Baekgom: the development of South Korea’s first ballistic missile

ABSTRACT

This article traces and analyzes the development of South Korea’s first ballistic-missile system from 1971 through 1978 based on memoirs and personal accounts by scientists and officials directly involved in missile development during this time. The system is often described as a reverse-engineered copy of the Nike Hercules, a US surface-to-air missile, but this description does not capture the true character of South Korean missile development during the 1970s. By working on the Nike Hercules-based design in cooperation with American and French contractors, South Korea’s weapons specialists gained experience and built facilities that underpinned autonomous missile development for decades afterward. The accounts of South Korean weapons scientists also demonstrate that tacit knowledge—subtle or secret methods and tricks transmitted in person from mentors to protégés rather than written down in textbooks or manuals—can play a crucial role in building successful weapons programs and capable research-and-development capacities.

KEYWORDS:

• South Korea
• ballistic missiles
• tacit knowledge
• technological cooperation
• arms control
• proliferation

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank Professor Jeffrey Lewis for suggesting this as a master’s thesis topic, supporting the project, and sharing invaluable advice and resources. Thanks also to Michael Elleman for providing generous and thorough feedback on several key issues, and to Joshua Pollack and Rhianna Kreger for their insightful comments and immense help in editing the final version of this paper. All remaining mistakes, misunderstandings, or mistranslations are mine alone.

Notes

1 See “South Korea: Missile,” Nuclear Threat Initiative, <www.nti.org/learn/countries/south-korea/delivery-systems/>; Missile Defense Project, “Missiles of South Korea,” Missile Threat, Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), https://missilethreat.csis.org/country/south-korea/; Daniel Pinkston, “The New South Korean Missile Guidelines and Future Prospects for Regional Stability,” International Crisis Group, October 25, 2012, <www.crisisgroup.org/asia/north-east-asia/korean-peninsula/new-south-korean-missile-guidelines-and-future-prospects-regional-stability>.

2 Just like South Korea’s secret nuclear program in the 1970s, official documents and records from the Park Chung-hee era concerning missile development are extremely limited, probably due to a combination of administrative and political reasons. See Se Young Jang, “Excavating South Korea’s Nuclear History,” April 10, 2017, Wilson Center, <www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/excavating-south-koreas-nuclear-history>. Since the 1990s, however, a number of South Korean officials and scientists involved in the initial stages of missile development have published quite detailed accounts, which, together with American records, make possible a thorough reconstruction of missile-related events and decision-making through most of the 1970s.

3 For example, see Sung Gul Hong, “The Search for Deterrence: Park’s Nuclear Option,” in Byung-Kook Kim and Ezra F. Vogel, eds., The Park Chung Hee Era: The Transformation of South Korea (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011), pp. 483–512.

4 The Nike Hercules was a US surface-to-air missile system developed in the 1950s. Batteries of Nike Hercules missiles, including radar-control and guidance equipment and operating manuals, were transferred to the South Korean military in the 1970s and used as a model for the Baekgom system.

5 Dennis Gormley, “The Risks and Challenges of a Cruise Missile Tipping Point,” September 1, 2008, Nuclear Threat Initiative, <www.nti.org/analysis/articles/cruise-missile-tipping-point/>. For more on the concept of tacit knowledge, see Donald MacKenzie and Judy Wajcman, eds., The Social Shaping of Technology (Philadelphia: Open University Press, 1999), pp. 425–29. For an application to missile technology specifically, see Donald MacKenzie, Inventing Accuracy (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1990).

6 An Dong-man, Kim Byeong-gyo, and Jo Tae-hwan, Baekgom, dojeongwa seungniui girok [Baekgom, record of challenge and victory] (Seoul: Planet Media, 2016).

7 See Ku Sang-hoe, “Hanguk misail gaebarui san jeungin gusanghoe baksa hoego” [Recollections of Dr. Ku Sang-hoe, a living witness of South Korea’s missile development]. Ku’s account was published in Shindonga in 1999 and in two parts on Bemil, a Korean military news and affairs website, in 2006. Unfortunately, the Shindonga web version appears to be defunct and the Bemil version is incomplete. Ku’s entire text, however, has also been published on the blog site of Daum.net. See parts 1 and 2 on Bemil at <http://bemil.chosun.com/nbrd/bbs/view.html?b_bbs_id=10040&pn=0&num=31712> and <http://bemil.chosun.com/nbrd/bbs/view.html?b_bbs_id=10040&num=31713>; and the same (complete) text at <http://blog.daum.net/_blog/BlogTypeView.do?blogid=08QGd&articleno=9205926&categoryId=395365&regdt=20060703225200>.

