A Marine’s Death Deals a Blow to South Korea’s National Security

During the period of unprecedented downpours in mid-July in North Gyeongsang Province, one estuary turned into a torrent, dragging two people downstream. The Republic of Korea Marine Corps sent in a search party, but several marines were also swept up in the rapids.

One of them, Private Chae, didn’t make it out alive.

At first the nation was grateful for the corps and mourned Chae’s death in the line of duty. Yet the tragedy turned out to be the consequence of professional negligence on the part of the top brass, and the subsequent investigation turned nasty. Now, the entire military is reeling from the repercussions.

For a start, the floodwaters were too strong for anybody to brave, let alone locate and rescue other people. Choppers and lifeboats were the only option – just as the first responders were doing. The thought of sending marines into the water hadn’t even crossed the mind of the commander of the Marine Corps 1st Division’s 7th Artillery Battalion, where Chae belonged. Yet the division commander, Maj. Gen. Lim Sung-geun, ordered precisely that: “Go knee-deep and poke everywhere,” he told his underlings.

That the Marine Corps chose the artillery battalion for the job was another senseless decision. Unlike the rapid response force and the special reconnaissance battalion, artillery marines hardly train in water.

On top of that, Chae was a private fresh out of bootcamp, which meant that he had only received rudimentary aquatic training during basic drills. At the time, however, the corps sent Chae and his comrades into the roiling water without life vests and other safety kits.

It seems clear that the supposed rescue mission was doomed from the outset. But that may not have mattered to the division commander who gave the order. Rather, public relations and grandstanding were on Maj. Gen. Lim’s mind.

In the texts between Lim and his staff, he gloated over the media coverage of his men and reminded everyone that the media and the people were always watching. He instructed the marines not to smile, to wear red T-shirts “so that everyone can see us,” and to salute well when he visited the site. He said not a single word about his troops’ safety.

Texts shared by the officers overlooking the operation revealed that the commander raved about “indoctrination” so that the marines would behave well in public. One lieutenant colonel admitted that the whole thing “was staged for strategic communication.” (More often than not, the limelight fastracks a commander’s promotion.) Some officers notified their base that the water had swollen up to the marines’ chest, but the higher-ups told them to continue.

Based on these findings, the head of the Marine Corps’ investigation unit, Colonel Park Jung-hun, charged eight officers with “professional negligence leading to manslaughter.”

Under the 2021 amendment to the Military Court Act – introduced to root out the military’s habit of concealing deaths resulting from bullying and sexual assault – the military should refer cases involving deaths to civilian authorities. On July 30, Park submitted his investigation report to Defense Minister Lee Jong-sup, who agreed with the content and signed off on transferring the case to the civilian police, as per the new procedure.

On July 31, however, the Defense Ministry canceled Park’s scheduled briefings to the press and the National Assembly. Then the ministry’s legal adviser allegedly pressured Park on the phone to drop the suspects’ names and charges from his report, especially those of Park’s superiors, Lim and one brigadier commander.

Lee then commanded Park to delay referring the matter to the civilian authorities, overturning his own approval from the day before. Park considered this to be judicial interference by the ministry and handed over his report to the civilian police on August 2.

Since then, the ministry has done everything it can to silence Park. In early August, the ministry accused him of being a “ringleader of mass insubordination” – a charge historically leveled against rebels and leaders of coups d’etat – and dismissed him from the top investigating position. It also carried out a search and seizure operation against Park without any explanations.

The Defense Ministry Prosecutor’s Office wrested the report from the civilian police, a move that stifled the Marine Corps’ independent investigative authority and trampled the law dictating the  smooth transition of a military case to a civilian body. The ministry’s Criminal Investigation Command scrapped the initial report and absolved most of the officers under suspicion. Then on August 21, Lee defended Lim in front of cameras, saying, “It’s the defense minister’s responsibility not to criminalize an innocent person.”

On August 30, the ministry requested an arrest warrant for Park.

In the request form, however, the ministry itself revealed that Lee had given instructions not to specify any suspects in the report. That contradicted Lee’s assertion that he didn’t give any orders to influence the outcome of the criminal investigation.

But Park alleges that it isn’t just the defense minister who abused their authority to meddle in the judicial process.

The president’s national security office requested and received Park’s report and the script for his press briefing; it was canceled shortly after. On July 30, there was a meeting convened by President Yoon Suk-yeol. According to Park’s statement, the Marine Corps’ commandant who attended the meeting told him that the president was furious at the report and ordered Lee to water it down. When Park produced the relevant evidence implicating the president, the ministry filed an arrest warrant based on “the need to prevent him from leaking” more damning materials to the public.

After the opposition Democratic Party called on the Corruption Investigation Office to step in on September 5, Lee tendered his resignation to Yoon. Soon after, Yoon announced that he would sack the secretary to the president for national defense and the second deputy director of national security. All of them, including Lee, were present at the meeting where Yoon allegedly arm-twisted everyone to redact Park’s report.

The Center for Military Human Rights, a local civil society group, argued that the president is trying to tie up loose ends by removing those with direct knowledge of his conduct. Meanwhile, the president’s office maintains that the replacement of these officials has nothing to do with Chae’s death, nor with covering up their involvement in murking Park’s investigation. Rather, it says, the president wants to fill the positions with those who have more international experience.

Still, the decision has raised eyebrows in both its timing and substance. This scale of the simultaneous reshuffling of the president’s top national security wonks is unheard of. Also, given that Lee has been hailed as the right man to beef up South Korea-U.S. security ties, his abrupt resignation has no other clear motivation than to protect the president. Abuse of authority is an impeachable crime and everyone understands the gravity of what’s at stake.

The Democratic Party is now pushing for a special counsel to investigate all the involved parties, which could potentially touch even the president. In the meantime, South Korea’s national security is receiving an unexpected blow – and Park is still being summoned by the ministry for insubordination charges.