect hailing from a special class of prosecutors. By choosing Yoon as their representative, they unexpectedly succeeded in reclaiming power, as if they’d won the lotto. The problem was, setting aside his lack of political experience, Yoon was totally unqualified to lead the country as its president.  Lee Myung-bak was a con artist, but thanks to his years of experience in the business and financial world, he at least knew how to keep up appearances. While Park really achieved nothing aside from becoming president, as the daughter of a dictator and the country’s first female president, she at least maintained a class of presidential dignity. It’s clear that Yoon, however, is increasingly becoming an insufferable figure. In the end, he floundered by declaring martial law out of the blue.  While we cannot confirm that Yoon acted according to the orders of first lady Kim Keon-hee, who some say has been the de facto president, the martial law declaration was undeniably an act of anachronistic greed and an attempt to privatize the presidency for an indefinite period of time. Whatever the case, what happened, happened. South Korea, which had been lauded as an advanced nation, became a backward country where a president could pull a self-coup overnight. The one silver lining, however, is that Yoon’s act of rash self-destruction has provided an opportunity for us to quickly address the stagnation that has steadily aggregated in Korean society.  For starters, the current insurrection situation needs to be settled as quickly as possible in a legal and constitutional way. The first step in this process is to continue the process of removing the insurrection ringleader, Yoon, that was begun by the impeachment motion. This includes his criminal investigation and trial, which should conclude in the maximum sentence allowed by law.  We also need to aggressively push for the dissolution of the People Power Party, the party of far-right vested interests, that is ruled by a number of collaborators who took part in the insurrection. We then must elect a new president and form a new democratic government.  From its general election victory to its swift suppression of the insurrection, the Democratic Party, the main opposition, has been partially exempted from taking accountability for the failures of the Moon administration. Considering the current political landscape, the Democratic Party seems to be the most probable candidate to become the ruling party. This would complete the political process of quelling the insurrection.  Yet it would be naive to conclude that Korean democracy would be restored at that point. Strictly speaking, it would be a return to ground zero in Korean democracy. The potential of establishing a constitutional republic that arose in 1987 has been suffocated over the past 30 years by a two-party system. In reality, our democracy has been reduced to ruins. From ground zero, we need to start again from the fundamental principles of liberty, equality and solidarity to build a true democratic, constitutional republic. This journey needs to be led by a new order, not the old one.   While they made an appearance during the 2016 protests at Gwanghwamun, the youth and women voters had failed to surmount the fences of their identity up until that point. This time, they emerged as an overwhelming collective in the Yeouido protests. The sense of crisis that they might lose democracy, which they’d been enjoying as carefreely as if it were the air they breathe, brought them out from the shadows.  Moreover, in the great fight for democracy, they acted with surprising aggressiveness, eagerly siding not only with older generations but with the farmers in Namtaeryeong and the disabled in Anguk. They have started becoming allies to all minorities fighting for their rights. They appeared to have been stuck in identity politics, but they broke free of that and stood on the front lines to stop the insurrection, going even further to exhibit marvelous acts of solidarity. It is moving to see among them the potential to defeat neoliberal hegemony and to build a new democratic republic.  These people did not march out into the freezing cold to get rid of one foolish president. They did not take time out of their studies or work to simply take part in the “public square spectacle.” They are no longer “admirable young people.” They are the ones who need to emerge as the political agents in order to create hope in Korean society, which has been bruised by inequality and discrimination and exclusion and hatred, a society that stands helpless amid the imminent climate crisis. It is only when their dreams of entering “into a new world”— that is, a new democratic republic — are realized that the insurrection will finally be over. Myoung-in Kim is a literary critic and professor emeritus of Inha University.

By Simone Chun | January 6, 2025 | Originally published in Counterpunch Yoon declaring martial law. For more than 44 hours Koreans have braved freezing snowstorms to demand the arrest of the elusive Yoon Suk Yeol, who has barricaded himself inside his official residence in defiance of constitutional and legal authority.  Yoon, extolled by Washington as a “champion of democracy,” has vanished from public view behind hastily erected barricades manned by security and military personnel while ignoring repeated summons from both the anti-corruption and prosecution services. Capping a monthlong standoff with the National Assembly, and the Korean public over his brazen attempted coup , Washington’s “ perfect partner ” has spent the past week deploying the armed military and security services at his disposal to physically prevent police from serving him with an arrest warrant for insurrectionism and abuse of authority. Investigators from the Corruption Investigation Office attempting to execute the warrant–the first against a sitting president–were forced to withdraw from the presidential compound after a five-hour standoff with the over 200 armed men deployed by Yoon. This unprecedented drama began unfolding on the night of December 3, 2024. Amid 250+ days of intentionally destabilizing US-led war games and months of massive citizen protests demanding his resignation, the deeply unpopular president put his nation under martial law for the first time since 1979, dispatching armed troops with the orders to “shoot to kill” if necessary to surround the National Assembly and prevent lawmakers from convening to rescind the order. By the following night, some 2 million Koreans bearing light sticks, candles, and beacons formed a luminous sea around the National Assembly to demand the impeachment of Yoon Suk-yeol, while lawmakers clambered over fences and security barriers to gain access to the chambers. With a vote of 204 to 85, which included 12 lawmakers from the ruling People’s Power Party (PPP), the National Assembly impeached Yoon, with Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung declaring , “the people have proved that they are the owners of this country.” While the Constitutional Court has 180 days to render a judgment on whether the impeachment motion is constitutional, Yoon’s rogue insurrectionism and contemptuous defiance of the rule of law is continuing, escalating tensions and instability. Yoon’s motivation for his failed insurrection lies in the ongoing crisis of legitimacy facing his puppet government, which has eagerly acquiesced to every demand made by its American and Japanese “allies” while making a hollow mockery of Korean self-determination and ignoring the interests of the nation he swore to defend. Since assuming power in 2022 after winning the presidency by a razor-thin margin of 0.7%, Yoon has actively worked to undermine the very basis of Korean independence and democracy back to its roots during the brutal period of Japanese colonization in WWII. Moreover, Washington’s unquenchable geopolitical ambitions , couched behind its so-called “ ironclad commitment to Korea,” mandates the continuation of its policy of preferring right-wing governments at the expense of Korea’s sovereignty. This has overtly empowered and legitimized Yoon’s autocratic pursuit of power against the interests of the Korean people. Thus, Yoon–who represented his country by sycophantically singing “American Pie” during a state dinner at the White House–has dutifully promoted the US-led trilateral “ Axis of War ”, facilitating non-stop US-led wargames, and escalating tensions with Pyongyang while persecuting his domestic critics as “communists” and “anti-state forces.” His ongoing rogue behavior of defiance of the rule of law is directly related to the strong support he has received from Washington as “Biden’s man” in Seoul. With the President suspended from power, what’s next for Korea’s “Revolution of Lights”?  How can the world support Korea’s quest for democracy, peace, and true sovereignty? Demand accountability for Yoon’s legacy of authoritarianism, his continuing assault on democracy and the rule of law, and his betrayal of Korean sovereignty in service of Washington’s geopolitical ambitions. Call for a final end to Washington’s shameful history of subverting South Korean politics by abetting dangerous far-right forces that take Korea’s democracy and sovereignty hostage. Simone Chun is a researcher and activist focusing on inter-Korean relations and U.S. foreign policy in the Korean Peninsula. She currently serves on the Korea Policy Institute Board of Directors and the advisory board for CODEPINK. She has over 20 years of teaching and research experience in the United States and has been a central contributor to the creation of a number of interdisciplinary Asian and Korean Studies degree programs. She has served as an assistant professor at Suffolk University, an associate-in-research at Harvard University’s Korea Institute, and a lecturer at Northeastern University. Follow her on Twitter at @simonechun .

By Gregory Elich | January 3, 2025 | Originally published in Counterpunch Photograph Source: 대한민국 국회 – KOGL Type 1 Since South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol’s failed attempt to impose martial law on December 3, a steady stream of revelations has emerged from reporters and investigators, painting an increasingly disturbing picture of events. Plans drawn up by Yoon’s co-conspirators included a shocking level of brutality and the promise of repression on a mass scale. His administration even made efforts to provoke a conflict with North Korea to bolster the case for martial rule. Although many Western reports framed the end of martial law as a triumph of democracy, South Korea is not out of danger yet. The extreme right actively opposes Yoon’s impeachment, and it remains to be seen if the Constitutional Court will confirm Yoon’s impeachment. Background to Martial Law Although the martial law declaration shocked many, signs of Yoon’s authoritarian nature were apparent long before. There was his propensity for making blanket condemnations of critics as “anti-state forces,” in essence conflating opposition to his right-wing policies with treason. That attitude was often openly expressed, as in a speech Yoon delivered on National Liberation Day in 2023, branding the liberal and progressive opposition as “anti-state forces that blindly follow communist totalitarianism, distort public opinion, and disrupt the society through manipulative propaganda.” In Yoon’s Manichean viewpoint, pitted against his far-right policies was a sizeable segment of Korean society that lacked legitimacy. “The forces of communist totalitarianism,” he continued in delusional mode, “have always disguised themselves as democracy activists, human rights advocates, or progressive activists while engaging in despicable and unethical tactics and false propaganda. We must never succumb to the forces of communist totalitarianism.” Yoon’s repressive tendencies often came to the fore more directly. Such was the case on May 31, 2023, when police attacked a union rally and then searched a construction union headquarters several days later, seizing electronic equipment and documents. In another example, a year ago, National Intelligence Service (NIS) agents, backed by more than a thousand riot police, raided the headquarters of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) and fourteen other union offices and residences. Based on the trumped-up charge that union officials were taking orders from North Korea, the raid netted three unionists who were arrested and later convicted to multi-year prison sentences. It is worth recalling that the NIS has a history of fabricating evidence against activists, most famously in its manufactured ‘evidence’ that led to the forcible dissolution of the Unified Progressive Party ten years ago. Political organizations also experienced repression, and last August, police raided the office of the People’s Democratic Party and its members’ residences, and two leaders of Korea Solidarity were sentenced to prison terms for violating the National Security Act, which has often been used as a weapon over the years to smother dissent. Yoon has faced rising labor unrest in response to his anti-labor policies. His response has been to implement a repressive policy against the union movement, characterized by a pattern of harassment . One of Yoon’s primary motivations for a military takeover was to deal a fatal blow to the union movement. He often ranted about the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, a particularly passionate object of his hatred. At Yoon’s residence in August, he discussed adopting emergency measures and specified what that meant for the KCTU: “We have to take action against these people.” Yoon obsessed over the April 10 legislative election in South Korea, which handed a landslide victory to the opposition, widely seen as a rebuke to him personally and his policies. Social media was flooded with inaccurate claims of electoral fraud by his supporters. No doubt, Yoon found such claims a more acceptable explanation of electoral disaster than to look within himself as the cause. Yoon began to cultivate relationships with far-right YouTubers who fed his delusion, firing his resentment and anger, and the subject formed another main factor motivating his plan for a military takeover. Planning for Military Dictatorship Martial law had a long gestation, the origin of which predated the April 10 election. Yoon drove the process at every step, with the earliest