A Plea for Help from South Korea Facing Crisis
2019-7-25, KORGAD (Korea Retired Generals and Admirals Defending the nation) [대수장(대한민국을 수호하는 장성단)]
KORGAD is asking veterans (and others) for help, including helping to publicize the critical situation in South Korea. The current crisis in South Korea could mean the loss of an ally (South Korea), loss of freedom, and the loss of millions of lives.
[The above video is in English. Additionally, the text of the above video is below.]
Dear veterans who fought for the democracy of South Korea,
My name is Dong Yon Kim and I am a former ROK (Republic of Korea) Air Force Officer and an honorary member of Korean Retired Generals & Admirals Defending the Nation (abbreviated as KORGAD), which was established on January 30, 2019, as a non-profit, non-partisan, and private NGO concerned about national security of the Republic of Korea.
Today, I am speaking on behalf of 850 members of Korean Retired Generals & Admirals Defending the Nation (KORGAD) and Korean War Veterans, namely General Paik Sun Yup. From now on, I will say the word “we” to represent the members of KORGAD and Veterans including General Paik Sun Yup.
We the Retired Generals and Admirals have been patiently waiting; we have been trying our best, because we want South Korea to be as Democratic as the United States of America.
However, currently, we are facing a tidal wave of challenges, which we have never expected, and find ourselves useless against it. Currently, we are trying our best to defeat this unprecedented challenge. Despite our tireless effort, the challenge we are facing gains more power and is trying to subvert our nation, South Korea. Therefore, we cannot leave this challenge as only our problem.
We are ashamed of ourselves. We are so shameful. We are so humiliated and dishonored that we hang our heads. We are disgraced because we have no power to defeat the challenge by ourselves. Now, we have no fancy uniforms, no firepower, but old bones, and bare fists. Yes, we have nothing, but we are full of spirit, which veterans all share. Our invincible spirits never age and stay with us and sustain us. Because of this spirit, we have decided to plead our story to our Korean War veterans: brothers and sisters. Yes, we are currently ashamed but being ashamed is better than feeling regret after the loss of our democratic nation, so we rather speak to you. We cannot close our eyes with unbearable regret so we speak up.
We came to the reality that we had to send a rescue request to the Korean Veterans who shed blood together in the Korean soil. Dear brothers, please listen to our shameful story of request.
The current situation in South Korea is happening without the knowledge of our brothers and sisters overseas. The past Korean War was the same. 4 a.m., June 25, 1950. It was a Sunday; most of the South Korean Soldiers at that time were on a vacation. Nobody expected North Korea’s sudden attack on South Korea. That’s how it all started.
At that time nobody knew what was coming. The current situation in South Korea is the same as the past. Currently even the South Korean people are unaware of the seriousness. News about South Korea is very limited overseas. Nobody ever delivers the story from deep inside of South Korea.
Currently, Korean War Veterans of the world are proud of themselves, so are we. We are proud of ourselves and we made a choice with no regrets. However, our blood and sweat spread in this Korean soil may turn out to be for nothing. We only fought for this country’s democracy but that meaning maybe faded in the future, because of the current challenge we face today. Please pay attention to our story.
South Korea has been a democratic country for the last 66 years after the Korean War, but the journey was rough. We have faced multiple crises and challenges. Sometimes, we had many twists and turns in our history. Also, there were small and large provocations by North Korea.
After all, these were all necessary steps in the maturation of democracy within South Korea. While we are building a stronger democracy in South Korea, North Korea could not stand it. North Korea exploited all possible ways and means to interrupt the establishment of democracy in South Korea.
On January 21, 1969, North Korea sent Special Forces to assassinate South Korean President Park Chung-hee. The attempted assassination failed, but North Korea did not stop there. In 1983, another assassination attempt happened in Rangoon, Burma; North Korea killed 21 presidential cabinet members with a timed bomb. Luckily, our President, Chun Doo-hwan survived.
North Korea tried to disturb the first Summer Olympics in South Korea. In 1987 North Korea sent covert agents to explode Korean Airline in mid-air, killing all passengers.
In 2010, North Korea mortar shelled Yeonpyeong-do (Yeonpyeong Island) also known as YP-do. In the same year, North Korea torpedo attacked the South Korean Naval Ship Cheonan, which killed 46 sailors.
In recent years, North Korea developed a new strategy of provocation and expanded their field of attack to the cyber domain. North Korea cyber-attacked South Korean financial and military networks and stole critical information from South Korea. Such attack not only aimed South Korea, but also our ally, the United States. In 2014, North Korea cyber-attacked the U.S.-based Sony Pictures Entertainment.
In 2017, North Korea spread the global scale cyber-attack with Wannacry Ransomware, which damaged 230,000 computers in 150 countries.
In 2013, We caught North Korea’s spy-ring in South Korea, which was led by the former South Korean Congressman. This spy ring linked to multiple spies within South Korean society and they planned to subvert South Korea.
