Korea: A Peninsula Divided

...North Korean contacts with foreigners are confined to carefully staged interviews and set speeches...

...It is a crime for a newspaper to carry editorials which are critical of the government or to carry news accounts which may reflect unfavorably on the government...

...Passengers on domestic flights are compelled to remove shoes for inspection prior David Finkelstein, a lawyer and Ford Foundation program officer specializing in Asian affairs, recently returned from a visit to South Korea...

...Korean intellectuals believe that even while maintaining its military commitment, the U.S...

...This article reflects only his personal views...

...Pyongyang is a clean city devoid of auto traffic, except for the several Mercedes (and one Jaguar) used by the mysterious elite who constitute the Central Committee...

...others are more optimistic...

...We must first secure ourselves against the former in order to survive...

...whisper confided to an American visitor: "The Republic of Korea has two enemies — the North and our own dictatorial government...

...Inflation is still rampant, but it is not apparent from the relative affluence of the crowds...

...A prominent Korean intellectual and former member of the National Assembly testified that he was hung upside down and burned with a flame in order to exact a confession...

...What of North Korea...

...At this moment, therefore, the uneducated masses might misunderstand a strong call for democracy...

...military assistance are not regarded as indispensable to fighting off an attack from the North...

...Under the circumstances, Ford's comments are hardly likely to have had much impact...

...In his recent foreign policy debate with Jimmy Carter, President Ford proudly mentioned that he told Park at the time of his concern about repression in South Korea...

...Unfortunately, few Western visitors have been invited to Pyongyang, and even foreign diplomats in residence there say they are subjected to extraordinary harassment and restriction of movement...

...9; converted the nation's college campuses into military garrisons under the "Student Defense Corps...

...Recent revelations of collusive bidding among Korean contractors to cheat U.S...

...There is a widespread belief, shared by some foreign diplomats, that North Korea (the Democratic People's Republic of Korea) might be inclined to launch an attack on the South...

...Some were sentenced to death...

...According to some reports, however, his efforts to pass on his mantle to his son are running into considerable resistance...

...session...

...In 1973, the candidate who last opposed Park, Kim Dae Jung, was kidnapped from his hotel in Tokyo by Korean agents...

...It would take at least seven days to prepare for an attack, and such activity would be immediately detected...

...Victims of Park's dragnet include politicians, students, religious leaders, artists, and a former Korean president...

...Second, Korea's foreign friends should continue their outspoken criticism of Park's anti-democratic policies...

...people seem to share President Park Chung Hee's apprehension that North Korean planes could be bombing Seoul three minutes after takeoff...

...They do not believe Kim wants to provoke a war and risk sacrificing all he has accomplished in rebuilding the DPRK after its virtual destruction during the Korean War two decades ago...

...Despite all this, or perhaps because of it, a few prominent scholars continue to throw in their lot with the government as advisers to President Park...

...South Korea, as many Koreans take pains to point out, is not Vietnam or Cambodia: It is, in their view, a relatively mature and stable society with strong impulses toward pluralism and even toward some semblance of democracy...

...A House international relations subcommittee headed by Representative Donald Fraser, Minnesota Democrat, bolstered by the testimony of prominent Asian scholars, has focused sustained attention on repression in South Korea and is beginning to investigate the evidently nefarious involvement of South Korea's CIA in American life...

...Much to the dismay of foreign diplomats negotiating the construction of nuclear reactors for this energy-poor land, Park even talks about the possibility of developing his own nuclear weapons capacity...

...Kindergarten and school facilities are also of a high order...

...The Park regime, perhaps fearing rising dissent over economic issues, launched a sharp attack on its critics...

...Whatever the sins of the other side, our own client defies the values we claim to advance...

...Industrial development has also been impressive...

...Still, pressure is certainly increasing in the United States for a new policy toward South Korea—one that would call for a phased reduction of military aid...

...Shortly after the American withdrawal from Vietnam a prominent Korean noted, "Park has successfully utilized the national security issue, which is real, to justify the repression of freedom...

...Having justified his repressive apparatus as the necessary price of vigilance against the communist threat, his survival is now dependent on public belief in that threat...

...debacle in Vietnam worried South Koreans of all political persuasions...

...And there are many other reminders that all is not well: At the airport, incoming passengers are subjected to security frisking and luggage examination in addition to customs inspection...

...In February of this year, Park's education minister fired more than 400 professors, largely for political reasons...

...Last August 28, former candidate Kim Dae Jung, along with former President Yun Po Sun and sixteen other opposition leaders, were sentenced to lengthy prison terms for the crime of saying out loud what we all know to be true — that the Park government is corrupt and repressive...

...Congress, where Park's violation of human rights has come under increasing criticism...

