The Two Koreas_ A Contemporary History - Don Oberdorfer [120]
Dobrynin recalled that Gorbachev's words to him were "we need some money." With that practical preamble, Gorbachev proposed that Dobrynin, in accepting the invitation to Seoul, use the occasion to explore the possibility of a major loan from the South Korean government. At this stage, Gorbachev was not ready to go to Seoul himself, but he told Dobrynin that he would be willing to meet Roh somewhere else, perhaps in the United States, where he was scheduled to have a summit meeting with Bush in late May or early June.
Dobrynin arrived in Seoul on May 22 and the following day was taken to a secluded Korean-style building on the grounds of the Blue House. There he met secretly with Roh and his security adviser, Kim Chong Whi, the architect of the Nordpolitik maneuvers. Dobrynin brought the news that Gorbachev was willing to meet the South Korean leader, a powerful symbolic step that was tantamount to official recognition and was certain to lead to full diplomatic relations in the near future. "You are the third to know," Dobrynin told the Korean president, "and you are the fourth," he said to Roh's aide. Emphasizing the need for secrecy, the Soviet emissary obtained a commitment that the Korean Foreign Ministry would not be informed until the last minute, because the Soviet Foreign Ministry had also been kept in the dark. It was agreed that the meeting would take place two weeks later in San Francisco, which Gorbachev planned to visit after the comple tion of his Washington summit with Bush. Dobrynin did not inform Foreign Minister Shevardnadze of the meeting until shortly before it was publicly announced, and the Soviet Foreign Ministry took no part in the session-an extraordinary omission in an important diplomatic event.
According to Dobrynin, he discussed with Roh in Seoul a loan of some billions of dollars without being specific on figures. In a 1993 interview for this book, Roh quoted Dobrynin as telling him that Soviet leaders "were in a desperate situation for their economic development." Having seen what Korea had done economically, Roh recalled, "they expected that South Korea could somehow play a role in the success of perestroika. As a model, they were attracted by the Korean economic development. That was their top priority at the time, and they naturally expected that South Korea could contribute to this." Roh told Dobrynin that Korea would make a major contribution to the Soviet Union, but only if and when full diplomatic relations were established.
From the Korean point of view, a full breakthrough with the Soviet Union was a development of immense importance. It would deprive North Korea of the undivided support of its original sponsor, its most important source of economic and military assistance and an important security guarantor against American power under the 1961 Soviet-DPRK treaty. Moreover, the spectacle of the general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union-the world's senior communist figure-meeting with the president of South Korea meant the legitimization of the Seoul government virtually everywhere and the final collapse of North Korea's long-standing effort to wall off the southern regime from communist nations. There was little doubt that in time China would follow the Soviet example in its own selfinterest.
Although the meeting of Gorbachev and Roh took place on American soil, the United States played only a minimal role in bringing it about. Secretary of State James Baker had discussed Korea with Shevardnadze in separate meetings in February,