Lawrence Peck
The shocking revelations of how Korea's leftist Minister of Unification Chung Dong-young publicly leaked secret and very sensitive intelligence information which had been provided to the ROK by the U.S. have caused a crisis in U.S.-ROK relations. As a direct result of this serious scandal, the U.S. has at least temporarily suspended the sharing of sensitive intelligence information with the ROK. This breach of trust from the highest level of the left-wing administration of President Lee Jae-myung was made worse by weeks of dishonest obfuscations by President Lee and denials by Minister Chung, who attempted to "interpret" the fiasco in deeply misleading ways. The first attempt at deception by Chung was his false claim that the information which he leaked was already publicly known, but that excuse was soon revealed to have been false. The next attempt at a cover-up of the damage was the false denial by Lee administration officials of any suspension of intelligence sharing by the U.S. That claim was also soon revealed to have been false.
This scandal and the reaction by U.S. intelligence officials is in some ways reminiscent of an earlier case. In 1947, the U.S. temporarily suspended the sharing of certain intelligence information with Great Britain and Australia. This occurred when the U.S. learned that in 1946, an Australian government official with access to British intelligence reports was a secret communist who had leaked top secret information to a Soviet intelligence agent. I am not implying that Chung is a communist or a secret agent, but merely pointing out how his reckless leaking of sensitive intelligence information resulted in extremely negative consequences for the ROK and harm to the U.S.-ROK alliance.
In the years immediately prior to North Korea's 1950 invasion of the ROK, there were significant security breaches involving U.S. military forces in Korea. These leaks involved Korean and American communists who supported North Korea and sometimes worked together. One of these Korean communists was Alice Hyun, reportedly one of the first Koreans to be born in Hawaii, who during a stay in Shanghai became acquainted with communist Pak Hon-yong, and apparently undertook missions for Korean communists and the Comintern in Asia. Returning to Hawaii, she was involved with the U.S. Communist Party there, and worked for the U.S. War Department as a linguist during World War Two. At the end of the war, she went to Tokyo to work for General MacArthur's U.S. Army headquarters, but she soon transferred to Seoul, where she worked as an interpreter for U.S. Army Intelligence under the U.S. Military Government. As an assistant section head, Hyun was able to hire communists to work for the U.S. Military Government, and she collaborated closely with non-Korean communist civilians and American communists serving in the U.S. Army and the Military Government in Korea. She and her comrades turned the Information and Education section of U.S. Army Intelligence in Seoul into a secret base of communist operations.
Eventually, U.S. counterintelligence learned of this communist cell operating in their midst in South Korea, and discovered that Hyun and her Korean and American comrades were not only interfering with the operations of the U.S. Military Government, but also serving as points of connection between the South Korean Communist Party and Korean communists and supporters of North Korea living in the U.S. Hyun and her communist cell were found to have been distributing in Korea a communist newspaper, the Independence Shinmun (독립 신문), published in Los Angeles by Korean American supporters of North Korea. Hyun and her brother, who was also a communist, were in direct contact with South Korean Communist leader Pak Hon-young. Most serious of all was the finding of U.S. counterintelligence that Hyun and her group were leaking sensitive information to the South Korean Communist Party and the U.S. Communist Party, which was obviously a major breach of security. As a result of this communist cell being uncovered, Hyun and some of her non-Korean comrades were accused of working to paralyze the efforts of the U.S. Military Government, removed from their positions, and sent back to the U.S. in mid-1946. This was the first case of Korean communists and leftists collaborating with American communists and leftists living in South Korea, which is a trend that continues to this day.
