The Two Koreas_ A Contemporary History - Don Oberdorfer [53]
In Seoul, President Park had not taken the withdrawal idea seriously at first, telling Korean reporters in an off-the-record luncheon that "I don't think it's going to happen soon." When Carter announced his decision publicly, Park summoned his national security advisers to the Blue House. Doing his best to control his emotions, the ROK president surprised his aides by saying he would not openly oppose the proposed withdrawal but would ask for compensation to maintain the North-South military balance. Park's attitude arose from his searing personal experience in 1970, when he had passionately opposed withdrawal of the Seventh Division, only to have all his objections overridden by Vice President Spiro Agnew, who had been sent to deliver the news. Agnew had emphasized that a U.S. president could assign his forces wherever and whenever he wished. In the face of this White House trump card, Park decided it would be unavailing and demeaning to mount a frontal attack on Carter's program.
Spurred on by doubts or outright opposition in the executive branch and the military, American domestic opponents of the withdrawal became more numerous and more vocal. To compensate for the withdrawal of American forces, Carter promised that $1.9 billion in military aid would be provided "in advance of or parallel to the withdrawals." This required congressional approval, but in July 1977, when Defense Secretary Brown briefed lawmakers at the White House, not a single senator or representative spoke up in support of the withdrawal, and many expressed their opposition. "It is clear that we face an uphill battle on this issue with Congress," Brzezinski reported in a memorandum to Carter.
Congressional support for South Korea had become a contentious topic independent of the troop withdrawal issue. Abuses of human rights and, especially, the arrest and conviction of eighteen prominent Christian leaders for issuing a manifesto complaining of the lack of freedom, provoked strong reactions from American churches and the public. In April 1976, shortly after the arrest of the Christian leaders and while Carter was still campaigning, 119 senators and representatives signed a letter to President Ford condemning "continuing suppression" in Korea and warning that ongoing U.S. military support could make the United States "an accomplice to repression." Six months later, after conviction of the Christians, 154 members of Congress wrote President Park to protest "disrespect for human rights," which they said was undermining American-South Korean relations. Carter, who sought to make human rights and morality central tenets of his foreign policy, found the Park regime's abuses particularly offensive.
Another intense controversy had erupted on October 24, 1976, when The Washington Post reported that a Korean agent, Park Tong Sun, had distributed $500,000 to $1 million a year to bribe as many as ninety members of Congress and other officials, and that U.S. eavesdropping devices had recorded the planning for the bribery scheme. The Post story, by Maxine Cheshire and Scott Armstrong, was based on leaks from a secret grand jury investigation initiated by the Justice Department. Coming on the heels of the Watergate scandal, which had driven President Nixon from office, the bribery saga quickly became known as Koreagate. Carter took a posture of full cooperation with congressional probes, writing in a confidential memo to his staff that "we should move without reticence to provide all possible informations re: violations of U.S. law."
By the end of 1977, Carter's first year in office, four full-scale congressional investigations of Korean activities were under way, and the FBI and Internal Revenue Service had launched additional investigations. Eventually only one member of Congress, Representative Richard Hanna, was convicted of being bribed. But with charges of bribery and an avalanche of investigations filling the news,