It Could Have Been Stopped
It could have been stopped.
"General, the tail team's jeep has a radio. We can give the arrest order right now."
At Lee Hee-young's words, Chang Do-young looked at him for a long, unreadable moment.
"You said a little while ago that Park Chung-hee was at home."
"Yes, General."
"Do we know what he's doing?"
"He's drinking."
"Alone?"
"Jang Tae-hwa, Kim Jong-pil, and Lee Nak-sun are with him."
Chang Do-young fell briefly into thought.
"Kim Jong-pil is Park Chung-hee's nephew-in-law, the one who got stripped of his uniform in the purification drive... Who are Lee Nak-sun and Jang Tae-hwa?"
"Lee Nak-sun is a major Park Chung-hee recruited at Second Army headquarters. Jang Tae-hwa is a civilian."
"And those three are sitting there drinking?"
"Yes, sir."
"Hm..."
Chang Do-young let out a low sound and sank into some private calculation. Lee Hee-young did not like the look of it. This was no time to weigh one thing against another. The moment called for speed, and speed meant arresting Park Chung-hee, the head of the coup, before anything else.
"Strange, though. Don't you think?"
The instant he heard it, Lee Hee-young shut his eyes tight. After all that deliberation, the Chief of Staff seemed about to play the wrong piece.
"A man on the verge of a coup, drinking at his leisure at home—doesn't that strike you as odd?"
"That's..."
Lee Hee-young's tongue caught for a second. Then, desperate to turn the general back toward an arrest, he pressed on.
"The attempt was uncovered at the 30th Division, so they're hesitating. And Major General Park has a habit of drinking before he does something big."
He brought up the old story: when Park Chung-hee went to ask Yuk Young-soo's father for her hand, he had drunk first, just to loosen his nerves.
"No. No, that isn't it..."
Chang Do-young shook his head.
"I know General Park. By now he's decided it's all over and given up. Drink himself blind, and let them come for him in the morning—that's what he's thinking. The man's softer than he looks. I know him."
Sensing the Chief of Staff's sympathy sliding toward Park Chung-hee, Lee Hee-young spoke in a rush.
"General, why not take Major General Park into custody for now? Hold him overnight and release him in the morning."
"Let's not make this bigger than it is. The 30th Division mutiny alone will be enough to rattle the Prime Minister. Small as it is, that's a unit inside Seoul, isn't it? And the country's already in enough disorder. If word gets out that an active-duty major general was arrested for plotting a coup, it won't do the nation any good."
"General, I understand what you're saying. Then let us bring Major General Park here. You could reason with him quietly yourself."
Lee Hee-young wanted Park Chung-hee cut off from the coup faction, if only to drive the odds of a rising as low as they would go. The Chief of Staff only laughed.
"No. No need for that. Once he sobers up tomorrow morning, he'll come find me on his own. Ha ha ha."
Lee Hee-young could not understand why General Chang held Major General Park in such low regard.
"Then at least authorize temporary house arrest. Just until morning—don't let General Park step outside."
It was his last request. Chang Do-young shook his head.
"That's asking for trouble. You'll only provoke him. What if he gets drunk and pulls a pistol?"
The string of refusals drained the strength out of Lee Hee-young. As he bowed his head, Chang Do-young clapped him on the shoulder.
"I'll see to any further measures. Colonel Lee, you just keep a faithful watch on General Park. Anything unusual, report it at once."
"Yes, General."
"You've had a hard time of it on General Park's account."
Chang Do-young smiled with perfect confidence. But something about it sat wrong with Lee Hee-young. The Chief of Staff showed no intention of going to Army Headquarters. He meant to stay on at the counterintelligence detachment. The fastest way to seize the situation was to command it himself from headquarters, and yet he would not go. He remained in the commander's office of the 506th and directed everything by telephone.
Is he afraid coup elements are hiding inside Army Headquarters? Does he think headquarters isn't safe?
If that was the fear, then all the more reason to go there, root the rebels out, and take the place in hand. Leaving the nerve center of the Republic of Korea Army unattended made no sense to him at all.
Coming out of the office the Chief of Staff had occupied, Lee Hee-young found Major Gwak.
"Add three more men to the team tailing General Park."
Told to put another jeep on the street, Major Gwak asked, "You think he'll come out of the house?"
Lee Hee-young nodded.
"That man will come out. He'll run, or he'll go to the 6th District Command and direct the coup from there. He means to see it through to the end. I'm sure of it."
At those words Major Gwak sent an extra surveillance team out at once, to take up position in front of Park Chung-hee's house.
Park Chung-hee opened the gate of the Shindang-dong Residence and stepped outside.
