On 26 October 1979, Park Chung Hee, the third president of South Korea, was assassinated during a dinner at the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA) safe house near the Blue House presidential compound in Jongno District, Seoul, South Korea. It was the first assassination of a head of state on the Korean peninsula in 605 years since the assassination of King Gongmin of Goryeo.
Kim Jae-gyu, the then director of the KCIA, was responsible for the assassination. Park was shot in the chest and the head. The head of the presidential security service, three bodyguards and a presidential chauffeur were also killed by Kim and his co-conspirators. The incident is often referred to as "10.26" or the "10.26 incident" in South Korea.
There is a great deal of controversy surrounding Kim's motives; it remains uncertain whether the act was part of a planned coup d'état or was merely impulsive. Discontent with Park's regime had been simmering below the surface and had culminated with the Busan–Masan Uprising ten days before the assassination, which Park had brutally suppressed.
Background
President Park's dictatorship
By the time of his assassination, Park had exercised dictatorial power over South Korea for nearly 18 years.
The Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA) was created in 1961 to coordinate both domestic and international intelligence activities, including those of the military. Almost immediately following its creation, the KCIA was used to suppress any domestic opposition to Park's regime, including wiretapping, arresting, and torturing without court order. The KCIA was heavily involved in many behind-the-scenes political maneuvers aimed at weakening opposition parties through bribing, blackmailing, threatening, or arresting opposing lawmakers. Nevertheless, President Park nearly lost the 1971 presidential election to Kim Dae-jung despite spending ten percent of the national budget on his election campaign. Park then established the Yushin Constitution in 1972 to ensure his perpetual dictatorship. The new constitution replaced direct voting in presidential elections with an indirect voting system involving delegates. It also allotted one-third of the National Assembly seats to the president and repealed presidential term limits. Additionally, it gave the president the authority to suspend the constitution and issue emergency decrees, appoint all judges, and dismiss the National Assembly. When opposition to the Yushin Constitution arose, Park issued a number of emergency decrees, the first of which made any act of opposition or denial of the Yushin Constitution punishable by imprisonment for up to 15 years.
Despite this, opposition towards Park's rule persisted. In the 1978 South Korean legislative election, despite Park's Democratic Republican Party (DRP) maintaining a majority, the New Democratic Party (NDP) won the popular vote by a narrow margin which further emboldened them. In September 1979, the courts nullified Kim Young-sam's chairmanship of the NDP, and on October 5, the DRP expelled Kim from the National Assembly in a secret session, leading all 66 NDP lawmakers to submit their resignations to the National Assembly in protest. The Carter administration in the U.S. recalled its ambassador from Seoul in protest, as well. On October 16, when it became known that the government was planning to accept the resignations selectively, democracy protests broke out in Kim's hometown of Busan, the second largest city in South Korea, resulting in arson attacks on 30 police stations over several days. The demonstrations, the largest since the presidency of Syngman Rhee, spread to nearby Masan and other cities on October 19, with students and citizens calling for a repeal of the Yushin Constitution. The KCIA director, Kim Jae-gyu, went to Busan to investigate the situation and found that the demonstrations were not riots, but rather a "popular uprising joined by regular citizens" to resist the regime. He warned Park that the uprisings would spread to five other large cities, including Seoul. According to Kim's personal account, the President's chief bodyguard, Cha Ji-chul, cited the Killing Fields in Cambodia to note that one or two million Koreans being killed wouldn't make much difference. Park agreed and said that he would give direct orders to the security forces to fire upon demonstrators if the situation got worse.
