The Two Koreas_ A Contemporary History - Don Oberdorfer [93]
Reagan and other senior American officials repeatedly and publicly praised Chun's "far-sighted" commitment to turn over power through constitutional processes, statements intended to lay down markers so that the pledge could not be ignored. "Chun Doo Hwan had made a commitment, and we wanted him to realize that the United States expected him to keep it," according to Secretary of State Shultz, who suspected that Chun would abandon. the commitment if he could devise a way to do so. Yet Chun insisted he was sincere, volunteering to Reagan, in a private meeting at the Blue House in November 1983, that because of the precedents of Presidents Rhee and Park, who unilaterally extended their terms of office and were finally ousted by force, "the people believe that a change of presidents is possible only through violence. This is a very dangerous way of thinking.... My term is scheduled to end in 1988 and it will."
Nevertheless, Chun found it more difficult than he expected to keep his promise. "In a country like ours, it requires a lot more courage to give up power than to grab it," he confided at a dinner for Blue House reporters. He was well aware of the immense personal risks of dismounting from the tiger he had been riding since December 1979, including political and legal retribution from those who had suffered under his rule.
An important factor in the Korean political transition was the worldwide trend in the mid-1980s, in which the United States played a supporting role, toward democratization of authoritarian, militarybacked regimes. The most dramatic case in Asia was the Philippines. Ferdinand Marcos's 1972 power grab, in which Washington had acquiesced, had encouraged Park Chung Hee to impose his authoritarian yushin system in Korea weeks later. But in 1986 Washington approved the "people power" revolution in Manila that ousted Marcos, and it prodded the falling dictator to leave the country for exile in Hawaii aboard a U.S. Air Force plane. These spectacular events emboldened the Korean opposition and focused an international spotlight on South Korea as the next potential flashpoint.
The opposition was also emboldened by the approach of the 1988 Summer Olympic Games to be held in Seoul, an event that promised greatly to enhance their country's international recognition and prestige and thus was of towering importance to all Koreans. The president of the International Olympic Committee, Juan Antonio Samaranch, had made it known that the games might be moved elsewhere in case of massive disorders in Seoul. This added substantially to the government's reluctance to use lethal and overwhelming force to put down protest demonstrations.
By the start of 1986, Korean public life was focused on postChun political arrangements. In April the president returned from a European trip convinced that a parliamentary system of government would best suit South Korea and, many people suspected, that it might permit him to retain power as prime minister or power broker after the end of his presidency. The opposition saw such a change as a threat. It demanded a return to the earlier practice of direct election of the president rather than election by an easily controlled college of electors, which had been established in President Park's martial-law "reforms." With the press still muzzled and the National Assembly a toothless body, the political contest was waged in the streets, with the opposition seeking to demonstrate insurmountable national support.
In keeping with tradition, politically active elements of the one million college and university students from Korea's 104 higher edu cation