documented case of its expression in December 2023, when he remarked to military officials, “The only way to solve difficult social problems is through emergency measures.” Serious planning got underway in five-party meetings led by Yoon that took place between June and November and which were attended by his key co-conspirators. Representing the military were General Lee Jin-woo, commander of the Capital Defense Command, and Special Warfare Commander Kwak Jong-geun. Others included Kim Yong-hyun, who held the position of chief of the Presidential Security Service at the time of the initial meeting and later on became defense minister. The final member of the team was Yeo In-hyung, chief of the Defense Intelligence Command. Yoon met with Yeo and Kim at least ten times to plan the operation, ending in November when they conducted a martial law simulation . At first, things did not go as smoothly as Yoon would have liked. According to an inside military source , “The president’s commitment to martial law has always been firm,” but Kim Yong-hyun was initially not very actively involved. By March 2024, though, Kim “had become a staunch believer in martial law, while on the other hand, National Intelligence Service Director Cho Tae-yong and [then Defense Minister] Shin Won-sik consistently opposed it.” At dinner one evening that month, Yoon, livid over his political frustrations, blurted out , “We will have to impose martial law soon.” Taken aback, Shin and Cho tried to dissuade Yoon, without success. Emotions ran high, and after dinner, Kim and Yeo joined Shin at his home, where they clashed over Yoon’s comment. Shin adamantly opposed martial law, and he and Kim soon became embroiled in a heated argument, shouting at each other until late into the night. Something had to be done about Shin, who, although a hawk, did not support Yoon’s overturning of the constitutional order. A man with his attitude toward martial law would not do. On August 12 , Yoon nominated the more supportive Kim Yong-hyun as his new minister of national defense, which took effect in September. A firm believer in martial law was needed in this position of authority over the military, and Kim was that man. In appointing Kim, Yoon shunted Shin to another position where he would not get in the way. Plans had progressed in September to the stage where elite agents from the Headquarters Intelligence Detachment (HID) began training to carry out operations under martial law. The HID is a special warfare unit that, in the event of war, has as its mission infiltration into North Korea to assassinate officials and commit acts of sabotage. Why this particular skill set was considered suitable against a domestic civilian population is indicative of Yoon’s attitude toward democratic opposition. HID agents assigned to martial law operations were chosen for their proficiency in hand-to-hand combat . On the day Yoon declared martial law, five of the HID agents deployed to Pangyo, on the outskirts of Seoul, and the remaining 35 were assigned to various locations inside the capital city. By November, the Defense Counterintelligence Command  drafted high-level plans for martial law . Roh Sang-won, a former intelligence commander widely regarded as the architect of Yoon’s martial law insurrection, devised imple mentation plans. Roh brought an unsavory background to the project beyond his intelligence experience. Six years ago, he was dishonorably discharged from the service after being sentenced to 18 months in prison for sexual assault . Despite his civilian status, Roh was a key collaborator, apparently due to his intelligence experience and longstanding friendship with Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun. In mid-November, Roh instructed Maj. General Moon Sang-ho , head of the Defense Intelligence Command, to provide a list of 15 people skilled in covert operations who would assist in a planned raid on the National Election Commission. Moon selected agents for the mission “who were really good at North Korean operations.” As the day of martial law approached, plans became more detailed. On December 1, Roh met with Moon and two military intelligence colonels at a Lotteria fast-food restaurant, where they discussed operational plans supporting martial law . Despite Roh’s civilian status, he gave the orders. Roh instructed the others to seize control of the election commission “to secure evidence of election fraud.” It was unconventional, to say the least, for a civilian to be in a military chain of command, delivering orders. However, Roh’s tight relationship with Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun was well understood. Roh played upon that factor in promising future assistance in directing promotion opportunities to the two colonels if they cooperated. However, the instructions that Defense Minister Kim had issued to Moon beforehand carried more weight: “Make it known that Roh Sang-won’s orders are my orders.” Several hours before Yoon declared martial law on December 3, a second meeting occurred at Lotteria. This time, Koo Sam-hoe, commander of the Second Armored Brigade, joined others in attendance. Under orders from Roh, Koo headed afterward to an intelligence command center in Gyeonggi Province to join HID agents on standby mode. Koo’s apparent role was connected to his brigade being the closest armored unit to Seoul. Although no information on the nature of his orders has been revealed yet, it should be noted that on the same day, Defense Minister Kim remarked , “The National Assembly is messing around with the defense budget, so let’s smash it with tanks.” There are well-founded suspicions that the conspirators anticipated that there would be large-scale demonstrations against martial law and that tanks were needed to put them down. Martial Law Goes into Effect At about 10:25 PM on December 3, Yoon began his speech proclaiming martial law. Supplementing the speech, the martial law decree prohibited all political activities, strikes, and demonstrations. It also stipulated that all acts that deny or attempt to overthrow military rule, which the document perversely termed “the free democratic system,” would not be allowed. All media were to be placed under the control of the Martial Law Command, with the warning that violators may be arrested, detained, searched without a warrant, and punished. The decree was chillingly redolent of South Korea’s previous experiences under martial law when people faced repression on a mass scale, imprisonment, torture, and executions. The South Korean constitution provides for martial law based on two exigencies – military necessity or national emergency. Neither applied in this case. But Yoon calculated that violence could substitute for legality. According to one estimate, Yoon unleashed at least 4,200 riot police and more than 1,700 military personnel at a variety of locations as his insurrection unfolded. Another estimate puts the combined total at 4,749. Because the constitution grants authority to the National Assembly to overturn martial law, it was Yoon’s primary target. If Yoon could stop the National Assembly from reaching a quorum and taking a vote, then he could make martial law stick. As soon as the news was broadcast, outraged citizens by the thousands raced to the National Assembly to confront the army and police, buying enough time for arriving lawmakers to fight their way through the military blockade and gain entry to the building. Those inside the building erected barricades at the doors and used fire extinguishers to fend off soldiers who had entered through windows. Many of the soldiers deployed to the National Assembly were informed beforehand that they were being sent to the border area and instructed to write a will and have blood drawn. Helicopters transporting them to the scene deliberately adopted complex flight patterns to disorient the passengers as to their destination. However, as soon as they arrived, it was immediately apparent to the soldiers that they had been misled. Several soldiers resisted orders to drag legislators out of the building. One soldier pointed out that his unit comprised only 230 people and asked, “So how could we possibly drag them out?” The officer in charge responded by explaining, “Dragging out means subduing them with guns or special forces techniques to immobilize them and then dragging them out.” Yoon’s motives were both strategic and personal, and his animus drove him to instruct the deputy director of the National Intelligence Service to target several individuals that he particularly loathed, including Democratic Party leader Lee Jae-myung, National Assembly Speaker Woo Won-shik, and Han Dong-hoon, the leader of his ruling party. “Take this opportunity to arrest them all, sort them all out, and give the National Intelligence Service the authority to conduct counter-intelligence investigations,” he urged. Additional orders went out to the counterintelligence arrest team to prioritize apprehending those three individuals and transferring them to a detention facility in Suwon, using handcuffs and shackles. The personalization of Yoon’s martial law took on such prominence that the office of the Defense Counterintelligence Command’s arrest team had a whiteboard listing the names of fourteen people to be rounded up. As Yoon began to fear that his plan to blockade the National Assembly was starting to unravel, his compound became a beehive of activity. A flurry of calls went out, demanding that martial law troops crush resistance. In one encrypted call to Special Warfare Commander Kwak , Yoon said he did not think the Assembly had a quorum yet and ordered him to break down the doors, go in, and drag out the people inside. Colonel Kim Hyun-tae of the Special Warfare Command received a similar call from Yoon , who told him that “there shouldn’t be more than 150 lawmakers in the chamber.” Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun made frantic calls along the same lines, instructing Colonel Kim to go in and drag out Assembly members before a quorum formed. He also urged Kwak to order his soldiers to force their way in, firing blanks and tasers. Under pressure from Kwak, commanders at the scene discussed those orders and the option of shutting off power to the National Assembly, but many of them expressed doubts about the legality of those orders . Desperate for more forceful action, Yoon reached out to Lee Jin-woo , commander of the Capital Defense Command, pleading, “Can’t four people go in and take them out, one by one?” Yoon soon called again. “Haven’t you gone in yet? What are you doing? Break down the door with a gun and drag them out.” Yoon badgered National Police Commissioner Cho Ji-ho six times that night, demanding , “Chief Cho, arrest all the lawmakers trying to enter the National Assembly. It’s illegal. All the lawmakers are violating the proclamation. Arrest them.” Meanwhile, as soon as Yoon proclaimed martial law, ten Defense Intelligence Command soldiers entered the National Election Commission (NEC) headquarters in Gwacheon. Around two hours later , 110 military personnel deployed around the building, only departing about fifty minutes after the National Assembly vote. An additional 130 troops headed to a position near the commission’s Election Training Center in Suwon. Martial law troops photographed wire connections to the servers and other details in preparation for reconnection in a planned removal of servers to a martial law-controlled installation. However, time ran out when the National Assembly vote cut short that assignment. Jeong Seong-woo, chief of the Counterintelligence First Division, met with the Military Security Office director, Cyber ​​Security Office director, and Scientific Investigation Office director to convey instructions from the head of Counterintelligence, Yeo In-hyung. “The prosecution and the National Intelligence Service will come to the Central Election Commission,” he informed them. “The important tasks will be entrusted to the prosecution, and we will provide support afterward.” These instructions strongly indicate that the Supreme Prosecutor’s Office, or well-placed officials within, were complicit in the martial law conspiracy. After Martial Law Fails, Yoon Strives for a Second Martial Law At 1:01 AM on December 4, having collected a quorum, the 190 assembly members who had successfully made their way inside voted unanimously to reject Yoon’s martial law. As specified by South Korea’s martial law act , once the National Assembly votes to lift a martial law decree, the president must announce its termination “without delay.” Rather than follow that constitutional obligation, Yoon maintained three and a half hours of public silence. Yoon’s immediate reaction was to ignore the National Assembly’s decision and forge ahead with plans to impose martial law. After the vote, Yoon called Commander Lee Jim-woo, telling him , “I can’t even confirm that 190 people have come in… Even if it’s lifted, I can declare martial law two or three times, so keep going.” For the first two hours, the Martial Law Command repeatedly contacted the administrative office of the Supreme Court, demanding that it send a court clerk to the command, presumably to act as a liaison officer. Through this arrangement, the military hoped to exert control over the judiciary. Doubting the legitimacy of martial law, the Supreme Court disregarded the demand. Half an hour after the National Assembly vote, Yoon summoned generals to meet with him in the martial law situation room at the Joint Chiefs of Staff. A bus transported 34 generals and high-ranking officers to Yoon’s compound. Details of the meeting have not been made public. What is known is that not long after martial law was voted down, the martial law command ordered the 7th Airborne Brigade in North Jeolla Province and the 13th Airborne Brigade in North Chungcheong Province to go into standby mode and prepare to advance on Seoul and reinforce troops stationed there. The 11th Airborne Division in Jeollanam-do Province was also set to go, issuing bulletproof vests, helmets, and firearms to the unit and keeping vehicle engines running, ready for immediate departure. Yoon also convened a council of ministers meeting in a KakaoTalk group chat room, which may not have gone as he had hoped, as Yoon subsequently went on the air at around 4:30 AM to announce the lifting of martial law. It was only then that airborne troops were