8 Oh Won Cheol, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol: enjinieoring apeurochi je5gwon [Korean economic construction: engineering approach, volume 5] (Seoul: Kia Kyeongje Yeonguso, 1996).

9 Richard M. Nixon, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Richard Nixon 1969 : Containing the Public Messages, Speeches, and Statements of the President (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1971), p. 548, <https://quod.lib.umich.edu/p/ppotpus/4731731.1969.001/608?page=root;rgn=full+text;size=100;view=image>.

10 Ibid., p. 549.

11 The text of the speech is available here: <http://watergate.info/1969/11/03/nixons-silent-majority-speech.html>. For an account of this period by a prominent American insider, see Henry Kissinger, White House Years (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011). For a more international history, see Don Oberdorfer and Robert Carlin, The Two Koreas (New York: Basic Books, 2013), especially p. 10. And, for a study focusing on the Korean perspective, see Nam Joo-Hong, America’s Commitment to South Korea: The First Decade of the Nixon Doctrine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986).

12 “55. Draft Minutes of a National Security Council Meeting,” March 4, 1970, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume XIX, Part 1, Korea, 1969–1972, <https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76v19p1/d55>.

13 “88. Memorandum From John H. Holdridge of the National Security Council Staff to the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger),” February 5, 1971, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume XIX, Part 1, Korea, 1969–1972, <https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1969-76v19p1/d88>; An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 32.

14 US Department of State, “U.S. and Korea Agree on U.S. Troop Reduction and Korean Modernization,” Department of State Bulletin, Vol. 64, No. 1653, (1971) p. 282, <https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=msu.31293008122024;view=1up;seq=282>.

15 For a detailed account of the Blue House Raid, see Daniel P. Bolger, “Scenes from an Unfinished War: Low-Intensity Conflict in Korea, 1966–1969,” Leavenworth Papers, No. 19, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, KS, pp. 62–65, <www.armyupress.army.mil/Portals/7/combat-studies-institute/csi-books/Scenes-Froman-Unfinished-War.pdf>.

16 See Sergei Radchenko, “‘We will fight them to the last man’: North Korea and the USS Pueblo,” Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, January 23, 2018, <www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/we-will-fight-them-to-the-last-man-north-korea-and-the-uss-pueblo>.

17 For a thorough overview of the Pueblo crisis, see Van Jackson, Rival Reputations: Coercion and Credibility in US-North Korea Relations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), pp. 33–38.

18 Ibid., pp. 46–47.

19 Ibid., pp. 63–99.

20 Vietnamization is discussed in Nixon’s November 3, 1969 “Silent Majority” speech, cited above and available at <http://watergate.info/1969/11/03/nixons-silent-majority-speech.html>. See also “Seoul Resists Koreanization,” New York Times, June 25, 1970, <www.nytimes.com/1970/06/25/archives/seoul-resists-koreanization.html>. For a historical analysis of Park’s defense-industry-development efforts during this period and their implications for ROK-US relations, see Peter Banseok Kwon, “Beyond Patron and Client: Historicizing the Dialectics of US–ROK Relations amid Park Chung Hee’s Independent Defense Industry Development in South Korea, 1968–1979,” Seoul Journal of Korean Studies, Vol. 30, No. 2 (2017), pp. 185–216.

21 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 22. Agnew’s trip was covered by the New York Times, which portrays him as struggling to reassure East Asian allies while maintaining the administration’s line on troop reductions. A White House spokesman quickly corrected Agnew’s comment about total withdrawal from South Korea within five years, asserting that there were no more withdrawal plans from South Korea beyond the initial 20,000 troops, but Park found Agnew’s remark unsettling anyway. See James M. Naughton, “Agnew Finds Seoul Tough in Bargaining on Arms Aid,” New York Times, August 26, 1970, <www.nytimes.com/1970/08/26/archives/agnew-finds-seoul-tough-in-bargaining-on-arms-aid-seoul-adamant-in.html?searchResultPosition=4>; “Mr. Agnew ‘Shows the Flag,’” New York Times, September 1, 1970, <www.nytimes.com/1970/09/01/archives/mr-agnew-shows-the-flag.html?searchResultPosition=3>.

