It looks like the Korean conservative party in an effort to protect the DSC is claiming that the organization once drew up martial law plans to protect former left-wing President Roh Moo-hyun:
This photo shows the Defense Security Command. (Yonhap)
The Defense Security Command (DSC) on Tuesday dismissed an opposition floor leader’s allegations that it drew up a document on the possible imposition of martial law after the 2004 impeachment of liberal former President Roh Moo-hyun.
Earlier in the day, Rep. Kim Sung-tae of the main opposition Liberty Korea Party raised the allegations amid criticism that the DSC explored the possibility of imposing martial law to quash public protests against then corruption-tainted President Park Geun-hye.
“Rep. Kim’s argument is different from facts,” the DSC said in a text message sent to reporters.
“The DSC under the former government checked if there was any problem (on the part of the DSC), and there was nothing whatsoever that indicates the unit considered the (possible invocation of) martial law,” it added. [Yonhap]
The roles of the DSC includes planning security measures and gathering information regarding military-related activities. Its primary mission is to protect national security, which includes anti-espionage and anti-terrorism activities and protecting defense industry-relation information. The commander of the DSC reports to the Defense Minister, but can report directly to the President as well.
It is arguable the South Korean political left want to either disband or “reform” the DSC before pursuing their own goal of creating a confederation with North Korea.
President Moon Jae-in, left, then the floor leader of New Politics Alliance for Democracy Party, greets former Prime Minister Kim Jong-pil at Seoul Asan Hospital in 2015. Yonhap
Former Prime Minister Kim Jong-pil died Saturday at age 92. Kim died at 8:15 a.m., an aide said.
Kim was taken to Soonchunhyang University Hospital in Seoul from his home in Shindang-dong, and he was already dead on arrival, hospital officials said.
He is believed to have died of old age.
Born in 1926, Kim graduated from the Korea Military Academy and played a key role in the 1961 military coup led by Park Chung-hee, who rose to president and ruled South Korea for 18 years.
Kim served as prime minister twice, first from 1971-1975 and then from 1998-2000.
He also served nine terms as a lawmaker and was considered one of South Korea’s most influential politicians in the 1980s-90s. He was known as one of the “three Kims,” together with former Presidents Kim Young-sam and Kim Dae-jung. [Korea Times]
The modern Korean history that Prime Minister Kim Jong-pil was part of is simply incredible. He was even responsible for an agricultural first by creating Jeju’s first tangerine orchard in 1968.
It looks like President Moon is in Russia setting conditions for any future summit between Putin and Kim Jong-un:
South Korean President Moon Jae-in and his wife Kim Jung-sook arrive in Moscow on June 21, 2018 for a three-day state visit that will include a bilateral summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin. (Yonhap)
South Korean President Moon Jae-in began his three-day state visit to Russia on Thursday for a bilateral summit with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin that will likely focus on ways to boost the countries’ economic cooperation, as well as joint efforts to rid North Korea of its nuclear weapons.
Moon’s trip marked the first state visit to Russia by a South Korean leader since 1999, according to his office Cheong Wa Dae.
He was set to deliver a special speech at the State Duma, the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia, becoming the first South Korean president to do so in history.
He will also meet Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev later in the day for bilateral talks on ways to expand their countries’ bilateral cooperation, Cheong Wa Dae said.
The Moon-Putin summit will be held on Friday, marking the third of its kind since Moon took office in May 2017. The two first met on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit held in Germany in July. They last met in September, when Moon attended the annual Eastern Economic Forum held in the Russian city of Vladivostok. [Yonhap]
It has long been known by Korea watchers that President Moon Jae-in’s Chief of Staff Im Jong-seok has prolific communist and pro-North Korean past. Over at One Free Korea, Dr. Tara O has a guest post that provides detailed background information that shows how immersed Im was in communist ideology before entering the Blue House. What I found really interesting was how during the Roo Moo-hyun administration Im founded a group that collected royalties for the Kim regime in North Korea:
Im Jong-seok
In 2005, Im Jong-seok founded and led as chairman, the South-North Economic and Cultural Cooperation Foundation (남북경제문화협력재단). The Foundation has been collecting royalties from MBC, KBS, SBS, and other TV and online broadcasters for North Korean TV footage. According to the Ministry of Unification, the foundation collected an estimated $1,876,700 over 13 years and transferred the royalties to North Korea until the Cheonan sinking in 2010. It is still collecting royalties on behalf of North Korea’s Chosun Central Broadcasting Commission, with the plans to transfer the money once the sanctions are lifted. The foundation even called the Ministry of Defense Public Affairs and demanded royalties for using the missile test footage in July 2017. North Korea does not pay for footage from South Korean broadcasts.
The foundation also has other revenue streams. One is membership and the other is education & research. It collects about 32,700,000 Won (~$30,000) on average for its annual membership. It also became a contractor to the Seoul City and Seongdong District governments, developing South-North “peace education” programs. What is interesting is that the contract with Seoul City was signed on the same day as when Park Won-soon, Seoul City Mayor, appointed Im Jong-seok as the Deputy Mayor on June 11, 2014. Im was the campaign manager for Park prior to that in 2014, and successfully led to Park Won-soon’s re-election. [One Free Korea]
You can read much more at the link where Dr. O in painstaking detail lists all of Im Jong-seok’s communist and pro-North Korean ties. Does anyone think that Im Jong-seok who less than a decade ago was collecting royalties to send to the Kim regime is interested in being an honest broker now between the US and North Korea?