told to stand down. It is not publicly known what other factors may have contributed to Yoon’s tardy decision to lift martial law. Yoon’s Plans for the First Days of Martial Law The Martial Law Command had prepared multiple facilities to house prisoners. One site, the B1 Bunker at the Capital Defense Command, located on the border between Seoul and Gwacheon, can hold up to five hundred people. A second site, the psychological warfare building in Seoul, is not far from the National Assembly, and it is here where prisoners were to be processed through the not-so-gentle hands of HID interrogators. These sites were intended to handle high-profile prisoners. It appears that ordinary civilians who were arrested would be directed into standard prisons. At 1:01 AM on December 4, as the National Assembly voted down martial law, a nationwide request went out to prisons, asking them to report on their capacity . Such a request would ordinarily only occur during regular working hours for prison staff, and the unusual timing is highly suggestive that the martial law operation included plans for immediate mass incarceration. Had Yoon prevailed, his troops stood poised to seize control of the election commission and its computer servers, which were to be examined for imagined evidence of electoral fraud. Democratic Party assemblyman Kim Byung-joo received information from an inside source that intelligence agents, supplemented by HID soldiers, planned to go to the National Election Commission headquarters, “overpower the department heads and thirty key staff members, bind their wrists and ankles with cable ties, cover their faces with masks, and bring them to the B1 bunker.” Election computer servers were to be transferred to the counterintelligence agency. A harsher fate than imprisonment awaited election officials after being abducted by the martial law arrest team. Specific equipment was needed to encourage the desired answers from the prisoners during interrogation, including awls, nippers, hammers, and metal baseball bats . It is all too easy to imagine the kind of damage such implements could inflict upon human beings. However, there were those who liked the idea, in particular Roh. At the December 1 Lotteria meeting, he said he would personally interrogate the chairman of the NEC. “Bring the baseball bat to my office,” he ordered, adding that he can break anyone who “doesn’t talk properly.” Roh also intended to compel the election commission website manager to post a “confession of electoral fraud” on the NEC’s website. At little more than two weeks before martial law, Roh was even more explicit about the interrogation methods that were to be employed against captured election officials. “If we catch and pulverize all the people involved in the fraudulent election, everything that was fraudulent during the election will come out.” Martial law planners intended to arrest and imprison a great many people. Following the collapse of Yoon’s insurrection, police raided the home of conspirator Roh, the central figure in drawing up implementation plans for martial law. They uncovered Roh’s notebook , where he had jotted down meeting notes. He identified as “targets for collection” and “detention and handling” the names of politicians, journalists, labor unionists, religious figures, judges, and government workers. Shockingly, the notebook mentioned executions by gunshot. How many people were destined to be killed under martial law has not yet been revealed. We only know the intention. Yoon personally supervised operations to arrest those whom he especially detested. High on his list was Speaker of the National Assembly Woo Won-shik. Forty minutes after martial law was voted down, several soldiers and two plainclothesmen arrived at Woo’s home , evidently waiting for his arrival so that they could seize him. However, like most lawmakers, Woo stayed overnight at the National Assembly to defend against any further attack by Yoon’s forces. Woo thereby evaded capture, and the soldiers waiting to pounce on Woo only departed three hours later , once Yoon announced the end of martial law. Cover Up Efforts at coverup began immediately after the cancellation of martial law. When soldiers returned to camp after the confrontation at the National Assembly, their mobile phones were confiscated, and they were forbidden to leave the base , an order that was not rescinded until December 17, three days after Yoon was impeached. The intent was to cut off communication with the outside world and prevent soldiers from appearing as witnesses before investigators. Only the commanders were exempted from this order. It is also reported that lower-level personnel in the Capital Defense Command and Special Forces faced similar restrictions. Lim Tae-hoon, director of the Military Human Rights Center, noted, “Attempts to destroy evidence and conceal the truth are being openly carried out everywhere. As long as Yoon Suk Yeol, the mastermind behind the insurrection, is not arrested and detained, attempts to destroy evidence by those involved in the insurrection will not cease.” After martial law came to an end, several conspirators gathered at Yoon’s residence to coordinate their stories to the public. Afterward, all the participants changed their mobile phones in an apparent attempt to cover their tracks. For his part, Yoon repeatedly employed delaying tactics, such as instructing his security service to block police from searching his home and repeatedly ignoring summons to appear before investigators. There is reason to suspect that the insurrection had more widespread roots than initially thought. Back on September 4, Democratic Party assemblyman Yang Moon-seok raised concerns that 130 generals had made or started to make deletions to Namuwiki, a Korean information website, over a short span of time. At his September press conference, Yang expressed fears about what he thought this may have portended. “I have strong suspicions that the Yoon Suk Yeol government and the military are preparing for a state of emergency, such as martial law, aimed at war or large-scale military deployment.” That fear, it turned out, was well-placed, and if there is indeed a connection with the mass deletions, then investigators have yet to uncover the full extent of the rot at the heart of the military. The first person to delete information was Commander of the Defense Counterintelligence Command Yeo In-hyung, who played a pivotal role in the martial law plot. Others known to have been involved in the insurrection also made deletions, but a connection has not yet been established for the others. It may be that the generals’ motivation was to remove public information that could tie them to other conspirators. At a meeting of the National Assembly Steering Committee on December 19, Yang once again raised suspicions about the incident , calling for an investigation and suggesting that the fact that generals “deleted their information on Namuwiki is highly likely to indicate that they are hidden collaborators in the insurrection.” Military Emergency as Justification for Military Rule As December 3, the day of martial law approached, the Yoon administration sought to establish a legal framework for military rule that the National Assembly could not reverse. Military necessity was one option. All one had to do was create a conflict with North Korea, and then no one could stop martial law. Astonishingly, the conspirators imagined that they could fine-tune the level of North Korea’s response just enough to manufacture a conflict while sacrificing some South Korean lives along the way, but without plunging the peninsula into a far more serious war. However, always in a conflict, the other side makes its calculations, and it is a delusion to believe that those can be externally guided. Those South Korean citizens who may have lost their lives in the process were not a factor for consideration. In one of the efforts to stir up trouble, South Korea sent drones over Pyongyang in October, releasing propaganda leaflets. Based on reports provided to Democratic Party investigators, it was the Office of National Security that ordered Drone Command to launch the cross-border drones, bypassing the Ministry of National Defense and Joint Chiefs of Staff. However, the military produced and supplied the propaganda leaflets to be dropped. Hoping for a response from the North Koreans, the Joint Chiefs of Staff announced , “In the event of a drone infiltration, we will respond accordingly and take due measures.” However, the South Korean military reaped only disappointment as North Korea failed to take the bait, denying the South of an opportunity for disproportionate retaliation. A more surefire approach was needed. Roh Sang-won’s notebook documented a more reckless concept. The Northern Limit Line is a highly disputed maritime boundary off the western coast that had been drawn, without North Korean participation, angling sharply northwards to hand over to South Korea a few islands that, in normal practice, would have belonged to the North. If one wanted to provoke a conflict, this would be a promising location to do so. In his notebook, Roh had written down the phrase, “inducing a North Korean attack around the Northern Limit Line (NLL).” First, the scene had to be set, and on June 3, 2024, the South Korean military nullified its September 19, 2018 agreement with North Korea that had, among other things, bound both sides to “cease all live-fire and maritime maneuvers” off the west coast. Later that month, the South Korean Marine Corps on the western islands of Yeonpyeong and Baengnyeongdo fired nearly 300 rocket, missile, and howitzer rounds. When that failed to elicit the desired reaction from the North, additional large-scale firing drills were conducted in September and November. One South Korean military official commented , “We thought this should have been enough to trigger a response from the NK military, but there was no reaction, and there was no sign of any provocation.” There is a discernible tone of disappointment in that statement. Another contentious issue in inter-Korean relations that held potential was related to the decades-long practice of right-wing groups in South Korea sending balloons across the border to dump propaganda materials. Tons upon tons of material repeatedly strewn across the landscape forced North Korea to expend enormous time and money in clean-up efforts. For years, the North Koreans limited themselves to complaints about the practice, generally to no avail. Finally, in May 2024,  the exasperated North Koreans decided to give their neighbors in the South a taste of their own medicine. Over a period of several months, a series of trash-dumping balloons were sent across the border, imposing on the South Koreans their own need for expensive clean-up operations. Here, surely, was an opportunity, martial law planners concluded. Since the North Koreans failed to respond as desired to indirect attempts to trigger conflict, then more direct action could do the trick. At more than one point, Roh and Defense Minister Kim discussed the potential ramifications of attacking balloon launch sites. They expected that North Korea would respond with countermeasures. In turn, South Korea could next strike Pyongyang, leading to an all-out war. This was too much even for such an extremist as Roh, who expressed reservations that Kim did not share. Undeterred, Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun established a chain of command dedicated to Operation North Wind to prepare for an artillery attack on North Korea. According to an inside military source, five days before martial law, Defense Minister Kim ordered Kim Myung-soo, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to carry out military strikes on North Korean balloon launch sites, an act of war that could have led to disastrous and uncontrollable consequences. Fortunately for Koreans on both sides of the border, Chairman Kim Myung-soo refused to follow such an irresponsible order. For his understandable caution, he was rewarded by having Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun shower him with verbal abuse. In the end, none of these potential pathways to producing a military conflict bore fruit, and impatience may have driven Yoon to act when he did. Yoon’s plunging approval rating had dropped to 17% the month before martial law, accentuating his political failure and almost certainly hastening his urge to act. A single source, an HID agent whose name has not been revealed for obvious reasons, contacted Assemblyman Lee Kwang-hee and provided details on one of the wilder schemes meant to buttress the case for martial law. Given the source and the ample evidence that the insurrectionists were capable of anything, his story cannot be too readily dismissed. According to the informant , the 35 HID agents deployed in Seoul had each been armed with five pistol magazines and a C4 plastic explosive. Their assignment was to create violent incidents if the martial law plan fell apart, which would provide Yoon with the pretext he needed for a second martial law adventure. The HID agents were not told when they would go into action; they only had to wait for the order to proceed. Their assigned targets were the Cheongju International Airport, the THAAD anti-missile base at Seongju, and the military airbase at Daegu. To maximize effect, American military assets were among the targets . The HID informant felt conflicted about his mission when he realized that he had been tasked to carry out an act of terrorism, and that led him to reveal what he knew in the hope that publicity would “stop the mission as soon as possible.” The informant’s revelation appeared to have his desired impact, as once the story made the news, the order came down to the HID agents to cancel their missions. Democratic Assemblyman Park Sun-won, a former National Intelligence Service deputy director, pointed out that hitting those targets would inevitably involve the U.S. military. Presumably, that intervention would have supported Yoon against his contrived enemies. Park also believes that if Yoon had managed to trigger a conflict with North Korea, that would have enabled martial law forces to more freely kill political opponents. There have also been uncorroborated reports that the Martial Law Command had planned assassinations and other acts of violence to provide a falsified pretext for martial