I’ve heared it said by others that back during the days of hard-core ROK military dictatorship (60’s and early 70’s) the US was concerned to prevent the ROK from starting a war in order to “liberate” the North. If so, maybe this was the reason for any “spying” by the US then on ROK officialdom, particularly during the Vietnam war when the US accepted an extraordinary amount of provocation by the North (to include the death of many of its servicemen) in order to avoid having a “second front”.

One suspects that the wholesale gutting the US CIA took during the Carter administration (77 through 81, following the famous Church Committee (US senator from Idaho) in 1975) put an end to any US “spy” efforts on the ROK.

Indeed, maybe that’s why Pres. Carter wanted to withdraw US forces from ROK? If he learned from any residual intel info of the belligerent intent of ROK toward the North, he may have wanted to avoid having the US drawn into another Korean war. As I recall he actually got as far as having one infantry battalion withdrawn from ROK back to CONUS; I remember reading about it in Army Times and being puzzled by his attitude at the time (since then I’ve become less puzzled, indeed I regard my vote for him in 76 as a great blunder).

I’ll have to read more about this period, maybe it’s covered in Oberdorfer’s book (?)

As I recall the famous “tunnel crisis” (my phrase for it) occurred in the last year or so of his administration (discovery of the infiltration tunnel under the DMZ, 3 total (?) ended up being found to date, they suspect there are at least several more still undiscovered).

If I’m right about this, how times have changed. If indeed the US failed to share intel recently about a NorK infiltration submarine, then one suspects the reason is that the sharing of such info would mean compromising the source (probably US technical means). And that the US intel community’s operating assumption nowadays is that elements in the ROK government would immediately “leak” any shared US intel to the North in order to curry favor.

Perhaps also the US suspects that the ROK has access to many sources of human intelligence regarding NorK nuclear program not available to the US, which it in turn is not sharing in fear that this would “provoke” the US. I certainly can’t imagine that the US has the ability these days to run any sort of resident human intelligence network in the North without the active assistance of ROK intelligence (ROK calls its agency “CIA” too, correct?)

If things have reached this level of discord then that is indeed ominous. The contingency plan discussed earlier almost certainly involves as one key element the detailed planning of joint ROK and US special forces operations, to seize and disable NorK nukes during a time of NorK collapse.

Indeed, one imagines that in such a hypothetical time of extreme crisis and internal collapse in the North, possibly PRC military liasion would be invited to join such teams at the last minute, in order to secure PRC support. But if the US and ROK can’t get their act together first this would be impossible.

Allies spy on each other, that’s just what countries do, but rarely to the degree that a head of state has to fear what he says (in direct conversation, not even on a telephone) in his official residence. “Just because espionage is conducted” doesn’t mean much, but it was an issue of degree.

“Obviously,” the US “reserves the right to hold intel obtained by American sources,” even when it’s not of “utmost importance.” Why you need to discuss Robert Kim’s actions is beyond me; the point was not that what he did was right or justifiable, it was that as a result of his case becoming public news it came to be known the US had intel on NK it wasn’t sharing with the “blood ally,” SK. Of particular note would be documentation outlining that the US knew of an NK submarine infiltration into SK and didn’t tell SK. The fact that Kim handed over intel that the US knew and didn’t inform SK alone may not be of the “utmost importance” and “alarming information,” but the fact that the US did not tell SK is, I would think, quite alarming. (Those are two different things: (1) intel obtained well after the fact outlining how the US didn’t tell SK, and (2) the fact that US didn’t tell SK.) I’m not in intelligence work and so only know what I read in the papers, but the US didn’t tell SK about an NK sub in its waters, one that eventually landed on shore, and we just happen to know about that because of Robert Kim. I’m don’t mean to say anyone needs to thank him.

And so for crying out loud, if “blood allies” are not going to share intel when an enemy sub is landing to extract infiltrators and unload new ones, what kind of “intelligence cooperation” exists for presidents harmful to the alliance like Kim Dae Jung and Roh Moo Hyun to ruin so irresponsibly?