...The fear that America would not stand by its security commitments — and that North Korean President Kim II Sung would take advantage of this—has subsided somewhat since the days following the exodus from Saigon, but national security still is a concern of even those most vehemently opposed to the Park regime...

...Furthermore, some close observers of the DPRK believe Kim wants to avoid all-out war, while wooing the Third World for political support...

...Thus, the DPRK has been able to deny visas to Americans on the grounds of "non-reciprocity," and to blame the United States for the current deep-freeze in "people-to-people" contacts...

...The story of Gulf Oil's corrupt involvement in Korea's corrupt politics, for example, was heard only through the rumor mills...

...The prevailing opposition attitude was summed up by a young Korean who in a 'Crime' in South Korea In South Korea it is a crime, punishable by a term of fifteen years in prison, to criticize the constitution or to call for its revision...

...The railroad system is reportedly entirely electrified...

...Some compare him to Cambodia's Prince Sihanouk (who has recently been shown greater hospitality in Pyongyang than in his own country), and it is certainly true that, like Sihanouk, President Kim II Sung delights in the adulation heaped upon him...

...This is not passive oppression...

...Tenure has been abolished at the universities, dealing a stunning blow to their integrity...

...Air raid drills bring traffic to a midday standstill...

...Those trials were a direct and ugly denial of the most essential element of political freedom — to think and speak freely, and to take public issue with those in power...

...Political prisoners are indefinitely detained and some, like the poet Kim Chi Ha (whose attorneys have also been imprisoned) , may be destined for death sentences...

...Women work long shifts in factories and then go home to prepare meals and do housework...

...the last semblance of a free press has been destroyed with the imposition of a government-controlled editorial board at Korea's most notable newspaper, Dong A Ilbo...

...Some 200 dissidents were put on trial in June 1974 for violating the emergency decrees...

...If the purpose of our involvement in South Korea is to protect its people from tyranny, then we have already failed...

...It is a crime, punishable by death, for a student to participate in virtually any political activity except, of course, that which glorifies the present regime...

...And in June a dozen ministers and social workers were arrested and charged with communist agitation in their work with Seoul slum dwellers and laborers...

...Newspapers are full of forebodings of attack from the North...

...Only 13 per cent of the work force remained above the government's estimated minimum urban standard of living...

...Government could exert useful pressure toward reform...

...Others have a longer perspective and argue that Park and Kim (reportedly even now quite ill) are mortals, and that their inevitable passing within a decade will bring a reduction of tension and enable the South to move toward democratization...

...But a two to eight-year term in one of Park's prisons is not a pleasant thing to contemplate...

...In short, North Korea seems to be an Orwellian society that has been relatively successful in its "forced march" toward industrialization...

...news media have been unusually attentive in their coverage of the deteriorating situation in Korea, and there has been strong reaction from Congress and academic circles to the plight of harassed and oppressed Koreans...

...Yet just a few miles north of this spot, at the so-called Demilitarized Zone, two American officers were beaten to death by North Korean soldiers last August 18...

...Despite the harsh totalitarianism of the regime, foreigners who have met Kim II Sung do not regard him as the barbaric demon depicted in South Korean and U.S...

...The democratic forces, who are also prepared to accord first priority to national security matters, will just have to wait for a better opportunity than the present insecure situation affords, to pursue their domestic goals without jeopardizing potential support from other quarters...

...According to those who have had an occasional glimpse of the society, there is no doubt about its severity as a totalitarian state...

...Some believe that the road to democracy will be a long one, and that the army will raise formidable obstacles...

...And with a stroke of the pen the dictator can make it a crime to do or say anything he does not want done or said...

...Third, visitors from abroad — and particularly U.S...

...GEORGE McGOVERN (Senator McGovern delivered these remarks in the Senate on September 15, 1976...

...It is also worth noting that fifteen days after the August 18 DMZ incident, revelations in the House International Relations Committee made it clear that it was not the unprovoked, premeditated act of the DPRK alone, but that the United States had been aware since August 6 that the tree-cutting exercise which led to the killings would create tensions, and had been carefully planning its moves in what can only be described as a game of political-military "chicken...

...There is an obvious risk that the divided-country status of the "two Koreas" will ossify over time and thus be harder to modify in the future, but it may be that Kim has chosen to avoid war and await the communist-inspired coup that he expects to arise within South Korea itself...

...With the possible exception of Albania (whose students go to China to learn German and French), the DPRK is probably the world's most intellectually and culturally isolated nation...

...If it goes, it has none at all...

...But most agree that time and the forces of pluralism, which admittedly still require much nurturing, are working toward the achievement of a less repressive society...

...Government's imperialistic action in stationing troops on Korean soil...

