• politicians, but by now he was merely following instructions; the ambassa-
dor had no realistic hope that Choi would respond favorably.^6
That same day Bob Brewster met with Chun Doo Hwan to deliver the
same strong protest. Chun replied that “impure elements” and “radicals”
had taken control of the demonstrations and that the government had been
forced to act as a result. Brewster was especially disappointed by this re-
sponse, for he had been led to believe by Chun in their earlier contacts that
such hard-line actions would be taken only in the most extreme emergency.
I frankly think Brewster was embarrassed by this turn of events, and at this
point he completely lost confidence in Chun’s willingness to tell him the
truth. Their relationship had been reasonably good to this point. In fact,
Brewster was probably the only U.S. government official who had such a
relationship with Chun since /—now that was gone.^7
There was at least one positive result of the May declaration of martial
law. From the eighteenth forward, there was no longer any difference of
opinion between the embassy and the U.S. military as to Chun’s intentions.
Following the report by Brewster of his meeting, and having assimilated the
widespread reports of the extent of the crackdown, Ambassador Gleysteen
now gave Washington his assessment of the situation: that Chun Doo Hwan
and the military had all but formally taken over the country.^8
A Slow ResponseFollowing the imposition of total martial law, we in the embassy were ini-
tially caught up in trying to understand the depth and implications of what
had happened. The mood in Seoul was sullen and defiant, but there was no
violent opposition. South Korea had experienced martial law on several
previous occasions, and it had never resulted in widespread violence; just
the opposite was normally the case. Also, there was a widespread Ameri-
can mindset that believed that the ROK military, despite its disciplined train-
ing and reputation as a tough and effective fighting force, would never fire
its weapons on its own people. Former president Syngman Rhee had been
forced out of office when such a thing happened in April, , and it was
almost impossible for us to believe that it could happen again, especially in
.
On Monday, May , the embassy was contacted by David Miller, the di-
rector of the U.S. Information Services Center in Kwangju, who relayed re-
ports told to him by local citizens that widespread rioting had taken place.
He said that there had been some serious casualties and that ROK Army