Defector to North Korea
By now most of you have probably heard about the South Korean defector to North Korea who used to work for the US Army.
North Korea’s official KCNA news agency said Kim Ki-ho, 59, had worked for the U.S. Army’s 6th Ordnance Battalion as a quality assurance specialist at Camp Long, near Wonju, but defected recently to North Korea. The news agency gave no details as to when or how he reportedly defected.
It said Kim “made the bold decision to come over to the northern half of Korea … unable to put up any longer with the disgraceful South Korean society, disillusioned with it where the nation’s dignity, sovereignty and human rights are violated at the hand of the U.S.”
However, I am going to do some speculation here on the motives of why he may have defected. Recently a requirement has been changed that USFK employees that reach the age of 60 years old must retire and they are replaced with younger workers. This guy was 59 years old and approaching the retirement age. Maybe the guy was being forced out of his job at a time when he still had financial debts that needed to be paid and he could not find another job because someone who is 59 years old does not easily find work in this country. So he went over the edge and decided to defect.
Like I said this is complete speculation on my part and maybe this guy was just nuts or one of the North Korean sleeper agents that according to GI urban legend work on all of our military camps here.
Never the less, it would be interesting to see what the investigation turns up on why somebody who worked for 20 years on a US facility decided to defect. I doubt we’ll ever hear about the results though becuase they will probably be classified.
The comments about human rights violations though I found humorous in light of my previous posting about North Korean gulags. I guess a drunk GI getting in trouble with South Korean authorities every 6 months and going to jail is a bigger human rights violation than killing babies in front of their mothers in gulag camps. I guess Mr. Kim Ki-ho, who has knowledge of South Korean prosperity, will have his chance to find out because he will definitely be put into one these camps to be re-educated.