He had watched his daughter Geun-hye at her homework, looked in on the sleeping Geun-young and Ji-man, and then buckled on the pistol his wife, Yuk Young-soo, had handed him. He already knew how badly the thing had come apart. Word had reached him that the coup attempt at the 30th Division was exposed, and that military police had moved on the 6th District Command, the post he had meant to use as his first command center. Each report had dropped through him like a stone. His mind had gone blank; more than once he had turned to the subordinate making the report and asked, helplessly, what they were supposed to do. He was only a man. Blow after blow had left him, for a while, without a direction.
When the last word came—that the military police had burst into the 6th District Command—he sat for some thirty minutes in a chair in the living room, boots still on, and smoked. Every time he hesitated, Kim Jong-pil kept urging him to try it anyway. Later Han Ung-jin and Chang Kyung-soon arrived at the Shindang-dong house and, finding him sunk in silence, asked him at the same moment to go out. In the end Park Chung-hee had no choice but to rise and say, "Let's go."
He was being pushed from behind by subordinates resolved to attempt the revolution even if it killed them. Before he left, he told his wife, Yuk Young-soo, "Listen to the radio at five." What she would hear, if she heard anything, was the reading of a revolutionary proclamation—and that broadcast would air only if the revolution succeeded.
The moment he stepped outside, he saw two jeeps standing in the alley. Counterintelligence jeeps. They had been posted in front of the house for days. Every time he looked at them he thought the same sour thought: if they were so suspicious, they ought to strip him of the uniform, not play at this.
He took his eyes off them and climbed into the lead jeep of the two waiting at the gate. Han Ung-jin and Kim Jong-pil rode with him. The rest got into Chang Kyung-soon's jeep. The two vehicles pulled away at once.
As they cleared the alley, the counterintelligence jeep closed in hard behind them. It shoved itself between Park Chung-hee's jeep and Chang Kyung-soon's, trying to break their movement. He had been followed by intelligence men often enough, but never like this. In the side mirror he could see Chang Kyung-soon's jeep and the counterintelligence jeep jockeying, one surging ahead and the other falling back, both of them coming on.
Park Chung-hee's jeep stopped in front of the Mihwa Hotel, behind the Hwashin Department Store. Chang Kyung-soon had thrown himself so hard into blocking the tail that the counterintelligence jeep was nowhere in sight. Han Ung-jin scrambled out and hurried into the hotel. He had left his pistol in the room and had come back for it.
A dry laugh rose in Park Chung-hee. He made no sound; he only laughed inwardly. A man who meant to make a revolution—the man who was supposed to guard him, no less—had left his pistol in a hotel room. None of them had their wits about them. Watching his subordinates flail, he felt his own mind grow strangely calm.
That's how men are...
Looking at how ill-prepared they were, he felt a surge of affection instead—something like pity for people who had agreed to die with him.
Han Ung-jin came back from the room with two pistols and held one out. Park Chung-hee unholstered the gun he was wearing and buckled on the Soviet pistol in its place. They started off again, and out on the main road the tail car latched on once more. Chang Kyung-soon's jeep, coming behind, fought desperately to block it.
At this rate I'll die before I even get across the Han.
They passed Samgakji and reached the Hangang Footbridge, and somewhere along the way the tail car had vanished. Park Chung-hee stopped the jeep and had Kim Jong-pil get out. Kim Jong-pil had to return to the Gwangmyeong Printing Shop in Anguk-dong and see the revolutionary proclamation printed; he had only come this far because he insisted on seeing them off at the bridge.
Standing beside the jeep, Kim Jong-pil said, "I'll see you at dawn."
"Yeah. All right."
Park Chung-hee said it flatly. There was nothing else to say. Dawn might never come.
Once Kim Jong-pil was down, he sent the jeep on. At the main gate of the 6th District Command, military police had barred the entrance with a barricade and were checking traffic.
"Who's there?"
Park Chung-hee rolled the window down.
"It's me."
The military policeman of the 6th District recognized him—the command's former commander. He saluted and telephoned inside. The man who answered was Chief of Staff Kim Jae-chun, of the coup faction, and the barricade opened.
As Park Chung-hee's jeep passed the gate, some twenty officers and another jeep appeared from nowhere and followed him through. They were the officers who, once the military police moved in, had been unable to enter the command and had hidden outside. They were supposed to have seized the 6th District Command before Park Chung-hee arrived. With everything coming apart, they were improvising.
From the moment he crossed the Han, luck began to run with him. Commander Seo Jong-cheol had not yet reached the 6th District Command.
Park Chung-hee walked into a headquarters in utter confusion. Revolutionary officers, officers who were not, and officers of the suppression force were all tangled together, each of them scrambling to understand what was happening. The revolutionaries sidled up to non-revolutionary friends and to officers of the suppression force, feeding them false information, winning some over and throwing the rest into disorder.
Then Park Chung-hee came in, smelling of liquor, and began to speak.
