Fashion Show
Between late summer and early autumn, Lee Ki-jo lived at such a pace that the turning of the season passed him by unnoticed.
He was doing everything in his power to strengthen Cheongsan Group's underlying competitiveness.
His first task was to scrutinize the firms around Yeongdeungpo more closely than ever before. Taking his lesson from the headers and rolling machines he had salvaged out of a shuttered plant, he went back for another look even at factories that had already gone under.
Hunting for a decent plating works and a capable aluminum shop, he placed an order whenever a factory came into view. The terminals that went into a radio's switches had to be plated, and shops able to lay a clean coat on thin sheet metal without damaging it were rare. Absurdly enough, some of the firms he commissioned melted the plates outright, or left dust clinging to the plated face—either because they had failed to get the concentration of sulfuric acid right, or because they had been careless about the pretreatment that stripped away dust and oil. The use of electricity in the bath brought troubles of its own. When the current ran uneven, the plated surface pitted.
The aluminum shops were no better. Aluminum was used widely on the outer shells of radios, so it had to look good even at a glance, but the results were a shambles. A cut face so rough it left a step hardly counted as a fault. Most of the shops could not draw a handsome hairline finish in the metal, nor manage a proper anodizing to keep it from oxidizing.
Ki-jo cast aside the firms whose skill fell short and set aside a handful that showed promise. On September 11, while he was resting after the supplier trials, Baek Nam-il of Taechang Textile came to see him.
"President Lee, busy these days?"
"Not at all, President Baek. How could I be busy?"
"Don't pretend you aren't. Word about you has spread all through Yeongdeungpo."
"What are they saying?"
"That President Lee is out shopping for factories. They say if one suits him, he buys it on the spot."
"He does?"
A hollow laugh escaped him. So his search for shops with real technical skill had been twisted into that.
"Every time I see you, President Lee—I've said it before—I wish you were my little brother. I teach you how to buy factory land, and you turn right around and put it into practice. Does my heart good."
Baek Nam-il was thoroughly mistaken. Ki-jo studied him; the man looked unusually pleased with himself.
"Has something good happened?"
"It has. Oh, it has."
Baek Nam-il sat down on the sofa, crossed his legs, and smiled.
"The Ministry of Commerce and Industry announced its plan for releasing next year's general industrial funds, you know."
Taechang Textile took all manner of government loans several times a year.
"Congratulations. How much did you receive?"
"Four hundred and ninety-two million hwan. Ha ha."
It was an enormous sum. In those days the textile industry took in a great share of the loans the government handed out. Textile goods sold as fast as they could be made, so there was no worry about recovering the money, and the textile firms were careful to pass a portion of each loan along to the Liberal Party. Among the Three White industries that then anchored the economy, a loan to textiles also looked the most respectable—more so than one to flour milling or sugar refining—for textiles were, in their way, a cutting-edge industry.
Ki-jo, though, did not expect Baek Nam-il to spend those five hundred million hwan on developing technology or bringing in machinery.
"Well, skim a little off the five hundred million for the Liberal Party, buy a bit of land, and it's tight. It isn't that much money. Taepyeong Textile got a billion this time."
As if even five hundred million hwan from the government failed to content him, Baek Nam-il shook his head. He envied Samsung and the other great firms as they spread their tentacles into everything, and yet he himself poured his business capital into all the wrong places. Ki-jo found it a pity. He remembered that by the end of 1958 the back wages Taechang Textile had failed to pay its workers would reach two hundred and fifty million hwan. It was not that the company lacked money and the payroll had slipped. The owner was simply putting off payment while he played the moneylender.
"President Lee, we're holding a nylon show before Chuseok. Come and see it."
"A nylon show?"
"That's right. The government keeps telling us to put on fashion shows, so we have to. We're first in nylon, and they say that for the sake of promoting domestic goods Taechang ought to step up. What can you do?"
"Yes…"
"His Excellency President Syngman Rhee stresses a self-reliant economy, and every year they hold a domestic-goods exhibition at Changgyeongwon. You can think of this as cut from the same cloth."