The most recent events happened on June 25th of this year, 2019. It was 69th anniversary of the Korean War. Anti-American activist rushed into the U.S. Embassy in South Korea with the vehicle. A vehicle carried a full of explosive gas containers. This may sound like the IED attacks on the U.S. base in the Middle East, but this happened in this country, South Korea. Additionally, Seoul City Mayor mobilized government contractors and police forces to demolish the South Korea’s Our Republican Party’s Anti-North Korea rally site in Seoul. Government contractors violently oppressed innocent citizens. This is not the story from Hong Kong, but South Korea in recent weeks.
In 2018, April 27 Inter-Korea Summit occurred in Panmunjom, Korea. We the Veterans have eye-witnessed the moment when the two Koreas’ leaders hugged each other. We all thought Korean Unification will come soon before we die, but about a week after Inter-Korea Summit, May 3rd midnight, in the middle of international water, South Korean Tanker JEY HOPE stayed along with the North Korean Tanker, NAMSAN 8. This North Korean tanker has been subjected to sanctions by the U.S. and the United Nations.
This is the first incident of South Korean vessel’s suspicious ship-to-ship transfer of oil to North Korea. Until now, South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs remains silent from the inquiries of the international community about this ship-to-ship transfer of oil to North Korea.
Recently, 4 escapees of North Korea came to South Korea via sea, but South Korean government sent 2 of 4 escapees back to North Korea within a week. South Korea’s only Intelligence Service, National Intelligence Service (NIS), destroyed the escapees’ boat. Therefore, the US Intelligence counterpart lost its chance to investigate the incident. What I am telling you now is only a few stories of what’s happening in South Korea.
Current president of South Korea is a former “human rights” attorney but the western media do not know the fact that he has a long record of Anti-America and Anti-government activism. When the current South Korean president was elected, the U.S. media praised and described him as a great negotiator. He led the Anti-America and Pro-North Korea movement in the 1980s, and most of his fellow comrades are the current cabinets and advisers of the president.
For example, Im Jong-seok, former chief of staff of South Korean Presidential office was the leader of National Council of Student Representatives or Jeondaehyeop. He sent his fellow student Lim Su-kyung to Pyongyang and let her participate in the North Korea’s COMINTERN (Communist International) event. She even met with Kim Il Sung, the first leader of North Korea. Im Jong Seok was the North Korea’s Liaison Officer to Seoul and he disseminated instructions to other comrades in South Korea.
This story of South Korea resembles the 1970s New Left Movement in the U.S. In 1960~70s in the U.S., there were multiple subversive groups, Fifth Columns: Students for Democratic Society (SDS) and Weather Underground Organization (WUO). These groups systematically promoted the Anti-Vietnam War movement and interrupted democracy in the U.S. Based on the CIA investigation, many of them linked to foreign governments, namely Communist Soviet Union and DPRK, orchestrated these groups in the background. (CIA reference: MH/CHAOS – Frank Rafalko)
Now, South Korean President, who has a long record of subversion, and his fellow comrades are in charge of South Korea. Can you imagine if the U.S. president was a former member of Weather Underground Organization? This unimaginable situation is the current situation in South Korea. A former human rights attorney, Moon Jae-in remains silent about the human rights abuses of North Korea. Also, he ordered South Korean Delegation to the United Nations to abstain the resolution for North Korea Human Rights. This story was revealed by the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of South Korea, Song Min Sun.
Additionally, North Korea has tortured innocent American student, Otto Warmbier and still has not apologized about the Otto’s death. North Korea denied their guilt.
The current president of South Korea did not participate in the event to commemorate fallen naval warriors of Cheonan naval ship for 2 consecutive years. The current president of South Korea did not participate in the event to commemorate Korean War veterans for 3 consecutive years.
On April 27, 2018 after Inter-Korea Summit, South Korean president announced “Panmunjom Declaration.” Also, September 19th of the same year, two Koreas signed the Military Agreement.
The document agreed by both sides were delivered in two languages: Korean and English. However, English version contained multiple disguised wordings. The U.S. media do not know this fact. In the Korean version both Koreas used the word, “Min Jok” (민족). In the Korean version of declaration, this word Min Jok appeared 10 times. This is North Korea-driven language which contains the embedded purpose of unification under communism. In the English version, two Koreas used the term “Blood Relations,” for the word Min Jok. This is not the direct translation but vague description. Min Jok actually means the “omogenous ethnicity,” or ‘ethnic superiority.’ Such term was used by the Nazi Germany under Hitler. Min Jok literally means “Our Korean Ethnic Superiority.” The reason why North Korea wants to emphasize homogeneous ethnicity is because North Korea wants to withdraw the U.S. forces out of the Korean Peninsula.
This strategy has been the core concept of North Korea which sustained for 3 successions of North Korea. Despite the fact of this concern, nobody pointed out the problem. September 19th Inter Korea Military agreement shows that South Korea allowed the inclusion of North Korea’s military strategy in the document.
Representatively, South Korea destroyed the Guard Posts at the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) between the two Koreas and put a white cloth on all of the ROK Army’s forward artillery and naval guns on warships as a symbol of peace, while North Korea did not reciprocate. Also, two Koreas agreed to extend “No Fly Zone” up to 40 km towards South Korea. Based on this new agreement, South Korea’s ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance) assets are no longer able to monitor North Korea effectively.