Rivalry between Kim Jae-gyu and Cha Ji-chul
While Park faced increasing opposition to his dictatorship outside the Blue House, another conflict occurred inside the Blue House between Kim Jae-gyu, who was appointed KCIA Director in December 1976; and Chief Bodyguard Cha Ji-chul, who was appointed to his position in 1974 after Park's wife Yuk Young-soo was killed during an attempted assassination of her husband by Mun Se-gwang, an ethnic Korean from Japan. The rivalry stemmed largely from Cha's increasing encroachment onto KCIA turf and belittlement of Kim in public. Almost universally disliked yet feared, Cha served Park in close proximity and became his most trusted advisor. Cha also appropriated tanks, helicopters, and troops from the Republic of Korea Army, leaving the presidential security apparatus with an entire division under his direct command.
The rivalry between Cha and Kim was heightened further by a series of political crises in late 1979, as the two rivals clashed over how to deal with growing opposition to the regime. In the NDP's election of its chairman in 1979, KCIA backed Yi Chul-seung to prevent the election of hardliner Kim Young-sam, but Cha interfered in KCIA's political sabotage with its own behind-the-scenes maneuvers. When Kim Young-sam was elected as the NDP chairman, Cha blamed the KCIA, which infuriated Director Kim.
After Kim Young-sam called on the U.S. to stop supporting Park's regime, Cha pushed for Kim's expulsion from the National Assembly in an interview with The New York Times reporter Henry Stokes, which Director Kim feared to be a disastrous development. Cha easily bested his opponent, as his hardline approach was favored by Park; he blamed worsening developments on Director Kim's weak leadership of the KCIA at every opportunity.
Assassination
On the day of the assassination, Park and his entourage attended ribbon-cutting ceremonies for a dam in Sapgyo and a KBS TV transmitting station in Dangjin. Director Kim was expected to accompany him since the TV station was under KCIA jurisdiction, but after Cha prevented him from riding in the same helicopter as Park, Director Kim excused himself from the trip.
After the trip—according to KCIA Chief Agent Park Seon-ho, one of the assassination conspirators—Park instructed the KCIA to prepare for one of his banquets which were held an average of 10 times per month. The banquet was held at a KCIA safe house near the Blue House presidential compound (now the Mugunghwa Dongsa Park), and was to be attended by Park, Director Kim, Cha, Chief Secretary Kim Gye-won, and two young women: Sim Soo-bong, a rising pop singer, and college student and guitarist Shin Jae-soon.
15 minutes after Director Kim was notified of the banquet, he called Army Chief of Staff Jeong Seung-hwa, arranging for him to dine with KCIA Deputy Director Kim Jeong-seop in a nearby KCIA building in the same compound. Just before the dinner, Director Kim told Chief Secretary Kim Gye-won that he would get rid of Cha. It is not clear whether Kim Gye-won misheard, misunderstood, or ignored Kim's words.
At 6:05 p.m., during dinner discussions of volatile political issues such as the demonstrations in Busan and Kim Young-sam, Park and Cha took a hardline approach. Park said that Kim Young-sam should have been arrested, while Kim Jae-gyu argued that the public believed that Kim Young-sam was sufficiently punished just by being expelled from the National Assembly. Park said the KCIA should be more threatening. Director Kim called for moderate measures, while Chief Secretary Kim Gye-won was trying to steer the discussion to small talk. At 6:30 pm, Sim Soo-bong and Shin Jae-soon entered the banquet hall.
Kim Jae-gyu later left the dining room to meet Jeong Seung-hwa and Kim Jeong-seop, and he came out with his Walther PPK pistol, which he had hidden on a bookshelf in his office. Kim Jae-gyu then met with his closest subordinate, former Marine colonel and KCIA Chief Agent Park Seon-ho (Kim Jae-gyu's student when Kim Jae-gyu was a physical education teacher), and Army colonel and Director Kim's secretary Park Heung-ju (Kim Jae-gyu's exclusive adjutant during his tenure as head of the 6th Division). Kim revealed his plan to assassinate Park Chung Hee with Cha Ji-cheol and told them to prepare within 30 minutes. Kim told them that he would take them out this evening and that when he heard gunshots from inside the room, they should help him kill the guards. Kim said to them: "The Chief of Staff and Deputy Director are here as well. Today is the day."
