Eye on Korea_ An Insider Account of Korean-American Relations

 •   

I believe that this was a mistake, the first of several made in dealing with

Chun and his followers during the period between / and the following

May. I also believe that the embassy may have had some other reason for

wanting to restrict Chun’s access to Wickham. By now it was becoming

evident that Chun held the real political power in Korea, and I think the

embassy wanted to take the lead in dealing with him. Some rivalry had

always existed between the U.S. military command at Yongsan and the

embassy, and the diplomats did not want any “mixed signals” confusing

the new Korean military leadership as to American policy objectives. Quite

simply the embassy wanted to run the show.

Wickham did meet with other officials, however, including the prime

minister, the new defense minister, and others. His message was consistent

in these meetings—the unauthorized movement of ROK Army troops as-

signed to CFC OPCON must not happen again. He stressed that such incidents

ran an unacceptable risk that CFC could not successfully defend against a

North Korean attack. This point was reiterated in letters that were distrib-

uted to the appropriate authorities and in numerous discussions with se-

nior Korean officers.

U.S. Policy Changes as a Result of 12/12

While these events were transpiring in Seoul, there were a series of meet-

ings in Washington for the purpose of reviewing U.S. Korean policy in the

aftermath of the military coup. As is normally the case in any full-scale

policy review, almost all the appropriate departments of government were

involved, but the major players were the White House, the State Department,

and the Defense Department. Several meetings took place in the days fol-

lowing /, and a number of options were considered, two of which were

quite controversial.

The first option was to reduce, remove, or otherwise adjust U.S. military

support for South Korea. Within this option were a variety of suboptions that

ranged from withdrawal of some or all of the U.S. forces in Korea to cancel-

ing or postponing the annual security consultative meeting. The purpose of

these actions would be to demonstrate American displeasure with the mili-

tary takeover and force the new power structure to move toward a more

democratic government or risk losing U.S. military support. In this regard, it

should be recalled that some Carter government advisors had supported the

withdrawal of U.S. forces from Korea earlier, and this faction saw the events

of / as an opportunity to raise the troop-withdrawal issue again.