The Two Koreas_ A Contemporary History - Don Oberdorfer [25]
It is clear that Park has turned away from the political philosophy which we have been advocating and supporting in Korea for 27 years. The characteristics of the discarded system which he regarded as weaknesses-the limitations on executive powers, the dissent and inherent uncertainties which arise in direct presidential elections-we regard as strengths. Because of our historic relationship with Korea, our security commitments, and the presence of a sustantial number of American troops, we are confronted with the problem of our reaction to these developments.
Habib reported that attempting to dissuade Park from the course of action he had chosen would be "impractical," but that seeking to soften the repressive aspects of new policies would be seen as giving tacit U.S. endorsement to the yushin plan as a whole. What remained, Habib concluded, was "a policy of disassociation," in which the United States would say it had not been consulted or involved in Park's actions and would stay clear of involvement in the reorganization of the Korean political system. In his cable, the ambassador faced squarely the consequences of the hands-off policy he recommended:
In following such a course we would be accepting the fact that the U.S. cannot and should no longer try to determine the course of internal political development in Korea. We have already begun a process of progressively lower levels of U.S. engagement with Korea. The process of disengagement should be accelerated. The policy we propose would be consistent with the disengagement trend, and Park's actions will contribute to the process.
Three days later Washington responded: "We agree with the Embassy's preference for a posture of disassociation.... In furtherance of this policy, we intend to refrain from arguing with the ROK in public, and seek to advance our counsel privately only where necessary and appropriate." When Prime Minister Kim Jong Pil visited the U.S. capital three months later, President Nixon told him privately that "unlike other presidents, it is not my intention to interfere in the internal affairs of your country." With these decisions, most of which were never announced, the United States acquiesced in a diminished role in South Korea's political future.
North Korea did not seem to mind Park's shift to a more authoritarian system that was more like its own arrangements, possibly believing that this would make it easier to negotiate accords with him. On October 21, in the immediate aftermath of martial law, the two Koreas jointly announced that KCIA chief Lee Hu Rak would travel to Pyongyang on November 2 for another meeting with Kim Il Sung and that North Korea would send a top-level negotiator to Seoul shortly thereafter. The joint announcement was taken as a sign that the North-South dialogue remained on track.
THE IMPACT OF YUSHIN
Within the South Korean body politic, the imposition of Park's yushin system provoked intense opposition from many quarters. Acting through the KCIA, the Army Security Command, and his increasingly powerful personal bodyguards, Park sought to silence all those who interfered or disagreed with his policies by temporary detention, arrest or imprisonment. In a brutal procedure known as the Korean barbecue, some opponents were strung up by their wrists and ankles and spread-eagled over a flame in KCIA torture chambers; others were subjected to water torture by repeated dunking or the forcing of water down their throats.
Chang Chun Ha, a distinguished Korean nationalist, told me how he had been seized on his way downtown and taken to a KCIA jail for a week of nearly continuous interrogation, in an unsuccessful effort to persuade him to endorse Park's martial-law "reforms." Meanwhile his distraught family, as his captors repeatedly pointed out to him, did not know what had happened to him or if he would ever return. Three years