09-151.pdf

Nonetheless, the woodcutters reported the incident to the national
police when they returned to their village about two hours later (note
the similarity with the Ûlchin-Samch’ôk raid, p. 148). Since it was
hard to believe that such a large group could cross the DMZ unnoticed,
the story was dismissed. While the search for the commandos began
where the encounter had taken place, the group moved quickly
toward Seoul. The final advance toward the Blue House began around
9 p.m. on January 21. Just before that, the police at a checkpoint had
urgently reported the infiltrators as suspects to the Chongno police
station. About 800 metres from the Blue House, they came under
police fire and split into smaller groups, fanned out and retreated
north. During the next three days, skirmishes between the infiltrators
and South Korean police broke out in and around Seoul. Only one of
the 31-man group was captured whereas 29 men were killed or
committed suicide. One man escaped to North Korea. In the
skirmishes on the streets of Seoul, 31 South Koreans were killed and
44 were wounded.
The only survivor, Lieutenant Kim Sin-jo, took a UNC investigative
team to the southern boundary barrier fence and showed them
where the commandos had cut the hole in the DMZ. He also confirmed
that the purpose of the mission had been to assassinate the
president and said “I’ve come here to cut off the throat of Park
Chung-hee.” Lieutenant Kim was released after one year of intense
interrogation by South Korean authorities. Notably, Lerner (2002)
quotes an anonymous general who, on August 16, 1968 in The New
York Times, claimed that “An infuriated ROK population demanded
retaliation, and only extreme American pressure prevented North
Korean President Kim Il Sung from sparking a second Korean War.”
198 Peace-keeping in the Korean Peninsula