Park Seon-ho and Park Heung-ju were surprised at first by the one-sided order, but they followed Kim Jae-gyu's orders and had Lee Ki-ju, the head of the security guard at the safe house (a former reserve marine sergeant, who always had Park Seon-ho's trust), and Yoo Seong-ok, the presidential chauffeur of the protocol department head's vehicle, join the assassination team. Yoo Seong-ok was a former Army sergeant; after being discharged from the military, he got a job as a KCIA driver. With the help of Park Seon-ho, he was assigned to a safe house, a first-class duty station; he was scheduled to get married in November of that year. At the scene, Park Heung-ju, Ki-ju Lee, and Yoo Seong-ok were in Na-dong's safe house. They hid inside a car parked near the kitchen and waited for the gunshot to be heard from the banquet hall. Meanwhile, Park Seon-ho prepared himself to kill Security Chief Jeong In-hyeong and Deputy Director Ahn Jae-song who were in the security guard waiting room, although he was hoping to convince them to stand down and, in effect, save them.
As 7 p.m. approached, Park Chung Hee looked at the clock frequently, and Cha Ji-cheol, seeing this, reassured Park by saying he would turn on the TV when the time was right. At 7 o'clock, Cha turned on the TV, which was on the door armor, with an automatic switch and watched news on KBS. After Kim Jae-gyu, who now was armed with a pistol in his pants pocket, reentered the banquet hall, Shin Jae-soon eventually noticed that Kim Jae-gyu, sitting across from him, was frequently looking at his watch. Park told him to turn off the TV, so Cha turned it off.
At 7:38 p.m., after confirming with Park Seon-ho that preparations were complete, Kim Jae-gyu entered the banquet hall again. At that time, Sim Soo-bong performed the song "I Love You" by pop singers "Lana.Et.Rospo", accompanied by Shin Jae-soon. Sim didn't like her performance, so she sang it again several times.
At 7:40 p.m., Kim Jae-gyu told Kim Gye-won to take good care of Park, shouted to Cha, "Insolent!", and opened fire, shooting Cha in the arm. Park shouted, "What are you doing?" Kim Jae-gyu then responded, "Hey, you try dying too." Kim Gye-won stood up, opened the door, and ran out. Kim Jae-gyu fired the gun twice at Park's chest from a distance of two to three meters, but the PPK jammed on a third shot. A shocked Sim Soo-bong immediately went outside, followed by a wounded Cha; he fled to a bathroom adjacent to the dining room and said, "Why is he doing that?"
When Kim Jae-gyu left the room, he came back with a Smith & Wesson Model 36 revolver owned by his subordinate Park Seon-ho. When Kim Jae-gyu aimed the gun at Park's head, Cha, who had emerged from the bathroom to look for a bodyguard, ran into Kim Jae-gyu as Shin Jae-soon ran to the bathroom in a crazed state. Cha then raised the door armor next to the door and resisted fiercely, but Kim Jae-gyu fired a gun into Cha's abdomen, fatally wounding him, after which Cha fell down next to the fallen door armor. Kim then took off Sim's arm that was holding Park before speaking to Park and shooting him in the head execution-style.
Upon hearing the initial shots, Park Seon-ho held two bodyguards in the waiting room at gunpoint and ordered them to put their hands up. He hoped to prevent further bloodshed, especially since he was a friend of one of the bodyguards, but when the other bodyguard attempted to reach for a gun, Park shot them both dead. However, at the moment when Park Seon-ho killed Ahn Jae-song and Jeong In-hyeong, the lights in the entire safe house suddenly went out. This caused Kang Mu-hong, in charge of repairs at the safe house, who was reading a newspaper in the underground boiler room, to mistake the gunshots for the sound of an explosion when the electricity short-circuited; however, Kang eventually realized that it was not a short circuit upon hearing the gunshots and shouting that continued outside, after which he turned on the circuit breaker again, locked the boiler room door, and hid himself.