Some thought he was only drunk and making a speech. Others thought there was something in what he said.
When he finished, he appealed to Deputy Provost Marshal Lee Gwang-seon and Lieutenant Colonel Jeong Myeong-hwan to help the revolution. Having come as far as the 6th District Command, he was thrashing now to make the thing succeed by any means he could. Someone told him the Army Chief of Staff was looking for him, and he ordered the call put through.
Chang Do-young, on the other end, asked, "General Park, what are you doing over there? I've canceled all the night training scheduled for today. Go home."
Park Chung-hee answered the man who was trying to talk him down. "I've already begun to act, to save a country that's going under. I'm deeply sorry I couldn't get your understanding beforehand. From here on, I'll simply do my best."
"Say no more. Let this end as a warning to the Chang Myon government, and we'll talk it through tomorrow."
"The units have already started to move."
"I told you I forbade any movement. General Park, you sound drunk. Go home at once."
"It won't do any good, no matter what you say. Just watch."
With that, Park Chung-hee slammed the receiver down. For a moment the deputy commander's office went utterly still. He looked around at the officers gathered near him. When he saw the desperate light in the eyes of those who had joined the revolution, he sat on the sofa and sank into thought.
If he went home now, he might still survive. Soft-hearted Chang Do-young would pretend it had never happened, or shrink the affair down to nothing. But he, and the officers who had joined him, would have to take off the uniform. Press ahead with the revolution, on the other hand, and General Chang had already moved; there might be precious few units left that could still march. Save his life and be driven from the army, or throw a gambler's stake with almost no chance of winning. He had to choose.
Park Chung-hee shot to his feet, unzipped his flight jacket, and drew an envelope from inside it.
"Get this to the Chief of Staff."
Kim Jae-chun, taking the letter, passed it to Lieutenant Song Jeong-taek of the 6th District operations section, and Song carried it into Seoul, bound for the 506th Counter-Intelligence Detachment. He handed Park Chung-hee's letter to Lee Hee-young, commander of the 506th.
"Major General Park Chung-hee asked that this be delivered to General Chang Do-young."
Lee Hee-young passed the letter on. Chang Do-young read it and gave an order.
"Find out whether Park Chung-hee is still at the 6th District. If he is, put him on."
Lee Hee-young telephoned the command, then handed the receiver to Chang Do-young. The Chief of Staff raised his voice and shouted.
"I read your letter. That's a crime, and it's reaction! Come to your senses and get home at once! If you don't, I'll have you arrested on the spot!"
For the first time, the word arrest left Chang Do-young's mouth. Only then did Lee Hee-young feel relief. Park Chung-hee, inside the 6th District Command, was a rat in a jar. But Chang Do-young hung up and gave no concrete order to arrest him. Lee Hee-young's heart darkened again.
He regretted not having told his men, when they were chasing Park Chung-hee, to ram the jeep. Without an order from the Army Chief of Staff, counterintelligence could not arrest an active-duty general. A traffic accident, they could have arranged. He had held the order back partly for his men's safety, and partly because it was obvious where Park Chung-hee was going: the 6th District Command. Commander Seo Jong-cheol and the military police were already supposed to be there. Catching Park, or stopping him, had seemed only a matter of time. Now he was beginning to think he had judged it wrong.
Just then Lieutenant Colonel Bang Ja-myeong of the 15th Criminal Investigation Unit came into the Chief of Staff's office. He and Baek Un-sang, deputy commander of the counterintelligence detachment, had finished hunting the ringleaders at the 30th Division and come to report. While he was reporting that the mutiny there had been put down, another report reached General Chang.
"What? The marines at Gimpo have started to move?"
Chang Do-young's face twisted. For an instant he looked shaken—the Army Chief of Staff, and his own orders were not holding. He picked up the telephone and called the military police company directly under Army Headquarters.
"Arm fifty men with carbines, take eight trucks, and block the bridge."
Having given the order, he turned to Lieutenant Colonel Bang as well.
"You will supervise the placement of the military police and report in from the field."
Bang Ja-myeong seemed to feel the order was not enough.
"Sir, there's an engineer battalion stationed on Namsan, and the military police units have heavy weapons."
Carbines would not give them the firepower to fight marines trying to cross the Han. He was asking for more men and more guns. Chang Do-young shook his head.
"No. That's enough. It'll do for now."
Then his attention drifted elsewhere.
Coming out of the office with Bang Ja-myeong, Lee Hee-young said, "Colonel Bang, stop them however you can. I'll help you get more troops committed."
"Thank you, Colonel."
Bang Ja-myeong set off for the Hangang Footbridge to carry out the Chief of Staff's order. Lee Hee-young, trying to fix Park Chung-hee's whereabouts, telephoned the headquarters. Every time he asked to be put through to an officer inside who had not been recruited by the coup, the line was handed to Chief of Staff Kim Jae-chun. A cold certainty settled on him. This was bad. The 6th District Command was plainly under the coup faction, not the suppression force.
