The second comprehensive special prosecutor team led by Special Prosecutor Kwon Chang-young, which is investigating allegations left unresolved after three earlier special counsel probes into insurrection, Kim Keon Hee and the Marine Corps death case, indicted former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Kim Myung-soo and others over their alleged involvement in the Dec. 3, 2024, emergency martial law declaration. The key factor distinguishing those indicted from those cleared, it has emerged, was each officer's degree of involvement in drafting a "fragmentary order" issued that night.
Non-indictment records and decisions obtained Monday for former Joint Chiefs operations chief Lee Seung-o, former military support chief Kang Dong-gil and former operations director Ahn Chan-myung — all cleared of charges of participating in a key role in insurrection — show that the special prosecutor team determined the Joint Chiefs raised the military-wide alert level to Grade 2 at around 10:40 p.m. on Dec. 3, 2024, after martial law was declared, and that a fragmentary order was drafted and transmitted to subordinate units at around 11:35 p.m.
The special prosecutor team indicted former Chairman Kim on an undetained basis on July 2 on charges of participating in a key role in insurrection, and referred former Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman Jeong Jin-pal, former Army headquarters policy chief Kim Heung-jun and former Joint Chiefs combat readiness inspection vice chairman Lee Jae-sik to trial in custody.
The team believes former Chairman Kim included in the fragmentary order a directive stating that the Capital Defense Command and the Special Warfare Command were to "prioritize missions under the control of the martial law command."
Regarding Lee, who was cleared, the team acknowledged that he was involved in drafting the fragmentary order.
However, the team found insufficient evidence to indict him, citing several factors: he did not appear to have directly inserted the language relating to the Special Warfare Command and the Capital Defense Command; there were grounds to doubt he had prior knowledge of the martial law declaration; and he had raised concerns with former Chairman Kim and others upon seeing troops enter the National Assembly.
In the case of Ahn, the team took into account that he had focused solely on drafting action codes — symbols used separately to indicate measures taken or to be taken in response to an unfolding situation — rather than the body of the fragmentary order itself, and that he had neither contributed to nor seen the main text.
Kang told investigators he had believed the emergency martial law was declared in response to a North Korea-related situation, according to the non-indictment decision. The team found that Kang appeared to have recognized the illegality of the martial law declaration through a martial law operations manual and informed former Chairman Kim of that illegality, then cleared him for insufficient evidence.
The team believes former Chairman Kim repeatedly dismissed objections raised by Joint Chiefs staff over the deployment of troops to the National Assembly, and issued no order to stand down even after around 1:03 a.m. on Dec. 4, 2024 — by which point the National Assembly had voted to demand the lifting of martial law and troops had in effect concluded the mission directed by then-Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun.
In indicting former Vice Chairman Jeong, former policy chief Kim and former inspection vice chairman Lee, the team found that each had participated in the illegal martial law as deputy commander, chief of staff and planning and coordination chief of the martial law command, respectively, had supported martial law operations for the Capital Defense Command and the Special Warfare Command, and had prepared to deploy additional forces even after the Assembly voted to lift martial law.
Meanwhile, the special prosecutor team on Friday sought an arrest warrant for former Ground Operations Command chief Kang Ho-pil over allegations that he was involved in setting up an internal operations center within the command after martial law was declared. A warrant review hearing was held Monday at Seoul Central District Court before Judge Lee Jong-rok, who handles insurrection-related warrants.
According to the special prosecutor team, a note found on the mobile phone of former Defense Counterintelligence Command chief Yeo In-hyung — written approximately one month before the martial law declaration — reportedly contained the phrase "the four of ㅈㅌㅅㅂ are prepared." The team suspects the initials ㅈㅌㅅㅂ refer to the Ground Operations Command, the Special Warfare Command, the Capital Defense Command and the Defense Counterintelligence Command, respectively.
bell@heraldcorp.com