22 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 22. This and all following translations from Korean sources are by the author. Many thanks to Professor Ha Jihye for her help in clarifying some of the trickier passages during the summer 2019 session of the Middlebury School of Korean.

23 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 37.

24 Ibid., p. 38.

25 Ibid., pp. 43–44. The agency’s Korean name is gukbang gwahak yeonguso.

26 Ibid., p. 45.

27 Ibid., p. 48.

28 Teuksu beobinche in Korean.

29 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 48–49.

30 As part of the five-year military modernization program, South Korea obtained permission and assistance from the United States to reverse engineer the M16 rifle and built a factory for this purpose in Yangsan, South Gyeongnam Province in the early 1970s. See Ku, “Recollections”; An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 33.

31 South Korea began secretly pursuing nuclear-weapons development in the early 1970s under Park but, under pressure from the United States, abandoned the program and signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in 1975. At least one former official, however, has claimed that Park harbored nuclear ambitions as late as 1979, but was unable to realize them because of his assassination in October of that year. See Oberdorfer and Carlin, The Two Koreas, p. 59. On the nuclear program, see Se Young Jang, “The Development of South Korea's Nuclear Energy Industry in a Resource- and Capital-Scarce Environment,” in Gareth Austin, ed., Economic Development and Environmental History in the Anthropocene: Perspectives on Asia and Africa (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2017), 245-270; Mark Fitzpatrick, “Chapter One: Republic of Korea,” in Asia's Latent Nuclear Powers: Japan, South Korea and Taiwan (London: Routledge, 2016); Hong, “The Search for Deterrence”; Kang Choi and Joon-Sung Park, “South Korea: Fears of Abandonment and Entrapment,” in Muthiah Alagappa, ed., The Long Shadow: Nuclear Weapons and Security in 21st Century Asia (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2008), pp. 373–403; Jonathan D. Pollack and Mitchell B. Reiss, “South Korea: The Tyranny of Geography and the Vexations of History,” in Kurt M. Campbell, Robert J. Einhorn, and Mitchell B. Reiss, eds., The Nuclear Tipping Point: Why States Reconsider Their Nuclear Choices (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2004), pp. 254–92.

32 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 63–64. Readers may wonder if Park’s reference to Israel was an indirect reference to nuclear weapons, as Israel had probably acquired an initial nuclear-weapon production capability by the late 1960s. See Avner Cohen, Israel and the Bomb (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), pp. 231–32. An, Kim, and Jo, however, do not attribute any nuclear connotations to this directive. In the author’s estimation, it is just as likely that this particular reference to Israel was inspired by the Israeli military’s impressive and proactive use of mechanized infantry and airpower in the 1967 Arab-Israeli conflict. Park’s thinking along these lines, including his preoccupation with the Arab-Israeli conflict, is discussed below.

33 Beongae saeop.

34 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 27.

35 Ibid.

36 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 65.

37 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 553. This and all following quotations from Korean-language sources were translated by the author.

38 The Korean War is often referred to in South Korea as the “6.25 War” after the date—June 25—that hostilities broke out in 1950.

39 Ibid. Daejeon is a city in central South Korea approximately 150 km south of Seoul, and therefore less vulnerable to attack. Daejeon was later chosen as the location for the ADD’s main missile-development, -research, and -production facilities.

40 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 554; the directive is also reproduced verbatim by Ku. “Convertibility of the warhead” may refer to the warhead’s potential to be reconfigured to carry a nuclear payload, but neither source provides a concrete explanation of this phrase.

41 Ku, “Recollections.”

42 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 555; An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 108; Ku, “Recollections.”

43 The Korean name for AIPP is Hanggong gongeop yukseong gyehoek.

44 Ku, “Recollections.”

45 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, pp. 555–56; Ku, “Recollections.”

46 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 112.

47 Ibid., p. 113.

48 Ibid.

49 Ibid., p. 115.

50 See “Army Personnel Actions,” Army Research and Development, Vol. 14, No. 3 (1973), p. 31, <https://books.google.com/books?id=78neAAAAMAAJ&pg=RA2-PA31&lpg=RA2-PA31&dq=clyde+hardin+korea&source=bl&ots=RDG4u0VfCL&sig=ACfU3U0sYZakZw6y6P8CHjbMtdl1UFG53A&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiD9ZTfrefhAhVQnp4KHSnYCsMQ6AEwA3oECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=clyde%20hardin%20korea&f=false>.