law, in which South Korean soldiers would be suited in uniforms of the North Korean People’s Army to misdirect responsibility. At this time, evidence for this allegation is thin. However, it does appear that an operation of some sort may have been in the works. In August, the Defense Intelligence Command contracted with a private company to manufacture 170 North Korean military uniforms to be delivered in the first week of December. The company, which had experience in manufacturing uniforms, was supplied with an actual North Korean uniform to use as a model. The ostensible purpose for the request was that the uniforms were needed to produce a movie, an unlikely scenario for the Defense Intelligence Command. Despite the company’s skepticism about the stated need, it made the uniforms and delivered them on December 6, by which time martial law had collapsed. Relations with the United States For the United States, Yoon had been a dream come true, a president who wholeheartedly embraced his assigned role as a junior partner in the anti-China tripartite military alliance with the U.S. and Japan. If Washington had any deep concern about martial law, it would only be that failure might risk opening the door to a less enthused, albeit still obedient, partner for U.S. militarism. Certainly, U.S. relations with South Korea would not have been adversely impacted by military dictatorship, as attested to by U.S. relations during South Korea’s previous experiences under martial law and other cases such as Pinochet’s Chile or Suharto’s Indonesia. What the United States did care about – and deeply so – was that regardless of events, South Korea would maintain its support for U.S. military confrontation with China. That is all that mattered, even if the freedom of South Korean people had to be sacrificed along the way. All the U.S. had to offer regarding Korea’s internal situation were anodyne comments, phrased so as not to antagonize any party. The Biden administration was far more active in laying stress on the expectation that South Korea should continue supporting U.S. militarism in the Asia-Pacific. Numerous statements and direct contacts were made to Seoul to remind them of that fact, including a personal visit from U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell. Military Dictatorship Over the Long Term So far, investigators have mainly centered their attention on the events leading up to and during the period of martial law. It is hoped that they will also address an additional question: what were the insurrectionists’ long-term plans? How did they envision military rule in the months and years to come? We do not have much direct information yet. Still, we can discern Yoon’s objectives in general terms based on the speech he delivered on December 3, in which he excoriated the National Assembly as a “den of criminals.” He went on to threaten to “immediately eradicate the unscrupulous pro-Pyongyang anti-state forces,” using his customary twisted characterization of progressives, trade unionists, activists, and the majority of Democratic Party members and supporters. One can conclude that a vast swathe of Korean society would have been imperiled. Let us also dwell upon Yoon’s choice of the word ‘eradicate’ in that speech. It is a strong word, and Yoon deemed it important enough that he spoke it three times. What kind of violence was Yoon suggesting with such language? We know the Martial Law Command was preparing for a significant influx of prisoners. However, mass incarceration is not necessarily synonymous with eradication. Yoon may have had something more permanent in mind. Additionally, Yoon had already demonstrated that he had no compunction in employing violence and that, at a minimum, plans included executing at least some high-profile prisoners and violently torturing election officials. Might many ordinary citizens also have been similarly ‘eradicated’? Even if this would not have been the case, under martial law, Korean society as a whole was fated to be subjected to repression on a mass scale. Furthermore, Yoon envisioned military rule as a long-term process. Just hours before announcing martial law, he issued a directive to “prepare a reserve fund for the emergency martial law legislative body” to replace the National Assembly. One does not establish a military-appointed legislature without anticipating it will be in place for years. Looking to the Future Yoon’s defiant attitude toward investigators has hindered progress in the impeachment process, allowing him time to systematically destroy evidence. In addition to obstructing legal procedures, his seditious messages are rousing extremist elements within the ruling People’s Power Party and among his supporters to back his refusal to relinquish power. Some fanatics have even begun to advocate violent measures . In his New Year message , Yoon warned that South Korea was in danger from “anti-state groups,” referring to advocates for the restoration of democracy and legality. Yoon added, “With you, I will fight to the end to protect this country,” signaling extremists to mobilize a tenacious and potentially violent resistance to keep him in power. Although stripped of active duties, Yoon remains as president of South Korea. It may take months for the Constitutional Court to reach a ruling on impeachment, and if the court fails to uphold Yoon’s impeachment, he will return to active duty as president. In that scenario, the only lesson he is likely to have learned is that a second attempt at martial law must employ more violence to succeed. South Korea’s future is riding on the development and outcome of the effort to bring Yoon to justice. Gregory Elich is a Korea Policy Institute board member. He is a contributor to the collection, Sanctions as War: Anti-Imperialist Perspectives on American Geo-Economic Strategy (Haymarket Books, 2023). His website is  https://gregoryelich.org    Follow him on Twitter at @GregoryElich .

By KJ Noh | December 11, 2024 | An earlier version of this article appeared in Counterpunch South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol announcing the lifting of his martial law decree. After South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol's coup was rescinded after 6 hours, Western pundits opined that this was an affirmation of South Korean democracy's robustness and resilience, its institutional maturity and strength. This is like saying after a survivor fights off an assault, that this demonstrates a mature state of legal order.  Hardly.  It signals the opposite: it demonstrates a gaping, terrifying lack of order. The defeat of martial law in South Korea is certainly an affirmation of the South Korean people: their courage and fearlessness.  But few Koreans are feeling safe that "democracy worked".   The most terrifying phrase in the South Korean lexicon is "martial law decree"--it triggers visceral memories of torture, disappearances, mass graves, and deep, paralyzing terror.  Even now, legislators are sleeping inside the Parliament building to ensure that if a second Martial Law decree is proclaimed, they will not have to scramble and claw their way through barricades to vote again.  Likewise, protestors are protesting and demanding impeachment while standing in spirited vigil outside the building to tackle martial law troops if they come surging out of their barracks again.    The recent motion to impeach Yoon Suk Yeol, which failed because his party walked out of chambers, signals a further breakdown.  Yoon, charged with insurrection, is still officially the sitting president--the head of government and commander-in-chief of the military--while the country is supposedly being headed by the Prime Minister and the head of the ruling party.  Since the constitution does not allow for such ad hoc transfer of powers, citizens are referring to this as a "soft coup".  And while the investigating police and prosecutors office have opened investigations, they are the very institutions whose leaders were involved in the coup, leading to doubts as to whether justice can be administered.  All this chaos undercuts the assertion that Korea is a "mature, leading democracy... one of the strongest, most dynamic democracies in the world, a champion of democracy for the world" .  Had it not been for thousands of Koreans streaming out at midnight and running interference with their bodies against martial law troops, South Korea's three-decade-long political experiment would have reverted to blank terror like a suddenly snapped film reel. Yoon's martial law declaration sought to white out all civil and political rights, as well as to extirpate and annihilate all political opposition--what he referred to as pro-North, anti-state forces.  It is only a series of lucky coincidences and missteps that it was thwarted.  And the crisis is not over yet. A Fraudulent Alliance of Democracies The coup attempt also highlights the mendacity that undergirds the US myth of "an alliance of democracies"--an alliance in which South Korea's President Yoon was touted as the leader of "the Global Pivot state", championing liberal democracy around the world and fighting "autocracies".   Yoon was even invited to address a joint session of the US congress, where, to repeated standing ovations, he unironically warned that "totalitarian forces may conceal and disguise themselves as defenders of democracy or human rights" and bloviated about the importance of the rule of law. This mendacity and hypocrisy is also evident in the reactions of the Western powers to the coup.  After martial law was declared and as legislative aides frantically barricaded doors in parliament to stymie marauding paratroopers, the only statement western governments and leaders could muster was  "we are watching things closely ".   Not one of them condemned or denounced the coup as an egregious attack on democracy or the South Korean body politic--as they would have immediately if any non-US-client state had declared martial law. They also intoned, hypnotically, "Korea is our closest ally": code for "We support Yoon and his policies".  In one telling back-and-forth, State Department Spokesperson Vedant Patel was asked if the US supported the recission of martial law.  Patel refused to condemn martial law, and also refused to support the national assembly's recission of martial law.  Instead, he mumbled vagaries about "peaceful resolution" and "rule of law", while talking of a "fluid situation" about which he could "not jump to any conclusions" or "get ahead of the process". The Taiwan DPP authorities, touted as a model Asian democracy, did them one better: as a kindred US-quisling state, they openly endorsed Yoon's absurd declaration of Martial law, posting  in their official account:  South Korean legislature has been controlled by pro-North Korean forces. To protect constitutional freedoms, SK president Yoon Suk Yeol has initiated nation-wide martial law. They bemoaned that they, too, were defending against "worldwide dark and evil forces" in their legislature, hinting they might also do the same. Insurrection, Democratic style After the South Korean coup blew over--for now--the same western pundits commented breezily, "Isn't South Korea's democracy great?".   No, it's not.  This insurrection could have turned out very, very badly--and it's not over yet.  It's not difficult to show that Yoon Suk Yeol committed treason--running roughshod over the South Korean constitution, by: Declaring martial law without justification: Martial law, under the Korean constitution, is reserved for war or catastrophic national emergencies that require suspension of government for military rule. Budget disagreement or policy friction/deadlock--not unusual in a polity--does not justify deploying armed force to assert power.  Labeling normal opposition as North Korean/anti-state subversion signals a despotically unbalanced mindset that harkens back to the worst excesses of the previous military dictatorships. Illegal plans for kidnapping: Intelligence services were directed to arrest "key political figures"--including opposition DPK party leader, Lee Jae Myung, the speaker of the assembly Woo Won-shik, the leader of the PPP (his own party), Han Dong Hoon, and RKP leader Cho Kuk, among others.  Post-decree disclosures have revealed that there were plans to hold these legislators in a black site bunker of the Capital Defense Command in Gwacheon.   Potential Election manipulation:  troops were sent to occupy national election committee offices.  These armed troops also brought with them an ambulance and an empty truck--possibly in anticipation of mass bloodshed and the need to cart away casualties and corpses.  Ominously, they seemed to have had a mission to target election servers.   Obstructing the constitutional process:  Korean martial law allows for the suspension of normal executive and judicial processes, but it does not allow for suspension of the legislature. In fact, the South Korean constitution specifically provides for legislators to rescind a martial law decree as part of its constitutional system of checks and balances. That Yoon sought to override that provision and prevent legislators from exercising their constitutional mandate by sending fully armed special warfare troops--the same Special warfare brigade that has historically always facilitated coups--to the national assembly to prevent legislators from entering signals criminal insurrection.  This was further confirmed by reports that the martial law troops had specific orders to "drag out" legislators from the national assembly chambers to prevent a quorum when a group were able to breach the initial cordon.  War provocations: More recent disclosures have shown that Kim Yong Hyun, the Minister of Defence, had ordered missile or artillery attacks into North Korea just prior to the martial law declaration, and had been responsible for a mysterious earlier drone incursion into North Korean territory.  Likely the joint chiefs had vetoed this rash action, but it suggests that there was an intention to provoke an intra-Korean conflagration to justify the martial law decree, making the claims of actual "North Korean invasion" in Parliament actually credible. Long term preparation:  Contrary to media claims that this was out of the blue and improvised, planning for the insurrection seems to have been months in preparation.  