After her return to the U.S., Hyun became actively involved with the Korean American communist group in Los Angeles and worked with their pro-North Korean newspaper Independence Shinmun. This group in 1948 sent a letter of loyalty to Kim Il-sung, in which they vowed to work on behalf of the North's regime in the U.S. This Korean American communist group in Los Angeles was the earliest forerunner of the current pro-North Korean movement in the U.S. In 1949, Hyun fled from the U.S. to North Korea via Eastern Europe, but because of her previous close ties to the South Korean communists and Pak Hon-yong, who later headed the South Korean Workers Party, she was reportedly executed along with Pak during Kim Il-sung's purges of the South Korean communists in the mid-1950s. Her son, who remained in Czechoslovakia, reportedly committed suicide. As for the letter of support which Korean American communists sent to Kim Il-sung in 1948, it was apparently discovered after the liberation of Pyongyang early in the Korean War, and this enabled the U.S. authorities to investigate and attempt to deport some members of that communist cell.
Another serious breach of security occurred during those years. This other case involved the communist Kim Soo-im in South Korea. Ms. Kim had a troubled childhood, but was later raised by and worked for American missionaries and doctors, becoming a competent English interpreter. However, she fell in love with communist Lee Kang-guk, who became attracted to Marxism while studying in Japan and subsequently went to study in Berlin where he joined the German Communist Party and was apparently involved in work for the Comintern. He returned to Korea and to engage in communist activities in the 1930s, and began his relationship with Kim, who was then married, in the 1940s. After the liberation of Korea, Lee joined the so-called "People's Committees" in the South and served as a close aide to communist leader Pak Hon-yong. Kim was hired as an interpreter for the U.S. Military Government, allegedly with the help of Lee and the communists, and she began a living with a U.S. Army colonel in charge of the military police, who was also then married, and with whom she apparently had a son.
When U.S. authorities discovered the counterfeiting activities of communists in the South Korean Workers' Party in 1946, Pak and Lee Kang-guk fled to the North. Lee did so with the help of his lover Kim Soo-im, who reportedly drove him in the car of her other lover, the American colonel. Kim then allegedly assisted in hiding South Korean Workers Party members, including her brother, who were fleeing the authorities, and smuggled funds from the North into the South. She even reportedly hid a communist official in the home of the American colonel with whom she was living. Kim's activities were discovered and she was arrested in 1950 and charged with aiding the North and the communists in the South and of leaking information she obtained from the American colonel about plans for Korean police after the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the South in 1949. A court sentenced her to death and she was executed shortly before or after the North's invasion in 1950. As for her lover Lee, he became a high-ranking foreign affairs official in the North and served in other roles there until after the Korean War, when his past work with Pak Hon-yong and the South Korean communists doomed him. When Kim Il-sung purged the South Korean communist faction in the North in the mid-1950s, Lee and Park were executed.
These cases, however, were not the only instances of national security breaches and leaks damaging to the ROK and the U.S. by interpreters and others working for the U.S. military and within ROK political circles. More recently, when the "Ilshimhoe" (일심회) North Korean spy ring involving members of South Korea's left-wing Democratic Labor Party was uncovered by ROK authorities in 2006, one of those involved as an agent recruited by the North was the Korean American Michael Chang (Jang Min-ho), who met with North Korean intelligence agents in China and North Korea while he was living in the ROK. Prior to that, he had visited North Korea several times while working in the U.S. for an information technology support center operated by the ROK Ministry of Information and Communication, In an ominous echo of the earlier cases noted above, it was discovered that Chang had served in the U.S. Army for several years in the early 1990s, and that after he moved to the ROK, his wife worked as an interpreter in the office of a U.S. Army lieutenant colonel at the headquarters of U.S. forces in Seoul. Chang reportedly received at least $19,000 in funds from the North, and was awarded the "National Reunification Medal" by the North in recognition of his work.
Although ROK investigators exposed the "Ilshimhoe" espionage network during the presidency of leftist Roh Moo-hyun, there were widespread suspicions at the time that the Roh administration had attempted to prevent a more complete investigation into the scandal since it may have led to members of his party and his government. After Chang served his prison sentence, he was deported back to the U.S., where he was greeted as a hero by pro-North Korean and communist groups and activists in Los Angeles. He became very active in hardcore pro-North groups, such as the U.S. branch of the Korean Prisoners of Conscience Support Association (미주 양심수후원회), Minjok Tongshin (민족통신), and the communist Party for Socialism and Liberation.