It has come to this: *Breitbart* just did a better job of describing the cast of extremists in Moon Jae-in’s cabinet than “respected” publications with correspondents in Asia.https://t.co/NbdJMjz8PL I don’t read Breitbart; saw the link in my traffic stats. But I know who does.
This really shouldn’t be surprising to anyone, the only thing surprising is how open this South Korean diplomat was about how pro-American diplomats have been marginalized in the Moon administration:
New Korean Ambassador to Vietnam Kim Do-hyun
The Foreign Ministry Tuesday admonished the new ambassador to Vietnam, Kim Do-hyun, for his critical remarks about the United States during an interview with a vernacular Korean paper.
The remarks in question are as follows: “The reason why the inter-Korean summit was successful is because pro-United States diplomats were not put in charge. … a majority of Korean diplomats have thought they could get promoted if they were close to Americans and if not, they would have no future.”
A ministry spokesman said, “Ambassador Kim went to his post several days ago. Since he will have many chances to have interviews with media, we have internally taken necessary steps.”
He said that he didn’t reveal what steps were taken but didn’t object when asked whether it was tantamount to a “verbal warning.” [Korea Times]
You can read more at the link, but I infer from Kim’s remarks that the Moon administration has marginalized diplomats considered pro-US and are only using North Korean sympathizers to interact with the Kim regime. This is not surprising considering the Moon administration has many left wing North Korean sympathizers. For example President Moon’s Chief of Staff, Im Jeong-seok is a former supporter of North Korea’s juche philosophy.
Over at One Free Korea here has a very interesting posting up about how liberal South Korean administrations target certain think tanks to fire employees or lose funding:
Robert Gallucci
Contemporary press reports alleged that Roh’s people directed the funding cut because they didn’t care for what TAE wrote, and because they really didn’t care for Nicholas Eberstadt (interviewed at this blog eons ago). One of the TAE authors called for an “amicable divorce” of the U.S.-Korea alliance, something that even most anti-American South Koreans fear. If this were to happen prematurely, it could cause capital flight, crash the KOSPI, and undermine the political support left-wing politicians build by profiting from the anti-American demagoguery of their simpaticos without openly propagating it themselves. Clearly, these issues are important matters of public policy for Americans. [One Free Korea]
Here is the most recent example of a liberal administration trying to influence a think tank:
Paradoxically, USKI is best known for publishing the reliably soft-line, anti-anti-North Korean, pro-“engagement” 38 North blog. It’s the last outlet you’d think Moon Jae-in’s people would mess with. (…………)
Not surprisingly, USKI and the KIEP have different explanations for KIEP’s funding decision, and by the end of this post, you’ll see why. KIEP says the National Assembly demanded the cut over questions about the transparency of USKI’s budget. But Robert Gallucci, the Director of USKI, says the real reason is that the Blue House wanted him to fire Jae Ku, one of the few right-of-center thinkers at USKI. (Mr. Ku gave an interview to this blog way back in 2005. I hope I’m not doing him any more harm by calling him a friend.) Later, Gallucci says the Blue House also told him to fire Jenny Town, a co-founder of 38 North. [One Free Korea]
I highly recommend reading the whole thing at the link, but it looks like the people at the Blue House involved in cutting the funding have ties to the People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy (PSPD) organization.
Hong and his boss Jang spent 6 years at People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy: it's an activist group ostensibly opposed to abuses of power by government & chebols. But it also put on anti-US beef (mad cow disease) demos and called for alternative Cheonan investigations pic.twitter.com/f4OW0Vay6u
So who is PSPD? They are a group that has long championed anti-US causes to include opposing the US-ROK FTA, the Camp Humphreys expansion, exploiting the No Gun Ri issue, wanting SOFA changes, and closing the Kooni Bombing Range. The most ridiculous issue they helped to lead was the 2008 anti-US Beef Riots. Most recently PSPD has been one of the major groupsbehind the anti-THAAD protests in Seongju.
The way I look at it the Korean government has every right to cut funding to think tanks they support. However, then they should release from jail the people imprisoned for the so called cultural blacklist during the Park Geun-hye administration. If the Park administration could not blacklist certain cultural organizations than shouldn’t the Moon administration not be able to blacklist certain think tanks?
I wonder if the ROK government will replace South Korean astronauts with undeserving North Korean astronauts if the Kim regime demands it like they did for the Winter Olympics?:
South Korea unveiled a long-term plan Monday to secure indigenous space technology with the aim of successfully landing a spaceship on the moon by 2030, the science ministry said.
Under the roadmap crafted and finalized by the Ministry of Science and ICT, the government will secure the necessary basic technology to send a spacecraft into lunar orbit by 2020 and to land it on the surface of Earth’s satellite a decade later.
In order to meet the goal, the ministry will begin analyzing critical related technology starting in 2019, officials said.
It marks the first time that the Moon Jae-in administration, which took office in May 2017, has mapped out a long-term strategy for space exploration. In the past, the country has mostly been busy with narrowing a technology gap with powerhouses such as the United States and Russia, the ministry said.
Under the latest plan, South Korea will also begin an era of private companies launching orbital space programs in 2026. [Yonhap]
Moon Jae-in's proposal to give service credit for membership in "civic groups" looks suspiciously like a scheme for politicizing the civil service by packing it with hard-left activists. https://t.co/9DZ80hhdWShttps://t.co/9DZ80hhdWS