By September, the warning had been sounded in the National Assembly, but recent information seems to suggest that special forces rehearsals for helicopter intrusion into the National Assembly area had begun as early as April, and by the summer, it seems to have been a regular topic of discussion in Yoon's circle.  Why the insurrection failed:   There are a multitude of factors that led to the failure of the insurrection.  Among them:   Flight delay: According to one  military expert,  the 707 special warfare forces brigade, had been ordered to "take the National Assembly building by 11:00 pm at any cost"--thirty minutes after the president's television address.  However, they were delayed when their helicopters did not receive air transit clearance over a critical security corridor.  All of South Korean airspace is tightly monitored and restricted--defended with radar and anti-aircraft batteries--especially in the capital. Yeouido, the area of the National Assembly building, and Yongsan, where the Defense ministry and Presidential residence is located, are especially tightly controlled. This delay in clearance resulted in troops landing at 11:48, rather than 11:00pm, and nearly two hundred speedy legislators were able to beat the special forces to the building, where they entered, barricaded, voted and rescinded the decree in record time.  Despite being equipped to cut electricity to kill the functioning of the legislature--all the forces were equipped with night vision goggles--they arrived too late to stop entry and then were further stymied by aides who frantically improvised barricades with chairs, cabinets, tables, plants, belts and duct tape in a hallucinatory modern day re-enactment of the Paris Commune. Noodle Pitstop: Another keystone cops scenario unrolled at the DCC (Defense Counterintelligence Command; formerly the DSC, an intelligence bureau that had been dismantled by the former president after it was revealed that they had planned an armed coup after the impeachment of Park Geun-Hye).  Fisticuffs flew when a commander refused orders to deploy.  The chastened troops, however, took their priorities in good stead after being dispatched: they took the time to stop and eat ramen noodles at a convenience store, before limping anemically to the electoral commission for their special operation, which was cancelled soon after arrival.  It's also been noted that 7 officers at the DCC opposed the actions as unconstitutional. Spirited opposition : Legislators jumped out of their beds and sprinted to the National Assembly.  Some pushed and cajoled their way past police blockades.  Others vaulted over the fences.  A blind legislator found herself stumbling and stymied when she could not surmount the improvised barriers that had been put up.  Still, she stated that she had voted "one million times "yes" in her heart against martial law".  One woman legislator tussled with a special forces operator, grabbing his rifle and screaming "aren't you ashamed?".  Meanwhile, thousands of citizens rushed out to pressure and obstruct soldiers and police, while aides successfully blockaded and fought back troops.  Sequencing and Timing Failure : The Martial Law planners seem to have cribbed their coup recipe from Chun Doo Hwan's successful 1979 coup: controlling intelligence services, deploying special forces, cordoning off the national assembly, and arresting the opposition, followed by massive troop mobilization.  However, they did not anticipate rapid response through SMS and social media that stop-hit their plans and brought out citizens onto the street.  This failure to shut down the media and internet resulted in an unprecedented civil response.  However, plans show that had the initial steps succeeded, there were plans to follow up with massive troop movements from the regional divisions into the city.  Even after martial law was cancelled, there were attempts in the early morning to bully the Judiciary to go along with the insurrectionists. The Republic of Prosecution:   Yoon's autocratic tendencies were well known even from his campaign promises: a former chief prosecutor, he had threatened to create a "republic of prosecutors"--something he rapidly put into practice using an army of prosecutors to steamroll opponents.  The opposition party leader, Lee Jae Myung, who nearly beat him at the polls, had his personal residence raided hundreds of times, and has been subjected to non-stop political prosecution. And according to aides, apparently, Yoon routinely discussed declaring martial law, almost as if he were ordering a pizza: "Shall we order Martial Law today?". So how did Yoon become touted as a paragon of democratic virtue?  How did he become so despotically out of touch?  What made him think he could get away with declaring himself dictator?  The answer to all questions points in the same direction. Despite being despised by Koreans for his despotic tendencies, Yoon was lionized by the US--the Biden administration at every turn.  He was pumped up as a global leader of "liberal democracy",  the leader of the  "global pivot state"  that "advances freedom, peace, and prosperity through liberal democratic values".  He received this constant stroking from the west, even as he was persecuting, prosecuting, and smashing every democratic and civil institution in sight: the media, the independent press, unions, opposition parties, peace and social service groups.  When unions went on strike, Yoon claimed they were anti-state pro-North seditionists and threatened them with prison and massive fines.  Scientific researchers had their faces smashed in and were dragged out like furniture for daring to protest research budget cuts.  Media institutions and opposition party politicians were endlessly SWAT-raided and arrested as if they were terrorists. Still, he was endlessly praised by the US even as he was smashing institutions and grinding Korean citizens under his boot heel. And when millions protested--most recently, one hundred thousand hit the streets of Seoul to demand his resignation in the week before the coup--the US and western press did a total media blackout.  Yoon may have been a bastard, but he was clearly the US bastard: incapable of any wrong, always to be coddled, protected, and valorized.  He was "Mr American Pie", Washington's own minstrel, "a good ole boy ...from a long, long time ago".   As a result, the Caligula of Yongsan became high on his own supply.  Earlier this year in March,  when Yoon hosted the US Summit of Democracies, even as he was threatening medical workers, South Korean Foreign Minister  Cho Tae-yul  stated without an ounce of irony:  [Our hosting of the summit] signifies our collective resolve to strengthen democracy globally...As President Yoon stated...where political freedom reigns supreme, there prosperity flourished.  Peace is guaranteed when countries that value freedom and human rights come together as one.  Korea’s own journey is a living testament to this truth. Our story showcases the political, economic and cultural potential that is unleashed when embracing the ideals of freedom, human   rights and the rule of law.  As Korea aspires to become a Global Pivotal State, we are committed to standing in solidarity with the international community to safeguard and advance these values.    Anthony Blinken  at the summit , also lauded South Korea   as "one of the strongest, most dynamic democracies in the world, a champion of democracy for the world." Blinken also highlighted South Korea's " commitment to freedom " and its strong ties to the US because of that commitment:  We’ve invested in the foundation of our strength, our democracies, while also deepening ties to our partners who share our commitment to freedom, to equal opportunity, to human rights, to the rule of law...Mr. President [Yoon], your principled leadership has helped bring us even closer together and has made Korea a global pivotal state.   What did the US know, and when did it know it?  This US support, encouragement, investment and deep ties to Yoon begs the obvious question:  What did the US know about the coup, and when did it know it?   The Pentagon refuses to comment on whether it was notified in advance.   However, it's virtually impossible for them not to have known. All previous coups in South Korea have been green-lighted by the US.  This is because the US has de facto control over all troops in South Korea; the Korean military reports to the CFC/UNC command, a joint command led by the USFK general.  The US also maintains "wartime" opcon (meaning it has operational control anytime it wants).  All troop movements have to be reported to and coordinated with the US, if for no other reason than to avoid a friendly fire incident in a densely territorialized area bristling with troops, arms, surveillance, and weapons on hair trigger alert.    And the SK special forces, like the ones at the National Assembly, are the most tightly integrated with the US of any military--it is the only US special operations command in the world where the US and host nation's Special warfare forces merge into a single entity.  From their own website :  Since its inception, SOCKOR (Special Operations Command, Korea) continues to be the only theater SOC (special operations command) in which U.S. and host nation SOF (special operations forces) are institutionally organized for combined operations. SOCKOR and Republic of Korea (ROK) Army Special Warfare Command (SWC) regularly train in their combined roles... ...If the armistice fails, SOCKOR and ROK SWC will combine to establish the Combined Special Operations Component Command Korea (CSOCC-K)...with the SOCKOR Commander as the Special Operations Component Commander. Minus the jargon, it means Korean special operations forces train and coordinate with US special forces almost as a single fighting unit.  It's highly unlikely a detachment could kit up completely without the US asking, "Where are you going at this late hour?".  A teenager's, "Oh, nowhere",  doesn't cut it.  Also, the Korean peninsula is the most densely surveilled place on the planet, and every inch of land and airspace is monitored.  It's surmised that the helicopters ferrying the troops to the National Assembly were delayed in getting air transit clearance because that area is one of the most highly restricted areas for air travel.  That air space surveillance and control is likely directly reported and coordinated with US command. Right now, according to a military watchdog, all military leave in Korea has been cancelled . A second martial law declaration is not completely out of the question. What comes next? It's unclear what comes next.  The only certainty, for the vast majority of Koreans, is that Yoon can no longer govern. Like a drunk driver--drunk in this case with power--the keys to the vehicle have to be wrested away from him.  Traditionally, in Korean politics, the end comes in the form of resignation (Syngman Rhee, 1960), assassination (Park Chung Hee, 1979), Impeachment (Park Geun-hye), usually followed by imprisonment or exile.  If Yoon is successfully impeached, and the impeachment upheld in the Constitutional Court--provided the court can find quorum--or if he resigns, an election and a peaceful transition of power could occur.  Yoon could face prosecution for insurrection, a capital crime, something that he does not have immunity from--and most certainly for other crimes if he is stripped of power.  Those are still distant hypotheticals: South Korea is now a constitutional grayzone of a powder keg with an insurrectionist-who-would-be-dictator as sitting president, a ruling party reluctant to cede power, a thwarted opposition, and a livid, enraged populace.   The stakes are tremendous and the only thing certain is that there will be more twists and turns.    Unbewitching Ourselves:  Only by a stroke of luck--delayed helicopters--and a lot of pluck--angry citizens roused from their beds, e-commerce truck drivers abandoning deliveries, sexagenarian parliamentarians engaging in parkour--was a political catastrophe and democratic meltdown averted this time. This failed coup constitutes a legitimacy crisis in one of the US's most important vassal states, one of an ongoing stream of ongoing crises for the US Empire among its vassals.  Touted as one of the most important leaders   and partners in promoting (US-designated) democracy in a "global fight against autocracies"--Kurt Campbell even nominated for a Nobel Prize--Yoon has shown himself to be a crackpot US-client despot, like generations of tinpot dictators before him.    Yoon's star was in favor only because he was a pliant executor of US geostrategic strategy--greasing US plans for war against China--in the high stakes agenda to maintain US global hegemony.  In fact, without deep US support, it's unlikely that such a profound political dunce--someone who had never held an elected office in his life--would have become president.  Certainly, he received dramatic pre-election support from the US ruling imperial elite, for whom he was a walking fulfillment list.   When he was elected, the champagne corks blew up in Washington.    By reverting to full barbarian-authoritarian-mode, the mask has fallen off this imperial clown show of US propaganda.  This is the real story of South Korea's coup: as the Empire weakens, its forcefield of mystification wanes. Its producers slip up, its hired actors mumble and miss cues, stagehands misplace props, and the extras walk off the set.  And we start to notice things behind the shimmering scrim.  Things break, fall apart, the illusion cannot hold. Yoon's sudden fall from grace is not a symptom of Korea's robust democracy, neither is it a sign that South Korea is stable and resilient.  There are still many dangers lurking as the ship of state struggles to right itself: possibly more emergency decrees, more military action, most certainly more protests and political turmoil.  But the 6 hour coup is certainly an unmasking of Yoon as an incompetent despot of the Empire, and the fraudulence of the Empire managers who sold him as a paragon of political virtue. Breaking the propaganda trance, is the place to start to break the hold of the Empire, as a full blown legitimacy crisis rages all around the world.  Courageous Koreans smashed that trance.  Will others join them?    K.J. Noh is a scholar and peace activist focused on the geopolitics of the Asian continent. He writes for Counterpunch  and Dissident Voice , and reports for local and international media.