I don’t want to waste time arguing that KDJ and RMH have been responsible or that they haven’t been harmful in one way or another to the “alliance,” but I do think the rhetoric mostly coming from Korean newspapers that served the Japanese colonial government and military dictatorships saying that the two have hurt “intelligence cooperation” with the US is what is irresponsible and I think they’re doing it to advance their own (domestic) agendas. Let’s assume that both presidents have indeed been bad for the alliance - the question I’d like to ask is when, if ever, has there really been healthy “intelligence cooperation” between the US and SK? Maybe had there been any KDJ and RMH would’ve harmed it, but I’m not sure there ever was that kind of sharing in the first place.

If I were the US I could think of lots of reasons not to have been sharing intel on NK with SK over the years, one of them being the fact that SK often used information about NK to bolster the domestic “public security” apparatus instead of to be better prepared for NK behavior. One line you hear from the newspapers saying there’s a problem is that the US is not sharing intel on NK with SK currently because of fear it would land in NK’s hands. That’s a little much, but if true would be a reason, and one likely different from whatever reasons there were in the past. Another reason, one that would be consistent over the decades, is that the US has not considered the entity that was once its nation-building project a true partner in the relationship (and I don’t wish to argue one way or another about whether it had grounds to think that way).

Given the degree to which the US was long rumored to be spying on the presidential residence and what became known as a result of Robert Kim’s actions I do indeed doubt there was ever a real healthy working relationship on intelligence between the two allies. All I know is what I’ve read in the Korean papers over the years, however, so I did want to ask, and not as a rhetorical question, if anyone out there in the English speaking world knows if a relationship of “intelligence cooperation” ever existed. There’s a lot of nonsense in the air in Korea about Robert Kim, too, so I do have my doubts about the “US didn’t share intel about NK sub” story, too, and would love to be set straight.

This isn’t to gloss over this news, but I would bet that there’s some intelligence that the US and Japan don’t share, because it conflicts with one or another country’s interests….

Ally or no ally, espionage is actively conducted by all countries against all countries of importance. Alliances were never and never will be one of complete trust between governments.

It is not surprising to hear of the US gov’t spying on South Korea. In turn, it isn’t a surprise South Koreans are spying on the US.

The South Korean government wire taps the US embassy in Seoul, and the embassy sweeps the building for wires constantly. There’s also rumors about the South Korean NIS wire tapping non-governmental American organizations in South Korea last year. The organization gave the wire tap to the CIA, who analyzed it and returned it to the South Korean embassy in Washington.

Also, with regards to Robert Kim’s actions, this was an act of espionage by South Korea. Sensitive American intel was obtained by someone on the payroll of the South Korean government and handed over to the South Korean embassy in Washington. The US reserves the right to hold intel that was obtained by American sources. Obviously, considering the light sentencing of seven years, information on North Korea obtained by Kim wasn’t of the utmost importance, and America wasn’t hiding alarming information. However, smuggling intel to foreign governments is a grave crime. In turn, Kim deserved the sentencing he received. He is an American who broke American law.

Just because espionage is conducted, that doesn’t mean relations between two governments are unhealthy. Healthy or unhealthy, espionage happens all the time. It is not the best measuring bar for US-ROK relations.

That’s an honest question, one someone else will be better qualified to answer, but the impression I get is that it has not.

Was not Robert Kim giving his contact information about NK that the US had but was not giving to SK back when he was arrested in 1996 (which predates KDJ presidency)?

And - another honest question - did not the US spend a lot of time over the years spying on SK governments (in an espionage/eavesdropping and not just “newspaper reading” kind of way)?

Legend has it that Park Chung Hee would sometimes go into the bathroom and turn on the water before having sensitive conversations there out of fear of US eavesdropping, and that a couple of floors of the Naeja Hotel (now gone, used to be near Cheong Wa Dae and owned by the US military) was used for such activities. Anyone know more?

South Korea and China both have a primary emphasis on avoiding a collapse in North Korea. So, they would be cutting their own foot off if they gave the US very damaging information about North Korea, because they not only know the US wants to apply more pressure (which would push toward collapse), they have decided to work against US pressure to apply more pressure to North Korea.

The US, for its part, would be stupid to share its best intel on North Korea, because it is highly likely the South Korean government has backdoor (and even frontdoor) ways to tip America’s hand to the regime in Pyongyang before the US is ready to announce the information as part of a new push to call for tougher measures against NK.

And even if that were not the case, giving South Korea a heads up on the most damaging intel gathered simply gives the South Korean government a better chance to devise strategies to weaken the intel’s potential impact on moving the involved nations toward sanctions or taking NK to the UN or such things.