Ki-jo nodded. Once Cheongsan was producing domestic radios, it too would be invited to that exhibition.
"Half the people who come to a fashion show are there to gawk at the models, but ambassadors and American generals get invited as well. It's a chance to widen your connections, so be sure to come."
"You've invited me, President Baek, so of course I ought to go. Please set aside three seats for Cheongsan."
"All right, President Lee. I'll have three seats ready for you in the VIP section. Ha ha."
Looking at Baek Nam-il, Ki-jo recalled the words of Confucius. When three walk together, one among them is sure to be fit to be my teacher. Baek Nam-il was a man who served him as a teacher by negative example. Yet even as that cautionary lesson, he was also a man who proved useful.
On Saturday, September 13, 1958, the Taechang Nylon Fashion Show opened at Gomipa Hall, a large cabaret on Chungmuro.
The place where the show was held had once been the site of Hirata Department Store under Japanese rule. After liberation the Seoul Emporium had risen there, only to burn to the ground, and Gomipa Hall had been built in its place. The ground seemed bound to fire by an unusually deep tie. In 1959 Gomipa Hall would burn and vanish once more, and in 1967 the Daeyeongak Building would go up on the same spot. Used as a hotel and an office block, the Daeyeongak would close its doors after a horrific fire in 1971.
Stepping out of the car, Ki-jo stood a moment lost in thought, gazing up at Gomipa Hall.
"Let's go in."
"Ah—yes, Advisor."
Ki-jo led the two men into the hall. The guests he had brought to the fashion show were James Hausman and Jang Ma-ryang, and before it began neither of them looked pleased to be there.
"What did you drag us out here for? They're just going to parade women's clothes around. Dull as dishwater."
Hausman grumbled as he dropped into a seat near the stage. Ma-ryang sat down wearing the look of a man who had no idea why he had come. Once the show actually started, though, Hausman's expression began, little by little, to change. Korean beauties in traditional hanbok and in nylon passed before his eyes, and he started to smile. When the audience applauded, he clapped along and laughed outright.
"Korea really is full of beautiful women."
Hausman gave Ki-jo's shoulder a tap as he said it.
When the fashion show ended, a banquet for the VIPs began. This was the hour Ki-jo had been waiting for. Of the two days the show would run, the first chiefly invited guests from outside the trade, and the second brought people from the industry itself. After looking over the dignitaries gathered for the banquet, he made his request of Hausman.
"Advisor, would you introduce me to a few diplomats?"
"What?"
At first Hausman refused.
"Let's just go, Ki-jo. I can't stand diplomats. Chatterboxes. Get a hold of you and they never let go."
"Please, Advisor. Just two countries. Germany and Italy."
"Germany and Italy? So it's nothing but diplomats from the war-criminal countries?"
"Then please introduce me to the French diplomat as well."
"Hah. I said I didn't want to, and all I've done is run up the number of countries. Three countries, that's it. Come on."
Among the diplomats stationed in Korea, Hausman was a famous man. He sat in on the State Council, and he had influence even with the president; it could hardly have been otherwise. He brushed past the people who came up to greet him with only the most perfunctory hellos. When he spotted the West German ambassador, he made straight for him.
"Ambassador Hertz, good to see you."
West Germany was a country that had opened ambassadorial relations with the Republic of Korea in 1958. A nation divided after the Second World War, it had moved quickly to ties at that level, perhaps because it shared so much with Korea. Once Hausman had introduced Ambassador Richard Hertz, Ki-jo offered his greeting.
"How do you do, Ambassador? I'm Lee Ki-jo. I run a defense firm here in Korea."
He introduced himself to the West German ambassador, for the moment, as the head of a defense contractor. He wanted to leave a strong impression.
"We also produce bearings and lease industrial machinery. I hope for cooperation with West Germany in the years ahead."
"A pleasure, Mr. Lee. West Germany and South Korea are nations with a great deal in common. I will do what I can for the advancement of both our countries."
Ambassador Hertz said it with a bright smile. He was fluent in English—and not only he. The diplomats of every country posted to Korea had to have English. American influence there was in a class of its own. In a crisis, protecting one's own nationals, or getting them out of Korea, was impossible without American help.