By Paul Liem  | December 4, 2024 On December 4, 2024, hundreds of activists rallied in New York, Los Angeles and San Franciso in support of the Korean peoples struggle to demand the resignation of President Yoon Suk Yeol after his failed attempt to suppress the opposition parties in the National Assembly by declaring Martial, December 2. The rallies were organized by the U.S. Out of Korea Campaign which was launched by Nodutdol for Community Development. The following is a solidarity statement delivered by KPI board member, Paul Liem, at the San Francisco rally. The Korea Policy Institute stands in solidarity with the struggle of the South Korean people to oust the dictator Yoon Suk Yeol from power and to make way for a leadership that will represent their true interests - to place prosperity for the common good over profits for the few; to demand sincere apology and just compensation from Japan for its crimes against the Korean people during WWII; to establish a lasting peace on the Korean peninsula between the Republic of Korea (ROK) and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK), and a framework within which separated families can be reunited. For his crime of insurrection, Yoon and those who plotted with him should be punished swiftly, but we must prepare for protracted struggle. Yoon has shown no remorse for his actions, nor any sign that he will resign voluntarily. Impeachment can only succeed with a National Assembly vote of two thirds, in favor. For this to happen at least 8 members of Yoon’s Peoples Power Party will have to defect. I hope they will, but we cannot count on it. Until now and the day when Korea will be free from the scourge of Yoon and the self-entitled First Lady, Kim Keon Hee, we in the US must work tirelessly to support the Korean people’s struggle against fascism until victory, even as we struggle against fascism here. This is a dangerous time for Korea, but not because of any threat posed by the DPRK, and not because of the developing alliance between the DPRK and Russia. It is dangerous because the neoliberal social order upon which US global hegemony rests is in political and economic crisis everywhere; in South Korea, Japan, Europe, Middle East, and even in the US. As a result, the US is going to desperate lengths to preserve its global hegemony at the cost of war in Ukraine, genocide in Palestine, war against Iran, regime change in Venezuela, and threatening war against China and the DPRK, to name a few. Yoon must go, not only because he is, in essence, a dictator in the same vein as Chun Du Hwan, Park Geun Hye, Park Chung Hee and Syngman Rhee. But because like them, he willingly places the interests of the U.S. ahead of the interests of the Korean people, and as a consequence Korea has been a divided country since liberation from Japan in 1945, in a state of war for the past 70 years, and today is the linchpin in a US/Japan/SK trilateral military alliance preparing to go to war with China and the DPRK, both nuclear armed countries. The peace-loving people of the ROK have no such interests in war with China and/or threatening the DPRK with regime change. For these reasons, and for his crime of insurrection against the democratic institutions of the ROK, the dictator, Yoon, Must Go. Paul Liem is the Chair of the Korea Policy Institute Board of Directors.

By J u-Hyun Park  | December 8, 2024 | Originally published in Peoples Dispatch Mass protest on the night of December 6 in anticipation of the impeachment vote. Photo: International Strategy Center (@go_isc) South Korean President Yoon Seok Yeol remains in power following a much-anticipated impeachment vote in parliament that was scuttled when the ruling People’s Power Party (PPP) boycotted the measure. While a handful of PPP lawmakers ultimately broke ranks to support impeachment, a sufficient majority to pass the measure could not be reached. The impeachment vote was held days after Yoon attempted (and failed) to establish martial law in the country . Opposition parliamentarians have vowed to continue impeachment efforts until Yoon’s tenure in office ends. In an effort to manage the political fallout, PPP party leader Han Dong-Hoon has announced the president will no longer have a role in state affairs, and promised Yoon’s imminent resignation. The Democratic Party, which holds a majority in parliament, has denounced the maneuver as a “second coup,” and questioned the legal basis for presidential authority to be transferred to Han. Millions of South Koreans poured into the streets on Saturday in anticipation of the impeachment vote, and demonstrations are ongoing . The Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, representing over a million workers, has also called an indefinite general strike until Yoon is removed from office. As lawmakers contend for power and the situation on the street remains fluid, a more protracted struggle for South Korea’s future appears to be settling in. To understand where things may be headed, the origins of the present crisis must be examined. Korea: Frontline of the New Cold War Yoon’s tenure in office has been marked by widespread dissatisfaction and growing domestic and regional instability. Elected in 2022 by the narrowest margin in Korean history, Yoon’s polarizing campaign took aim at organized labor and the feminist movement domestically, and pledged fealty to Washington in the New Cold War and a hard line against North Korea . In just over two years, his administration has brought the Korean peninsula to the brink of war, helped carve Northeast Asia into opposing military blocs, and unleashed a host of economic woes in South Korea that have wreaked havoc on workers. While Yoon’s anti-democratic tendencies were apparent from the beginning, he was exalted by President Biden and the US media apparatus as a visionary leader. This was not a case of Washington tolerating a strategic ally’s unseemly tendencies: Yoon’s foreign and domestic policy were integral to Washington’s New Cold War and its vision for South Korea’s place in the international hierarchy of humanity. Yoon’s war on trade unions in particular must be reconciled with US attempts to split South Korea from China and establish a neomercantilist sphere in the Pacific. This has forced a painful realignment of South Korea’s economy, resulting in years of trade deficit, mass bankruptcies among small businesses in particular (which employ over 75% of workers), and a sharp loss of purchasing power as the value of the Korean Won declined (27% drop in value relative to the dollar since 2020) and costs of living soared. Parallel to this, Yoon has investigated and prosecuted thousands of union organizers on a range of spurious charges, even driving some to the point of suicide . The New Cold War has made South Korea’s economy a sacrificial lamb for Washington’s imperialist strategy , and Yoon’s war on labor was central to eliminating workers’ opposition to US objectives. On the military front, Yoon proved to be an even greater asset. His unbridled aggression against North Korea successfully reversed the limited gains made under the previous Moon Jae-In administration, even driving Pyongyang to the point of abandoning its longstanding policy of peaceful reunification. Frequent US war games, measured in hundreds per year, and startling deployments of US strategic assets like nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers to Korea have become the norm. Perhaps most significantly, Yoon permitted Washington to join Japan and South Korea in a common US-led military alliance, known as JAKUS. This longstanding strategic objective was always impeded by South Korean public opinion, and the demands of living survivors of colonial crimes for justice, recognition, and reparations. Like South Korea’s trade unionists, Korean survivors of colonialism were another impediment to Washington’s designs, and Yoon could be counted on to steamroll them. For this, senior Biden official Kurt Campbell called for Yoon and former Japanese Prime Minister Fuimio Kishida to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. Democracy victorious? While the outcome of Saturday’s vote infuriated millions, impeachment was perhaps doomed to fail from the beginning. The Democrats and other opposition parties always lacked a necessary supermajority in parliament. Moreover, the constitution requires more than six Supreme Court judges to ratify an impeachment vote, and the court lacks this quorum thanks to years of political deadlock, meaning even a successful vote would have become stalled. The defeat of martial law was celebrated by many as a victory for liberal democracy, and yet liberal democracy may prove to be its own worst enemy. Protest outside the National Assembly on December 7, the day of the impeachment vote. Photo: International Strategy Center (@go_isc) The maneuvers at play in the halls of power in Seoul are manifold, but Han Dong-Hoon’s statement on the PPP assuming the responsibilities of the presidency until Yoon’s resignation is revealing. While reassuring the public and the international community that a peaceful transition of power would occur, Han also declared , “Firmly maintaining the South Korea-US alliance and the trilateral security cooperation with the US and Japan is a very big and crucial task.” The defeat of martial law through the mobilization of millions of South Koreans has set the stage for the ruling class response. South Korea is brushing against a revolutionary situation—the ruling class cannot rule in the old way, and the working class cannot live in the old way. The threat of the KCTU’s general strike in particular weighs heavily on the situation, as does the continued presence of masses of people in the streets. The PPP’s rush to remove Yoon despite their opposition to impeachment reveals a willingness to dispose of him to keep the party, and subsequently Washington’s agenda, in control. Not every revolutionary situation ends in revolution, and this case is no different. What happens next is in the hands of South Korea’s masses, progressive organizations, and political parties of the left. Should the movement be placated by resignation alone, South Korea’s woes under Yoon will only persist and metastasize further. Should a more advanced horizon be set and the mass struggle successfully expanded, the risks of repression will rise, but so will the possibility of achieving real change. The South Korean masses have ousted anti-democratic leaders many times, but a lasting, revolutionary transformation of society and the political system have not been achieved. The sacrifices of the masses in fighting for their country’s future have always benefited the Democrats, who have squandered their mandate and ultimately betrayed the movements that brought them to power. Consequently, each deposed leader has been eventually followed by new representatives of the ruling class’ most reactionary factions. Less than a decade ago, the mass Candlelight Movement brought down the government of Park Geun-hye. In the absence of an organized political force of the left ready to take power, the Moon Jae-In administration arose. Just five years later, Yoon was elected through the narrow openings created by Moon’s failures and betrayals. As efforts are made to prevent the PPP from clinging to power, the Korean left must also recognize the necessity of building an alternative to the Democrats to establish a political project capable of serving the working majority and bringing an end to the cycle of authoritarian backsliding and mass rebellion. Ju-Hyun Park is the engagement editor at The Real News and an organizer with Nodutdol.

By Dae-Han Song | November 30, 2024 | Originally published by Int'l Strategy Center The United States is colonizing and militarizing Earth’s orbit, recruiting allies such as South Korea’s Yoon Suk Yeol administration. More specifically, the US Space Force is creating a “swarm” of satellites that, when combined with AI, seeks to attain a god’s eye view across all domains of war. This proliferated warfighter space architecture (PWSA) of small low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites would allow the United States—in its Department of Defense’s words —“to sense, make sense, and act at all levels and phases of war, across all domains, and with partners, to deliver information advantage at the speed of relevance.” These actions have started an international arms race to space. In 2020, China applied  to the United Nations International Telecommunication Union to launch its own LEO satellites. Yet, saddled with $35 trillion in debt, the United States can’t do it alone. It needs its arms industries and allies such as South Korea. This has led the Yoon administration to launch its own NewSpace program  to nurture its own aerospace industry. The colonization and militarization of Earth’s orbit will generate trillions of dollars  for war profiteers while impoverishing humanity and the planet. On October 19, 2024, dozens of activists from struggles across South Korea held their first national gathering—the “National Discussion on the Space Industry And Militarization of Space”—opposing the Yoon administration’s NewSpace program due to its destructive military, economic, and environmental costs. South Korea’s NewSpace Held as part of Space4Peace’s annual “Keep Space for Peace Week” actions (timed to coincide with the UN’s World Space Week), the conference was held in Daejeon, one of the three locations for Yoon’s regional space cluster. Sung-hee Choi, of the People Against the Militarization of Space and Rocket Launches, explained that LEO satellites are promoted for their potential to provide universal internet access, such as SpaceX’s Starlink, with little mention of their dual military purpose. The US Air Force recognized in 1996  that this dual purpose would give it the “ultimate high ground” in warfare. Choi explained how the United States’ massive debt means it needs  allies such as South Korea to win space colonization. In 2016, the US signed a space cooperation agreement  giving South Korea access to US aerospace technology and knowledge. In 2022, the Yoon administration agreed to house  a US Space Force foreign command, integrating  South Korea’s satellites into the United States’s military satellite network. In June 2024, South Korea conducted its first multi-domain military exercises with the United States and Japan that included the space domain. Then, in September 2024, South Korea signed a Letter of Intent  with the US to share non-classified aerospace technology through the US Space Forces-Space Joint Commercial Operations. SpaceX is central to the United States’ NewSpace approach to addressing its space needs via the private sector. Harnessing its reusable rocket technology, its 399  launches, and Starlink’s 6,371  active satellites (60 percent of the world’s total), SpaceX’s Starshield (Starlink’s military version) provides  the satellite and launch services for the US Space Development Agency’s proliferated warfighter satellite architecture. Following the United States’ lead, the Yoon administration is creating its own version of SpaceX: Hanwha Aerospace . Outwardly, the Yoon administration promotes its investment in aerospace as a source of regional development for underdeveloped areas. Yet, as Hyun-hwa Oh, co-president of Catholic Climate Action, mentioned, few people living in those places are aware of how these new industries are used for waging war and even fewer have a say in whether or not to host them. Worse, many are forced to choose between jobs building weapons or no jobs at all. The costs of war 4.0 The fourth industrial revolution is transforming the way we wage war. If satellites will integrate and control all domains (naval, air, land, space, and cyberspace), then at the heart of its command center (the Joint All-Domain Command and Control) will be AI and machine learning in order to “extract intelligence autonomously and build predictive models of what they [satellites] observe.”  As presenter Hee-eum noted, we are already witnessing the human costs of War 4.0 through Israel’s Lavender AI program. As reported in +972 magazine , during the first weeks of the Israeli bombing of Gaza, Lavender identified nearly all those that would be targeted for bombing. Despite knowing about the AI program’s 10 percent error rate, most of the targets it selected were rubber-stamped in about “20 seconds.” War 4.0 also accelerates environmental destruction. As Hee-eum highlighted, the roundtrip to launch satellites releases greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to driving a car around the earth 70 times. Worse, it releases soot that absorbs heat  and can increase temperatures in the upper atmosphere. Furthermore, the AI that will sift through the satellite data is highly energy-intensive. Even ChatGPT requires  10 times more electricity than a Google search. Furthermore, a Starlink satellite is deorbited after five years  and then is burnt up upon reentry, producing aluminum oxides that deplete the ozone layer . The US Air Force prefers even shorter life spans  to enable more frequent upgrades. The expansion of these satellites will create more space junk burning up and polluting the atmosphere. Still fighting Cold War 1.0 If the conference launched the fight against the Yoon administration’s militarization of space, it also remained connected to frontline struggles against militarization in South Korea, the United States’s first line of attack against China. In particular, presenters spoke about the construction of airports with dual military functions. Kim Yeon-tae president of the People’s Action to Nullify The New Saemangeum Airport, noted the absurdity of spending over 40 trillion won ($30 billion) to build 10 more airports in an area as small as South Korea, where 11 out of 15  airports are running at a loss. Constructing new airports only made sense when taking into account their dual military use. More specifically, Saemangeum International Airport—right across from China and connected to the US Kunsan Air Force Base—would allow the Air Force Base to launch more jets. Soon-ae Kim, chair of the Operating Committee of Jeju’s Green Party, explained how building a second airport on the island as well as prospects of its military use violate Jeju’s official designation as an island of peace. Conference speakers and attendees made clear that their movement was rooted in frontline struggles against profiteering from human and environmental destruction and that it would continue. Yong-woon Hwang, a journalist and activist against the Jeju Naval Base, proposed building public awareness around AI and the militarization of space through the annual Whistler Film Festival . Ultimately, the activists gathered to build a better world we can live in and leave behind for our children. Dae-Han Song is a KPI Associate, the head of the Contents Team for the Seoul-based International Strategy Center, and a member of the No Cold War collective.