He asked Kim Jae-chun outright, "Is General Park there?"
"He is."
The moment he heard it, Lee Hee-young knew Park Chung-hee was not at the 6th District at all.
"I'd like to speak with him."
"He's had a great deal to drink and he's asleep. Talk to him tomorrow."
Kim Jae-chun went on lying. Lee Hee-young was convinced Park Chung-hee had slipped away from the Chief of Staff's threat of arrest. He asked himself what he would do in Park's place. Not run. He would make for the paratroopers. Park would already know the marines were out, and to improve the coup's chances he would try to bring the airborne in as well. He had been drinking, but his judgment had not come apart.
Lee Hee-young had the feeling of a man who had looked beaten coming back to life. The suppression force had strength to spare, and still General Chang was not pressing the suppression. It was as if he expected a few trucks parked on the Han bridge to make Park Chung-hee give up of his own accord.
Lee Hee-young thought of Defense Minister Hyun Suk-ho. The minister was not a man who meddled readily in the army, but unlike Chang Do-young he was the one person who might demand that the coup be crushed without compromise. He was about to call him when Hyun Suk-ho and the principal staff of Army Headquarters walked into the 506th. Lee Hee-young felt a little easier. He expected the minister and the staff to point out where the Chief of Staff had gone wrong.
His attention turned now to the Han bridge. That was the place to stop rebel troops entering Seoul. Worried for Bang Ja-myeong, who would have to hold the enemy with too few men, he took a jeep and set out for the Hangang Footbridge.
When he arrived, eight trucks were drawn up in the shape of the character for eight, blocking the bridge in three layers. But the gaps between the trucks used as a barricade were wide enough for another truck to pass. The defense was hopelessly slack. Even so, to stiffen the morale of Bang Ja-myeong, who was commanding on the spot, he told him that the defense minister and the Army Headquarters staff had reached the counterintelligence detachment and were discussing the suppression with the Chief of Staff.
Lieutenant Colonel Bang looked somewhat relieved, and said to the military police company commander, "Captain Kim, if you have to, open fire."
Then he turned to Lee Hee-young. "Colonel, would you report the defensive disposition to the Chief of Staff for me?"
"I will."
"I'm going to Army Headquarters for a moment."
"Why?"
"I need to pull the antiaircraft machine gun off the headquarters roof, if nothing else."
"I'll go with you."
"No, Colonel. I'll go alone. I'll say the Chief of Staff ordered it. If a counterintelligence officer is standing there, the whole atmosphere will turn strange."
"Will you be all right? It could become a problem later."
If Bang Ja-myeong moved a heavy weapon from Army Headquarters to the Han bridge on his own authority, he could be hit with a heavy sentence. He only smiled.
"I have to hold the bridge first. Colonel, pretend you didn't hear me."
Lee Hee-young nodded. The Gimpo Marine Brigade would reach the Hangang Footbridge soon. Only fifty military policemen were guarding it, but a machine gun set on that long, narrow throat would be enough to hold. Even if Park Chung-hee came on with the paratroopers as well, they could stop him somehow or other. While the heavy machine gun bought time, a single tank requested from the Americans would cork the bridge shut.
Bang Ja-myeong left for Army Headquarters, and Lee Hee-young stayed on the bridge, waiting. He meant to leave only after he had seen the antiaircraft gun emplaced. As things stood, that was the only way left to stop Park Chung-hee. He wanted to see it with his own eyes.
But Bang Ja-myeong, who had gone for the machine gun, was back almost at once, empty-handed. He was smiling brightly.
"Colonel! The suppression force has reached Army Headquarters! The 6th Corps artillery has packed the front yard! We don't even need to emplace a heavy machine gun!"
In that instant the strength ran clean out of Lee Hee-young's legs. The 6th Corps was coup troops, thick with Kim Jong-pil's classmates from the eighth class of the Korea Military Academy.
Ah. I let my guard down, the same as the Chief of Staff...
The realization burned. He had known Park Chung-hee would call in the 6th Corps artillery at Pocheon, the unit Kim Jong-pil had recruited. He had been certain the American checkpoint at Uijeongbu would stop them. Korean units could not move without American permission, and a checkpoint would never pass a unit whose movement had not been scheduled. He had also judged that rebels would not shoot their way through Americans to break a checkpoint. And yet, it seemed, there was no such thing as never. By whatever means, the artillery from Pocheon had passed the Uijeongbu checkpoint and reached Army Headquarters.
Lee Hee-young scrambled into the jeep and raced for headquarters. Once he had confirmed that the troops occupying the front yard were the coup force, he turned and drove at full speed for the counterintelligence detachment, where the Chief of Staff was waiting.