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SOUTH KOREA | March 2, 1998 VOL. 151 NO. 8 |
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Cloak-and-dagger games: Saving the life of a leader
Suddenly, as if in response, the rumble of aircraft engines swept over the ship. As crew members shouted "an airplane," Kim heard heavy objects falling into the sea. Then the ship turned so sharply Kim was thrown to the deck. "Are you Mr. Kim Dae Jung?" a sked a voice, which Kim aides now believe belonged to the ship's cook. "I think the worst is over and you are alive." The fly-by had scared Kim's captors enough to save his life. Only now are details of the kidnapping beginning to emerge. Last week, a top Korean official revealed that the kcia had planned the abduction, but he failed to explain the mysterious appearance of the plane. Time has learned that Kim's savior was the Unit ed States. According to Donald Gregg, then chief of the Central Intelligence Agency's Seoul station, the U.S. swept into action immediately on hearing news of Kim's abduction. Ambassador Philip Habib called Gregg into his office. "I know how things work a round here," said Habib. "They're going to wait 24 hours, and if we don't say anything Kim will be killed." As Gregg tells it, he called in as many favors as he could from among his Korean counterparts to verify the kcia's role in the kidnapping. The next morning, Habib went to the Blue House and warned President Park Chung Hee that Kim's murder would be a "terrible setback" for U.S.-Korea relations. The aircraft that buzzed the death ship that night was not American, says Gregg, but could have been Korea n or, more likely, Japanese. In any case, its warning kept Kim from a horrible fate. The next U.S. intervention on Kim's behalf was considerably more complicated. It was late 1980, and the dissident leader had been convicted of treason and was awaiting execution. Overseas Koreans, foreign leaders and human rights activists had called for his release, to no avail. In Washington, Jimmy Carter was in the process of turning over the White House to President-elect Ronald Reagan. With U.S. diplomats being held hostage in Iran and a still-intact Soviet Union to deal with, who had time to care ab out a lone dissident in far-off Korea? But U.S. officials had been debating Kim's plight for months. Some thought the U.S. should launch a public protest to Chun, asking him to prevent the execution, others argued such a move would be counterproductive. In early December, Gregg, then on the Na tional Security Council staff, left for Seoul with Defense Secretary Harold Brown for a meeting with Chun that both men doubted would yield much. To their surprise, Chun got right to the point. Remembers Gregg: "The first thing he said was, ŒI've got a te rrible problem with Kim Dae Jung. Every single Korean military official wants me to execute him. If I do, I know I have trouble with you and in Europe. I do not know what to do.'" Yet Chun seemed inclined to go with his generals. "I left the meeting think ing that we failed and Kim Dae Jung was a dead man," recalls Gregg. Meanwhile, State Department official Michael Armacost, among other policy-makers nervous over Kim's fate, contacted Richard Allen, a foreign affairs adviser to Reagan. Armacost warned Allen that a high-ranking Republican had told senior Korean officials t hat Chun should deal with Kim as he saw fit. If that message was not quickly disavowed, Chun was likely to consider it a green light to kill Kim. After seeking Reagan's support, Allen leaked news reports that the new administration would in fact not look kindly on an execution. The Koreans arranged a meeting in Washington with a Chun emissary-who said it was none of Washington's business. "I said if you [kill him] you will be struck by a lightning bolt from heaven," recalls Allen, who concedes he did not have a clue as to what Washington's policy would be. The next day, Chun's emissary suggested a deal: if the Korean President were invited to Reagan's inauguration, they might consider a lesser penalty for Kim. Allen easily said "no" to that; heads of state do not attend presidential inaugurations. "They mad e a big mistake out of ignorance, and now I knew I had the leverage," Allen recalls. He pressed the Koreans to relent and, confidant that Kim's life was saved, he discreetly arranged a "private" visit for Chun with Reagan in February 1981. Ironically, tha t helped earn Reagan the ire of Kim supporters in and out of Korea for "coddling dictators." Even Kim, whose life had been twice spared, learned only years later that it was the Republicans who bailed him out. "He has a very warm feeling for the U.S.," sa ys former Congressman Stephen Solarz. "He knows if it wasn't for us, he undoubtedly wouldn't be here." -By Stella Kim/Seoul. With reporting by Douglas Waller/Washington
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im dae jung had just finished a secret lunch with another Korean opposition leader at Tokyo's downtown Grand Palace Hotel on Aug. 8, 1973. As Kim stepped into a hallway, a group of men grabbed him, ordering him in
Korean to keep silent. Beaten and smothered with a chloroform-soaked rag, Kim was bound, blindfolded and dumped into a waiting car. By the following night, he had been transferred to a Korean freighter at sea. There he was bound again, his face covered in
tape with air holes around his nose. As the ship moved off into the darkness, his captors roped Kim to a traditional Korean funeral plank for burial; weights were attached to his wrists. A devout Catholic, Kim saw the end coming and began to pray.