By Tim Beal | November 13, 2024 | Originally published in Pearls and Irritations At the beginning of World War I, when the British Expeditionary Force in France was being battered by the advancing German army there was great anxiety in Britain. Then the Russians magically came to the rescue. …a ‘Great Rumour’ spread across the United Kingdom that Russian troops had landed in Scotland on their way to the Western Front. At one of the tensest periods of the early fighting, mysterious trains were allegedly passing through English villages carrying hordes of between 10,000 to 250,000 Russians to join their British and French comrades in fighting the Germans. The cargo was identified owing to foreign accents, grey uniforms, long, shaggy beards, and above all ‘snow on their boots’, despite it being late summer.…. [There were] fifty-seven cases where people believed they had actually seen the Russians themselves. The British government was happy to have the rumour flourish because it boosted morale and it was not officially denied until 15 September 1914, when news from the front become more palatable. The Great Rumour of a Russian expeditionary force ‘with snow on their boots’ has an uncanny resemblance in some respects to current reports that North Korea troops are battling the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF) in Russia’s Kursk oblast. Both stories are implausible and lacking any substantiated evidence. They both illustrate the propensity of people to ‘believe the unbelievable’, as the social historian Catriona Pennell puts it, in times of social stress. The big difference is that while the Great Rumour was condoned and exploited by the government it was, according to Pennell, a case of spontaneous combustion akin to religious apparitions, whereas the North Korean myth, to coin a convenient phrase, has been created and disseminated by governments – initially the Ukrainian, then the South Korean and finally the US. They each have their specific trajectories and motives, some of which are more straightforward than others. The story of the North Korean troops can reasonably be described as a myth because the central claim that Kim Jong Un is coming to the aid of a desperate Vladimer Putin by sending troops to Kursk to fight the UAF and that this represents a threat not merely to Ukraine but NATO, on both sides of the Atlantic, is more fantasy than fact. It is very likely that there are North Korean troops in Russia, in various places, doing various things – training, liaison, systems maintenance, etc. – but to call this an escalation that represents the entry of a third state into the conflict is misleading because this has always been a war between Russia and NATO with Ukraine merely being the disposable tip of the essentially American spear. It is a mythical threat contrived to draw NATO into direct, rather than proxy war with Russia. Not that there have not been numerous attempts to provide ‘evidence’ to give flesh to the myth, much of it quite risible and causing embarrassment to the professionals. For instance, NK News , a leading Western anti-North Korea news outlet, has bewailed How North Korea’s troop deployment to Russia has triggered a rash of fake news . Apart from faked stories showing dead or wounded ‘North Korean soldiers’, NK News mentioned social media posts which purported to show Russians sampling North Korean dogmeat. However, North and South use different terms for dogmeat, and the can shown in photos was South Korean. Fake news can be a tricky business. The Seoul newspaper Hankyoreh reported how South Korean intelligence – no stranger to fabricating news itself – was becoming increasingly annoyed at the ineptness of Ukrainian propaganda, in particular a story how 40 North Koreans had been killed in battle, before Zelensky claimed that they had even entered combat. Given that South Korean intelligence has been the main public source purporting to show North Korea troops being sent to Kursk one can empathise with their concern about damage to the credibility of the narrative. The absence of evidence of North Korean involvement has been cleverly obscured by the media describing the endorsement of an allegation as ‘confirmation’. For example, this from the Brookings Institution : In early October, Ukrainian intelligence reported that several thousand North Korean soldiers were undergoing training in Russia in preparation for deployment to the Ukrainian front line later this year. South Korea’s National Intelligence Service (NIS) later corroborated Ukraine’s assertions, sharing satellite images of Russian vessels transporting the first batch of 1,500 North Korean special forces to Russia’s Far East. On October 23, White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby confirmed the presence of at least 3,000 soldiers. The Pentagon now believes that 10,000 North Korean troops are in Russia with a contingent heading toward the Kursk region in western Russia to battle Ukrainian forces.[emphasis added] Reported, corroborated, confirmed, believes – a variety of words to disguise the fact that no evidence is being presented. What would real evidence look like? The Hankyoreh makes a reasonable stab at it: People who have experience in gathering military intelligence say that when it comes to reports about North Korean soldiers fighting in Ukraine, it’s only when Russian and North Korean authorities officially confirm them that we can accept them as fact.….[Other evidence would be] If troops at the company or battalion level or higher participate in the fighting and the identities of North Korean troops are confirmed among the dead; if a North Korean prisoner of war directly testifies about North Korean troops fighting in Ukraine; if North Korean military documents containing operational orders, combat orders, or tactical training plans are confiscated; or if wiretaps containing confirmation about North Korean troops in combat are leaked. However, in the likely absence of neutral observers any such reports from the Ukrainian government would lack forensic credibility. There have been conflicting claims about the number of troops and their whereabouts, with the US often saying it cannot ‘confirm’ Ukrainian assertions. Then on 7 November it was reported that Seoul says North Korean troops have not entered combat, refuting claim by Zelensky . To compound matters, the New York Times had previously said that the US government had accepted the Zelensky claim, and that a US official said there had been significant North Korean casualties, although the location of the incident was unknown. And always there is no meaningful evidence. The South Koreans provide commercial satellite photographs of warehouses claiming that they house North Korean troops without explaining how they know that, or indeed, why the Americans don’t. The Americans claim there are 3,000, 4,000, 10,000 North Korean troops – the numbers vary – here and there in Russia – first in the east then in the west, in Kursk, doing training, or suffering casualties in battle, without giving any indication how they might know. SIGINT (interception of communications), HUMINT (spies on the ground), satellite imagery, a stiff bourbon while recalling memories of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction and links with Al Qaeda- who knows? So it looks as if we must accept that we will not see much in the way of credible evidence and we must turn to the assessment of plausibility. Many people argue that the Russians are struggling to make progress, are facing unacceptably high casualties and so are turning to North Korea out of desperation. For instance, Kori Schake of the American Enterprise Institute claims that North Korea Joining Russia’s War Is a Sign of Weakness and argues that Washington should take advantage of ‘Moscow’s faltering prospects’ by upping aid to Ukraine. There are a number of problems with this, but two stand out. Russia is not faltering and does not need foreign troops. It is slowly and methodically demolishing the UAF, focussing on attrition – destroying the enemy whilst husbanding resources and keeping its casualties as low as possible – rather than taking territory; Ukraine is now struggling to survive, not to win . This is especially so in Kursk where the Ukrainians are not fighting from defensive positions built up over the last decade, as in the Donbass, but above ground where they are vulnerable to Russian firepower. There are huge problems integrating foreign troops in the modern net-centric battlespace, where so much depends on drones, glide bombs, and targeting artillery, which in turn requires communication between units. This is no easy business as the US, which has the largest empire in history, knows full well and that is why it has innumerable military exercises with vassal militaries around the world, sometimes bilateral but often multilateral, to achieve ‘ interoperability’ . From the Russian point of view, a large contingent of North Korean soldiers, not speaking Russian and not familiar with the technologies and command structures, would be more trouble than it was worth. The Korean People’s Army (KPA) would find the battle experience useful, but this would be a minor benefit in the circumstances. As investigative journalist Seymour Hersh would say none of this passes the smell test. But if there are no good reasons at the moment why Russia would bring in large numbers of North Korean troops to fight in Kursk, what about motives on the other side to construct such a myth? The Zelensky government has far and away the strongest motive. As its military buckles under the Russia onslaught, and its society and economy are in desperate straits, it considers direct US military intervention as the only possible solution and sees the ‘North Korean threat’ as a strong card – Ukraine’s Zelensky urges allies to act before North Korean troops reach the front . The primary ‘act’ that Zelensky wants is authorisation to use NATO-supplied missiles to strike deep into Russia. This would have less military significance than political because these weapons require NATO targeting and operational involvement which Putin has warned would trigger a Russian response which would escalate into direct war. The hapless Mark Rutte, fresh in the job as NATO Secretary-General just at the time when Trump’s victory threatens him with a status and salary cut, echoes the call: Rutte’s message to Trump: North Korean troops in Ukraine war threaten the US too . South Korea’s role has been more difficult to pin down. Despite the economic and strategic danger of alienating Russia, the Yoon Seok-yeol administration quickly jumped on the bandwagon, providing much of the ‘intelligence’ behind the narrative. There were even rumours of dispatching F-16s, with pilots, to Ukraine. This may have been due to the desire to cosy even closer to Washington; Yoon is a very unpopular president, with approval ratings now at 17%, and presumably feels US support essential. There were also business opportunities for South Korea’s burgeoning military-industrial complex, with air defence being high on the Ukrainian wish-list. However, with Trump#2 now looming the situation changes. It is presumed that Trump will want to disengage from Ukraine, so promulgating war scares would no longer be welcome to him, and US aid for Ukraine to buy South Korean armaments would dry up. Hence, perhaps the contradicting of Zelensky’s claim about North Korean troops in combat. Needless to say, it is the US response which is easily the most significant. Whilst US spokespersons have not directly contradicted anything that Ukraine (or South Korea) has claimed about North Korean troops, they have been less than enthusiastic in endorsing them. Often, they would come up with statements which were vague, and, importantly, not disprovable; the statement that there are 10,000 North Korean troops in Russia is not subject to be disproved. The Hankyoreh, in an article entitled US and others say they ‘can’t confirm’ North Korean troop deployment — but why? addressed the issue of US reluctance: Some observers say that US authorities are refraining from confirming the dispatches of North Korean troops because of the news’ potential to impact the presidential election next month. If North Korea’s direct involvement in the war is officially confirmed, then there could be increased pressure on the US and NATO to respond accordingly. We are now entering an interregnum – the gap between Trump’s victory and his inauguration when the Biden administration is still in office. We can expect Zelensky to double down on his effort to draw the US directly into the war, and the ‘North Korea troops’ myth may remain a strong card. However, it is unlikely that the Biden administration will take the bait. It has resisted so far -with the Pentagon surely conscious of the danger to America, advocating caution – and is unlikely to plunge the US into a devastating, perhaps catastrophic war with Russia towards the end of its term where it would bear responsibility for defeat but not plaudits for victory in the unlikely event that came to pass. It will, however, keep the war going so that the collapse of the Ukraine adventure happens in Trump’s watch. Meanwhile, just as there were eye-witness accounts of those mythical Russians in 1914, now scared and obsessed Ukrainians soldiers are seeing North Koreans disguised as Buryats, a Mongol people from Siberia who have a contingent in the Russian army serving in Kursk. In time it is probable that those North Korean troops, threatening not merely Europe but the US itself will fade into obscurity like those Russian soldiers marching through England with snow on their boots. As the historical circumstances that generated it change, so the myth may wither and die. Tim Beal is a retired New Zealand academic with a special interest in U.S. imperialism, mainly but not exclusively with respect to Asia. He is the author of North Korea: The Struggle Against American Power  (Pluto Press, 2005), Crisis in Korea: America, China, and the Risk of War   (Pluto Press, 2011), and numerous articles. He has traveled to North and South Korea and is chair of the NZ-DPRK Society. His website, Asian Geopolitics , has more information and links to his recent publications.