...Should it diminish, his government would quickly lose whatever legitimacy it now has — in the eyes of both the South Korean people and the U.S...

...In the past, prisoners have usually been held incommunicado, so charges of torture cannot be proved...

...Koreans who are still brave enough to talk about the issues, and many understandably are not, do so in whispered conversations only after leaving offices that they suspect of being bugged...

...military command in Korea, its confidence unshaken by the Vietnam experience, believes the North Koreans could be decisively defeated in eight days if they were not joined by China or the Soviet Union...

...Everyone seems to be working at maximum capacity...

...Rather, he is described as having an extremely sharp mind and much personal charm...

...Though the South Korean government claims that the DPRK has put underground much of what is worth bombing, visitors to the North say this is not the case: Ammunition factories and coal mines are below the surface, but other industrial plants are extremely vulnerable...

...embassy...

...In short, Park Chung Hee has subjected his countrymen to a cruel dictatorship...

...vote has gone in North Korea's favor — but he suffered a considerable setback at the recent Columbo meeting of Third World countries, presumably a result of negative reaction to the DMZ killings, and he has judiciously decided not to raise the matter at the current U.N...

...The possibility of American withdrawal fuels the South's sense of insecurity and reinforces Park's repressive instincts...

...In March of this year, however, those eighteen Koreans, now under sentence and awaiting the outcome of their higher court appeal, apparently decided that they had waited long enough...

...As one of these critics puts it: "If America stays, it has very little influence...

...military units and the unfolding scandal of Korean payments to scores of Congressmen only serve to emphasize the sordid nature of the Park regime and its Washington supporters...

...As foreign debts brought the nation to the brink of bankruptcy, inflation ranging between 20 and 40 per cent forced real wages down for the third year in a row...

...The U.S...

...Unfortunately, although Representative Fraser managed to place the resolution on the calendar for a vote by the full House prior to adjournment, House Speaker Carl Albert, in one of the many services he has performed for the South Korean lobby, removed the item from the calendar, thus preventing Congressional approval of the resolution...

...and expelled or suspended several hundred students, many for distributing reports of Gulf Oil's huge secret contributions to Park's 1971 campaign...

...We cannot know what will happen next to those eighteen distinguished Korean leaders...

...This hardly seems to be a country worrying about imminent war...

...The U.S...

...Although the DPRK (like South Korea) has incurred a large foreign debt, and in recent months has been unable to meet repayment schedules to Japan and Western Europe, the debt is renegotiable and should not present an unmanageable problem...

...Nonetheless, on June 2 the House defeated (by a vote of 241 to 159) an amendment to the foreign-aid bill which would have penalized Korea for its repressive policies by cutting to $290 million the $485.5 million amount proposed by the Ford Administration for military assistance...

...Verbal reports of the torture of political prisoners — though dangerous under Emergency Measure No...

...propaganda...

...articles on Korea's deteriorating international image, brought in by visitors, are eagerly devoured...

...As one foreign diplomat in Seoul suggested, the summary executions in the spring of 1975 were evidence that Park does not want advice from those who might counsel against further violations of human rights...

...But the prospects for such a contribution are not encouraging: Korean intellectuals have not distinguished themselves as high-minded public servants in the past, but have tended to be mere government mouthpieces...

...The U.S...

...Furthermore, the resolution called on the South Korean government to remit their sentences...

...Rather, the American presence is seen as symbolic, and its withdrawal, particularly at this time, is feared as a possible invitation to Kim II Sung to precipitate an attack...

...Police State The world recession hit South Korea, heavily dependent on foreign investment, extremely hard last year...

...to boarding...

...South Korea boasts an army of more than 500,000 supposedly well trained men, a gross national product considerably higher than the North's, and a population (twice as large) that is vehemently anti-communist and presumably ready to fight to the death...

...Public housing is said to be superior even to China's...

...troops from Korean soil — the first time a U.N...

...faculty have been fired and students expelled, and last year the presidents of the three major institutions — Seoul National, Korea, and Yonsei — were forced to resign...

...Efforts to penetrate that isolation have consistently been rebuffed by the North Koreans, whose invariable response to Americans seeking visas is a diatribe against the U.S...

...9 — circulate consistently...

...The 40,000 American troops and U.S...

...There is unparalleled regimentation: Children arise at dawn for morning exercises, march off to school in a way that makes China's youth look positively casual, and finish classes late in the afternoon...

...State Department has refused to allow members of the North Korean U.N...

...But an investigator for Amnesty International reported on a young prisoner who emerged for his trial with his ears and eyelids missing and his fingers burned together...

...The government maintains those were accidental injuries...

...Can the United States do anything to assist those democratically minded Koreans who are now the victims of Park's oppression...