In their visits to the U.S., left-wing Korean politicians and officials of left-wing ROK administrations have also been involved in situations which could have and may have resulted in leaks of national security information and were, at a minimum, potential or actual breaches of reasonable security precautions meant to prevent such leaks. There have been four particularly outrageous instances of ROK officials, who were directly involved in foreign policy and national security matters, having meetings with such pro-North individuals in the U.S. and thereby failing to observe reasonable security precautions.
The first case occurred in 2017 and involves the American Marxist Tim Shorrock, who has been affiliated with pro-North Korean groups, demands an end to the U.S.-ROK military alliance, and seems to deny the fundamental legitimacy of the ROK. In June of 2017, two weeks after leftist Moon Jae-in became president, a delegation of officials from the ROK's National Security Office visited Washington, D.C., led by Moon's top national security advisor Chung Eui-yong. One of the main reasons for Chung 's visit and meetings with U.S. officials was to discuss the deployment of the THAAD anti-missile system in the ROK, which Moon had opposed. Shorrock wrote on social media at the time that he had dinner "with someone on this trip." It is not clear if the Korean who was part of this delegation was a journalist or an official of the National Security Office, but if it was a national security official working for Chung with whom Shorrock met, that would have been a potential breach of national security.
I am not implying that Shorrock was an agent of influence for North Korea, as are some of his comrades. His arrest for assault and battery makes him a bad candidate for recruitment by any foreign government. I am not aware of any meetings which Shorrock has had with North Korean agents, but he has actively collaborated with pro-North activists from groups such as Women Cross DMZ, the former 6.15 Implementation Committee (6.15 공동선언실천 미국위원회), and Nodutdol (노둣돌) who have for years been meeting with North Korean intelligence agents. Shorrock has been a strong opponent of the THAAD deployment in the ROK, and a defender of the sabotage planner and traitor Lee Seok-ki. If it was an ROK national security official under Chung who met Shorrock, and not simply a journalist, and if that official had shared any sensitive information with Shorrock, that would have been a security breach. If Shorrock had even inadvertently revealed any sensitive information which an ROK official may have shared with him to one of his comrades who was in contact with North Korean agents, those friends of Shorrock might have reported such information to the North's agents. As it turns out, it may have been Chung himself who was involved in leaking information about THAAD. He has been indicted and is currently on trial for allegedly having shared secret information about the THAAD deployment with far-left anti-THAAD protesters and officials at the Chinese embassy in Seoul.
The second case occurred in 2019 when Hong Ik-pyo and Lee Jae-jeong, two leftist members of the ROK National Assembly from the Korea Democratic Party, visited the U.S. to meet with Christine Ahn, the leader of the pro-North front group Women Cross DMZ, and to participate in an event organized by Chung Ki-yeol, a fanatically pro-North activist who essentially acts as an agent of influence for the North. Hong and Lee participated in Chung's so-called "Global Peace Forum on Korea," an event filled with leading, hardcore pro-North activists, several of whom, such as Chung Ki-yeol and Lee Keum-soon, were in contact for years with the North's intelligence agents at the United Nations. However, in this case, Hong and Lee did not need to worry about any information they shared with those three individuals possibly being reported to the North's agents, because North Korean intelligence agent Ri Ki-ho from the North's United Nations mission was himself present at that event with Hong and Lee, and posed for photos with them.
It was outrageous that members of the ROK National Assembly participated in an event organized by an extremist fanatic and North Korean loyalist such as Chung Ki-yeol and attended by other hardcore supporters of the North including American communists from the Party for Socialism and Liberation. However, it never resulted in a scandal, since the ROK media which briefly reported on the forum failed to note that it was a pro-North event. Chung, who has lectured at Kim Il-sung University in Pyongyang and Chosun University of the North Korean-controlled Chongryon (총련) in Tokyo, and was involved in North Korea's efforts to compel the ROK to return defectors to the North, was probably proud that he was able to gain legitimacy by having Hong and Lee attend his forum. The North considered Chung's work in the U.S. to be so important that it awarded him a medal and doctorate degree. Clearly, any sensitive information which may have been disclosed by Hong or Lee at that event, even if inadvertently, would have been reported to Pyongyang.