South Korean Air Force ISR assets cannot perform the mission properly. At that time, the South Korean Ministry of Defense proudly said there will be no problem with the warning capability and systems. However, on May 4th and 9th of this year, South Korea failed to detect North Korea’s short-range tactical missiles. It was a surprise launch by North Korea. South Korean Defense Ministry detected the missiles only 1 minute before the launch. This is an obvious warning failure. Recently, on June 15th, South Korean Navy did not know until a ship carrying four North Korean defectors docked at a South Korean port. This is the current state of South Korean military’s combat-readiness.
We the South Korea’s generals and veterans have brought up the problem of North Korean military countless times to South Korean government. On November 21, 2018, General Paik Sun Yup led our veterans and officially invited South Korea government’s key members including former and current Ministers of Defense and military chiefs, including the former Minister of Defense, Song Young-moo, who signed the Inter-Korea Military Agreement, but not a single member responded to our official invitation and no one showed up to our interpellation event. The South Korean government has not yet responded to our questions about this unfair Inter-Korea Military Agreement. It has been nearly 1 year, but we have not received its answer.
Currently, South Korea’s ruling party, which is President Moon’s party, enacted a new law to suspend the National Security Law of South Korea. The National Security Law of South Korea is the only law that provide the legal basis to catch spies, but this law will gradually fade away, losing its relevance.
South Korea’s only intelligence Agency, NIS (National Intelligence Service) is no longer collecting intelligence about its number 1 threat, North Korea. Since January of 2018, the Moon Jae-in administration ordered NIS, National Intelligence Service, to transfer its North Korea division to the police. The South Korean Police has no ISR capability against North Korea and has no system to share its intelligence with the U.S. Intelligence Community.
President Moon also planned to change the name of the NIS to International Security Intelligence Service, which is known as ISIS. Not only did he degrade the capability of the NIS, but also created dysfunction within the South Korean Defense Security Command. Defense Security Command is South Korea’s military intelligence agency. A year ago, the South Korean Prosecutors’ office summoned former commander Lee Jae-su of the Defense Security Command for the allegation of political involvement but such a claim had no legitimate proof. During the inhumane investigation, Lieutenant General Lee Jae-su committed suicide to prove his innocence In his suicide note, he condemned the unfair judgment of the current administration and he left a memo that his innocent subordinates were not involved with the allegation. Now the Defense Security Command also got rid of its function to collect information about North Korea. The current administration is considering putting the photo of a former chief of Intelligence, Kim Jae Kyu, who assassinated President Park Chung Hee on the wall in the Defense Security Command headquarters. After he killed the former president of South Korea, Kim Jae Kyu said at the court, “it was a Revolution.” This current government of South Korea tried to commemorate the assassin who was known to be anti-government.
Recently, the South Korean government made a plan to commemorate the Korean War with North Korea for next year. The Korean War is not a finished war, but we are in an armistice. North Korea still calls itself the victor of the Korean War. They teach their people South Korea and the U.S. attacked North Korea first, but the current South Korean government is trying to jointly hold next year’s inter-Korean event to commemorate the Korean War with the enemy, North Korea.
This ridiculous situation is currently happening in South Korea and it is just the tip of the iceberg.
South Korea is in danger. We the veterans came to the conclusion that the current situation in Korea is just as same as the Korean War. Our situation now is the dawn of the D-Day of the Korean War. A flower of democracy in South Korea is about to fall. We cannot cover everything happening in Korea in this short video.
We have now decided that there is no other way but to appeal to veterans around the world. Soon, the South Korean government is going to accept the system of North Korea. If South Korea becomes a Communist country, the blood and sweat that we shed in this country together will be wasted. We have to fight back together to defend the democracy of South Korea.
Now, we have nightmares and wake up in the middle of the night because of the fear. North Korea never changes. Communists never change. North Korea, while in talks with the United States, reactivated a nuclear facility and fired many missiles. It is a naive delusion to expect North Korea to change. We have been talking to North Korea for decades. The six-party talks also failed and the end of every negotiation has returned to a stronger North Korea. North Korean Kim Jong Un never gives up his luxury. Before we expect them to change, we have to change first. We have to fight. We have to unite. We have fought for the democracy of South Korea that our children will enjoy. We will continue the fight even after our death. We have to fight because we need to honor the cause of our fathers who fought before us.
Tell veterans around the world. Our brothers and sisters, we need your help. Publicize the crisis in Korea and mobilize all available means and methods. This is a great opportunity for us to reunite after 69 years.
Let’s meet again for the proud South Korean democracy. Let’s unite again for a beautiful future.
If you want to help us, please reach out. At the bottom of this screen, there is an email address, through which you can contact us.
The email address is vofgeneral@gmail.com
You can contact us through that email.
Thank you for listening to our long plea. We sincerely thank all veterans of the world.
Again, this is our request of support and I am representing 850 retired veterans including General Paik Sun Yup.
Thank you.