Ki-jo pressed the point with the West German ambassador once more.
"I would like to see West Germany's precise and outstanding machine-industry technology passed on to Korea. Only then can we prevail against the communist state across our border."
"I quite agree."
Ki-jo talked with him a while longer, and they parted with a handshake.
"Now let's go see the Italians. Strange feeling, meeting nobody but Axis men."
Hausman was a veteran who had been wounded in the Battle of the Bulge, the greatest clash between American and German forces in the Second World War. He introduced Ki-jo to Giorgio Sparazzi, the Italian minister to Korea.
"How do you do, Minister Sparazzi?"
Ki-jo praised Italy's textile industry and its machinery industry, and spoke of his hope for cooperation between Italy and Korea. Italy was a power in machinery as well. For the present, Korea's relations with Italy stood at the ministerial level, but in 1959 they would formally rise to ambassadorial rank, and Minister Sparazzi would be appointed ambassador as he was.
Listening to what Ki-jo said, Hausman understood why he had asked to meet the diplomats.
"Just France left, then. What are you hoping to get out of them?"
"I'm not sure it can be done, but I want Citroën's front-wheel-drive technology."
"What? You want French automobile technology?"
"Yes."
"America's auto technology is plenty good."
"Because America doesn't readily hand its technology over."
"The French won't be easy, you know. A pack of daylight robbers, the lot of them."
For whatever reason, Hausman seemed to dislike France even more than the Axis powers. He seemed to hold France, which had surrendered early in the Second World War, in greater contempt than the enemies he had actually fought. All the same, he introduced Ki-jo to the French minister. France, too, was scheduled to upgrade its diplomatic relations to the ambassadorial level that October, and Angelo Vici, the French minister to Korea, was expected to become ambassador in place.
Ki-jo praised France's automotive technology and took care to set French pride upright.
"Citroën's front-wheel-drive technology is the finest in the world. No other country could build a car like the Traction Avant."
He spoke of the Traction Avant's monocoque body and let his grasp of the engineering show. He talked of French politics as well.
"I believe Prime Minister de Gaulle will be elected president."
It was a confident word on a matter that held the attention of the whole world. Charles de Gaulle, then serving as prime minister of France, was working to revise the constitution, turn it into a strong presidential system, and stand in the presidential election.
"You sound rather certain. Politics is a thing no one can predict, but it may well turn out that way."
Minister Angelo Vici, who had at first thought little of Ki-jo, changed his look once Ki-jo displayed a thorough knowledge of technology and politics. As the conversation drew toward a close, Hausman glanced at him with an expression that said, That ought to do it, hasn't it? When the talk with the French minister ended, Hausman spoke.
"I'm heading back to Yongsan."
The unofficial diplomacy seemed to have worn him out.
"Please go on ahead, Advisor. I'll stay a little longer."
Once he had sent Hausman off, Ki-jo turned to Ma-ryang.
"Now let's go meet the ambassador of the Republic of China. Taiwan."
All the while, Ma-ryang had stood behind Ki-jo, playing something like a bodyguard. A towering giant in a suit at his back had made the picture a handsome one. Now, though, it was Ma-ryang's turn to step forward. He was fluent in Chinese, and he had a record of service with the Nationalist Army in the war against Japan. On top of that, General Kim Hong-il, whom Ma-ryang had once served, had been posted as South Korea's ambassador to the Republic of China.
When Ma-ryang approached the Republic of China ambassador and spoke to him, Ambassador Wang Dongyuan gave him his full attention. Ma-ryang introduced Ki-jo. Ki-jo set great store by Taiwan as well. There would be a great deal to cooperate on in the years ahead.
Even after he finished talking with Ambassador Wang Dongyuan, Ki-jo remained late in the banquet hall, bent on building connections. Senior officials of the government were there as well, and he made their acquaintance too. He did not waste a single minute.
When the networking was done and he had returned to headquarters, he set about preparing the meeting of affiliate presidents to be held on September 30. He wanted to lay before them, properly and in full, the blueprint for Cheongsan Group's structural reform that he had spent more than a month drawing up.