The third case occurred in 2019, when Moon Chung-in, an advocate and architect of the ROK's failed "Sunshine Policy" of appeasement of the Pyongyang regime, visited Washington, D.C. to lobby in support of North Korea's demand for a no preconditions peace agreement with the U.S. Moon did this lobbying together with Women Cross DMZ leader Christine Ahn and her late comrade Ms. Hyun Lee, a longtime Nodutdol activist. Moon, who was a top national security advisor to then President Moon Jae-in, potentially breached national security by collaborating and having discussions with pro-North activists such as Ahn and Lee, because both Ahn and Lee's fanatically pro-North group Nodutdol have for years been communicating with North Korean agents at the United Nations and in Pyongyang. As a national security advisor to an ROK president, is it shocking that Moon Chung-in apparently did not care that any sensitive information which he may have shared with those pro-North activists, even inadvertently, may have been reported to the North's agents. Given his far-left views, however, from his hostility to the U.S.-ROK alliance, his blaming Israel for the Hamas atrocities of October 7, 2023, and his sympathetic attitude toward China and North Korea, he seems to be a natural ally for pro-North activists in the U.S. As a top advisor to the ROK president, the fact that he collaborated with pro-North forces in the U.S. was damaging since it served to legitimize such extremists.
The fourth case also occurred in 2019, and was another potential leak of sensitive national security information due to an interpreter. In that year, Lee In-young, then a far-left National Assemblyman of the Korea Democratic Party who in 2020 was appointed as President Moon Jae-in's Minister of Unification, visited Washington, D.C. to meet members of the U.S. Congress. In one such meeting, with far-left Democratic Party Senator Jeff Merkley, Lee used Hyun Lee, the pro-North activist from Women Cross DMZ and Nodutdol, as his interpreter. It is not known who made the extremely reckless decision to use Ms. Lee as the interpreter for this meeting, but regardless of who chose her, it was certainly a potential breach of national security. It is unclear why Lee did not rely on the ROK embassy to provide an interpreter. Considering Ms. Lee's pro-North views and her deep involvement with Women Cross DMZ and Nodutdol, whose members have for years been in contact with North Korean intelligence agents, the use of her to interpret at the meeting between Lee and Merkley could have potentially resulted in the contents of their discussion, including sensitive information, being leaked to North Korean agents or used by pro-North forces. Like the above-mentioned incidents, this potential leak should have caused a scandal in Seoul, and perhaps resulted in Lee's nomination as Minister of Unification being withdrawn or rejected, but the ROK media did not report on this incident.
All the above-mentioned actual and potential breaches of national security, which did result or could have resulted in leaks of sensitive or classified information to the enemies of the ROK and the U.S., were avoidable. These were cases in which common sense security measures were ignored, due to the underestimation or denial of the backgrounds and views of the individuals involved. Even in cases where information characterized as top secret was not at risk, other information which would nevertheless have been of significant use to North Korea and its agents was involved. The solution to such lapses, actual and potential, is for government officials and politicians the U.S. and the ROK to recognize the existence, nature, and role of pro-North Korean and other extreme-left individuals, and to prevent such persons from having access to sensitive information, which they might share, purposely or inadvertently, with North Korean agents or others who have been in contact with such agents.
Chung Dong-young, Minister of Unification
By Lawrence Peck
Lawrence Peck has been researching and monitoring the activities of pro-North Korea and far-left groups and activists in the U.S. for over 25 years. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and a Juris Doctor degree from Loyola Law School of Los Angeles. For several years, he lived and worked in Korea for some large Korean business groups, and he is currently an advisor to the North Korea Freedom Coalition of the U.S. Lawrence may be contacted at the following address: write.to.lawrence.now@gmail.com
Lawrence Peck
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