...He enjoys going into the villages and factories and rubbing shoulders with the masses, something the aged Chinese leadership had reportedly been unable to do in recent years...

...The creation of such a police state has, by now, painted Park into a corner — an explosive one...

...In these circumstances, it is not surprising that the Korean intellectual community feels increasingly isolated from the outside world...

...mission to travel outside New York City to accept an invitation to participate in a seminar at the Harvard Law School, and it has also refused to consider issuing visas to North Korean scholars invited to an academic conference at the University of Hawaii...

...In 1975 it took over the last vestige of a free press, the Dong A Ilbo newspaper...

...Offensive articles and even single sentences in Time, Newsweek, and other such magazines are painstakingly excised from each copy entering the country...

...Significantly, the House International Relations Committee unanimously approved a resolution in September that not only condemned North Korea for the killing of the two Americans at the DMZ but also condemned South Korea for the harsh sentences imposed on the group of eighteen prominent citizens...

...So it seems that the great majority of South Koreans, including those most critical of the regime, want the United States to continue its basic military commitment...

...Unquestionably, the U.S...

...Despite President Ford's failure to meet with the opposition during his one-day visit in November 1974, other visitors have apparently been encouraged to do so by the U.S...

...He is quick to cite a lack of American resolve as a rationale for tighter mobilization and control over dissident elements...

...China and the Soviet Union, bent on avoiding unnecessary confrontations with the United States, undoubtedly prefer it that way and have taken pains to dissuade Kim from a more belligerent course...

...Until the United States and the DPRK attempt some degree of mutual understanding, there is likely to be little reduction of tension on the Korean peninsula...

...Not surprisingly, therefore, the DPRK has apparently been highly successful on the economic front Agriculture is mechanized, and wheat production is high enough to permit substantial exports...

...Foreign observers who have recently been in the North tend to discount the immediate fears of the South...

...It is a crime for any citizen of Korea to criticize the government in conversations with foreigners...

...Many Americans would agree that the United States does, indeed, bear some responsibility for the current impasse...

...The most ardent critics see the struggle against Park continuing despite his manipulation of the national security issue...

...only then can we move on to destroy the latter...

...Today South Koreans cannot speak to foreign journalists without risking later questioning by police, and buses traveling between South Korea's cities are regularly stopped for identity checks...

...decreed Emergency Measure No...

...JAMES STENTZEL (James Stentzel, a missionary-journalist who has covered events in South Korea from Tokyo and Seoul for the past five years, wrote these observations for Pacific News Service...

...A democratic parliament, he argues, would not vote funds for the increased military expenditures that would be necessary to compensate for an anticipated cutback in American aid...

...Kim was reportedly much encouraged by the United Nations vote at the last General Assembly session urging withdrawal of U.S...

...In the evening the streets of downtown Seoul, polluted though they may be, bustle with well dressed people of all ages, some shopping in the many fine stores, others just strolling and enjoying themselves...

...Intelligence reports indicate, however, that despite the North Korean tunnels discovered last year at the Demilitarized Zone, DPRK forces are not deployed for an attack on the South...

...It is even a crime carrying the death penalty for a student to miss classes without an approved excuse...

...Kim apparently believes the growing dissension in the South reflects pro-communist sentiments, but nothing could be further from the truth...

...As these Koreans see it, the United States should, for the time being, maintain its military presence in the South...

...They are, understandably, extremely sensitive to suggestions that they have "sold out," and they justify their political participation as an effort to contribute to the nation's well-being, not to advance their own ambitions...

...And a few weeks later eighteen of South Korea's most distinguished citizens — including sixty-two-year-old Lee Tae Yong, Korea's first woman lawyer and a recent recipient of the Magsaysay Award, her seventy-two-year-old husband, a former foreign minister, and seventy-nine-year-old Yun Po Sun, former president of the Republic — were given prison sentences ranging from three to five years for the heinous crime of reading a declaration of human rights at an ecumenical mass and thereby, through some curious twist of government rationale, allegedly inviting attack from the North...

...The latter group hopes to facilitate this process by insisting that the government begin immediately to outline the steps it intends to take to ensure the relaxation of repression once the goals of the current five-year plan are achieved and the North thus no longer poses a serious threat...

...First, they suggest that negotiations on the specifics of military aid should be conducted on a case-by-case basis...

...His "crime" was to charge in his 1971 campaign, quite correctly, that Park intended to declare martial law...

...This depressing recitation could go on and on...

...policymakers — should make it a point to meet with opposition elements and intellectuals, as well as with Korean leadership, to demonstrate that America's concern is the survival of South Korea, but not necessarily of the Park regime...

...In short, the impression of tranquillity— if that word is ever applicable to contemporary Asia — is belied by these ugly events...