By KJ Noh | October 14, 2024 South Korean novelist Han Kang has won the Nobel Prize for Literature, beating short-listed literary heavyweights like Thomas Pynchon, Haruki Murakami, Salman Rushdie, Gerald Murnane, and the all-odds-favorite, Chinese author Can Xue.  Han Kang was as shocked as anyone else after receiving the call notifying her that she had won. When asked what she would do next, she  said  she would quietly "have tea with her son".  She has refused a press conference, saying that " with the wars raging between Russia and Ukraine, Israel and Palestine, with deaths being reported every day, she could not hold a celebratory press conference. She asked for understanding in this matter." A brilliant, powerful writer, but clearly the literary dark horse in the race, Han Kang's unexpected award is the closest the Nobel committee could get to acknowledging the Palestinian genocide. Han Kang herself had not mentioned Palestine until her recent Nobel award. But it's unmistakable that her award is a reflection of the current historical moment.  Of course, we cannot presume what the Nobel Committee's position on the Palestinian genocide is. Certainly, the Nobel Committee would have been crucified by institutional powers if they had awarded the prize to a deserving Palestinian writer or poet; nor could they have risked a redux of Harold Pinter's public takedown  of Western brutality and hypocrisy.  But the Nobels are always political statements, situated in the political moment, and across a backdrop of live-streamed genocide and daily atrocity, it's unthinkable that that Palestinian genocide could have been far from their minds or ignored in their deliberations. The awarding of the Nobel to Han Kang is that oblique acknowledgment. Of the short and long lists, she is the only contemporary writer dedicated to witnessing and inscribing the horrors of historical atrocity and mass slaughter perpetrated by the Imperial powers and their quislings.  The  Nobel committee  suggests this by praising her for " her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life"  and characterizes her work as "witness literature", "a prayer addressing the dead”, and  as artworks of mourning that seek to prevent erasure.   The echo of Palestine is not lost in that description of her major works:  In  Human Acts  ("The Boy is Coming"), she wrote about the effects of the US-greenlighted massacres of civilians in the city of Gwangju by a US-quisling military dictatorship.  At the time, the US did not want a redux  of the fall of the Shah of Iran, where popular protest brought down a US quisling dictator. Instead, the Carter Administration authorized the deployment of South Korean troops (at the time under full US operational control) to fire on and slaughter students and citizens protesting the recent US-backed military coup.  And exactly as in the current moment, the US portrayed itself as a hapless bystander to mass murder, enmeshed but incapable of preventing it, when in fact, it was the underwriter and the agent of the massacres.   Tim Shorrock clearly documented the doublespeak: “Gwangju was an unspeakable tragedy that nobody expected to happen”, he said. The State Department, he added, continues to believe the United States “has no moral responsibility for what happened in Gwangju.” Han Kang's book doesn't bother to accuse the US: her book is not a political tract, and most people in South Korea know these facts backwards and forwards.  Instead, she reanimates the human suffering of this massacre from the standpoint of multiple characters: the grieving, the dead, the tortured, the resisting, the guilty living--including herself.   Starting with a pile of hundreds of decomposing bodies in a makeshift morgue, tended to with exquisite care by a young boy, Dong Ho, she shows us what it smells and feels to contact an unfiltered massacre.  Dong Ho is actually a stand-in for a real person, Moon Jae-Hak, a high school student shot dead in Gwangju. Han Kang reveals that Dong Ho/Jae-Hak had moved into the room of the home that Han Kang herself had vacated 4 months earlier as her family serendipitously moved out of the city of Gwangju. It's clear that had it not been for fate, Han Kang herself could very easily have been that dead child:  Dong Ho is a stand-in for both Jae-Hak and Han Kang.  That trope becomes obvious as Dong Ho survives a first skirmish, runs away from a shooting, while his comrade falls.  Han Kang writes:  I would have run away... you would have run away. Even if it had been one of your brothers, your father, your mother, still you would have run away...There will be no forgiveness. You look into his eyes, which are flinching from the sight laid out in front of them as though it is the most appalling thing in all this world. There will be no forgiveness. Least of all for me. It may not be possible to write herself into forgiveness for surviving, and Han Kang does not attempt it.  You’re not like me…You believe in a divine being, and in this thing we call humanity. You never did manage to win me over…I couldn’t even make it through the Lord’s Prayer without the words drying up in my throat. Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. I forgive no one, and no one forgives me. She simply bears witness:   I still remember the moment when my gaze fell upon the mutilated face of a young woman, her features slashed through with a bayonet. Soundlessly, and without fuss, some tender thing deep inside me broke. Something that, until then, I hadn't realised was there. And she mourns the unmournable:  After you died, I couldn't hold a funeral, So these eyes that once beheld you became a shrine. These ears that once heard your voice became a shrine. These lungs that once inhaled your breath became a shrine...After you died I could not hold a funeral.  And so my life became a funeral. And she denounces, what could easily be an echo of current Israeli " Amalek " doctrine:  At that moment, I realized what all this was for. The words that this torture and starvation were intended to elicit. We will make you realize how ridiculous it was, the lot of you...We will prove to you that you are nothing but filthy stinking bodies. That you are no better than the carcasses of starving animals. In another novel,  I do not part  ( "I won't say farewell"; "Impossible Partings") , she tells the story of those who perished, disappeared, were buried, without a farewell.  The title is a message to those who disappeared, perished under rubble, or vanished into mass graves without so much as a farewell, a stubborn assertion that they will not be lost, abandoned, forgotten.   Drawing from an image from a relentless dream, and a line gleaned from a  pop song  overhead in a taxi, she tells the story of the US-instigated genocide of Jeju Island in 1948, where 20% of the population were wiped out, bombed, slaughtered, starved to death under the command of the US military government in Korea. This is Gaza--with snow:  Even the infants? Yes, because total annihilation was the goal. After the surrender of Japan in WWII, post-colonial Korea had been assigned to the shared trusteeship of the USSR and the US.  On August 15th of 1945, the Korean people declared liberation and the establishment of the Korean People's Republic, a liberated socialist state consisting of thousands of self-organized workers’ and peasant collectives. The USSR was supportive, but the US declared war on these collectives, banned the Korean People's Republic, forced a vote in the South against the will of the Koreans who did not want a divided country, and unleashed a campaign of politicide against those who opposed or resisted this. Jeju island was one of the places where the carnage reached genocidal proportions, before cresting into the full-scale omnicide of the Korean war. That genocide was covered up and erased for half a century, where not even a whisper of truth was permitted. For this, Han Kang uses over and over again the metaphor of snow:   "A cluster of forty houses, give or take, had stood on the other side, and when the evacuation orders went out in 1948, they were all set on fire, the people in them slaughtered, the village incinerated. She told me about how, when she was young, soldiers and police had murdered everyone in her village... The next day, having heard the news, the sisters returned to the village and wandered the grounds of the elementary school all afternoon. Searching for the bodies of their father and mother, their older brother and eight year old sister. They looked over the bodies that had fallen every which way on top of one another and found that, overnight, a thin layer of snow had covered and frozen upon each face. They couldn’t tell anyone apart because of the snow, and since my aunt couldn’t bring herself to brush it away with her bare hands, she used a handkerchief to wipe each face clean..." Snow, for Han Kang "is silence". Rain, she says, "a sentence".  This is a theme in her books: cleaning bodies, brushing away blood and snow with precision, to see things clearly, trying to recover some dignity and truth, no matter how excruciatingly painful. The book itself is an excavation--a relay race, as she put it--passed along through three women characters, each one excavating further into the harrowing truth--"to the bottom of the ocean" of horror.   The snow that fell over this island and also in other ancient, faraway places could all have condensed together inside those clouds. When, at five years old, I reached out to touch my first snow in G—, and when, at thirty, I was caught in a sudden rain shower that left me drenched as I biked along the riverside in Seoul, when the snow obscured the faces of the hundreds of children, women and elders on the schoolyard here on Jeju seventy years ago.... who's to say those raindrops and crumbling snow crystals and thin layers of bloodied ice are not one and the same, that the snow settling over me now isn't that very water? As she uncovers—like "a tough homework assignment"--the Bodo league massacres, the Jeju massacres, Vietnam massacres, Gwangju, she tries to thread all of them together in an unbroken thread using "an impossible tool”--the flickering heart of her language--animated by an "extreme, inexhaustible love" and the stubborn refusal to turn away:  Han Kang recalls her very young self when she first became aware of the atrocities in a secret chapbook, and thus formed the question that centers her writing: After it had been passed around the adults it was hidden away in a bookcase, spine facing backwards. I opened it unwittingly, having no idea what it contained. I was too young to know how to receive the proof of overwhelming violence that was contained in those pages. How could human beings do such things to one another? On the heels of this first question, another swiftly followed: what can we do in the face of such violence?" Han Kang’s question is the question that should animate all of us, as we, too, realize what has happened, and what is happening under imperial colonial regimes. None of us can unsee what is unfolding in front of our eyes.  The French have an appropriate wording: Nous sommes en train d’assister à un genocide : we are witnessing—that is to say, assisting , in smaller or greater ways—a genocide.  As Jason Hickel puts it: The images that I see coming out of Gaza each day—of shredded children, piles of twisted corpses, dehumanisation in torture camps, people being burned alive—are morally indistinguishable from the images I have seen in Holocaust museums. Pure evil on a horrifying scale. What can we do? Each of us must confront this question individually and collectively, and all of us, together, must take action.  None of us will be forgiven for turning away.       K.J. Noh is a scholar and peace activist focused on the geopolitics of the Asian continent. He writes for Counterpunch  and Dissident Voice , and reports for local and international media.