51 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 115–16.

52 The following story is related entirely in Ku, “Recollections,” under the section titled “Ddeuthaji anheun mi gukjeongbu chocheongjang” [An unexpected invitation from the American Department of Defense].

53 Ibid.

54 Ibid.

55 “Ku baksa, neombeo won malsseongkkun!” The United States would not explicitly endorse a policy to curb missile proliferation until the 1980s, with the advent of the Missile Technology Control Regime. However, the spread of potentially nuclear-capable ballistic-missile systems was nonetheless of significant concern to American policy makers in the 1970s, due to their potentially destabilizing effect in compact, volatile theaters such as the Middle East and East Asia. See Wyn Q. Bowen, “U.S. Policy on Ballistic Missile Proliferation: The MTCR’s First Decade,” Nonproliferation Review, Vol. 5, No. 1 (1997), p. 24. International sharing of technology and information related to missile production and development was thus regulated by strict export controls and subject to government approval.

56 McDaniel’s position at MICOM is specified in “Laser Guidance Systems Pass in Tests at Redstone Arsenal,” Army Magazine, February 1972, p. 55. An online copy is available here: <https://books.google.com/books?id=WENEAQAAIAAJ&pg=RA1-PA55&lpg=RA1-PA55&dq=john+mcdaniel+micom+1972&source=bl&ots=dmZ9rBO5HF&sig=ACfU3U2aMqk8a8kKxUey_Fz3CrmMJgdhtQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiem_6G5OnhAhVSjp4KHSElBagQ6AEwC3oECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=john%20mcdaniel%20micom%201972&f=false>.

57 Ku, “Recollections.”

58 Ibid.

59 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 556.

60 Ibid.

61 Ibid., p. 557.

62 Ku, “Recollections.”

63 The Nike Hercules itself was a surface-to-air missile and not a ballistic missile. It was maneuvered remotely all the way to its target—an incoming enemy aircraft or missile—and thus followed a radar-guided intercept trajectory rather than a ballistic trajectory. The ADD would have to re-engineer the system’s guidance-and-control equipment and software to make it into a surface-to-surface ballistic missile.

64 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 122–24. In 1975, the ADD also began researching another design concept based on the US Pershing series of ballistic missiles. The concept was abandoned after preliminary research, however, because the high speed of the Pershing system, over Mach 5, would have exceeded the stress- and heat-resistant capabilities of South Korean materials science and industry at the time. See An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 209.

65 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 122–23.

66 Several prominent sources, including the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) and the CSIS Missile Defense Project, date this agreement to 1972 (see NTI’s South Korea country profile at <www.nti.org/learn/countries/south-korea/> and CSIS’s page on the NHK-1/Baekgom at <https://missilethreat.csis.org/missile/nhk-1-nike-hercules-korea/>). However, Ku and Oh say that the guidelines were communicated to the ADD by General Richard G. Stilwell in his capacity as Commander of US and UN Forces, Korea, a position Stilwell did not assume until August 1973 (see Ku, “Recollections”; Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 560; Headquarters United Stated Forces Korea, “Annual Historical Report CY 1973,” 5, <http://nautilus.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/ahr_seventythree.pdf>). Additionally, An, Kim, and Jo state that the confrontation over the Baekgom’s nuclear capabilities was based on CIA intelligence on ADD missile development plans as of May 1976 (pp. 210–11).

67 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 211; Ku, “Recollections.”

68 Shim Yung-taek, Baekgom, haneullo sosaoreuda [Baekgom, rise into the sky] (Seoul: Giparang, 2013), pp. 251–52.

69 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 127

70 Ibid., pp. 126–28.

71 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 558.

72 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 184–85.

73 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 558.

74 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 109–10; Ku, “Recollections.”

75 A non-exhaustive list of such study opportunities includes study tours by Ku and Lee to US government missile-research facilities as well as cooperative technology-transfer and research arrangements with McDonnell Douglas, Northrop Grumman, and Lockheed Propulsion Company in the United States as well as SNPE in France. See An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 134.

76 Ibid., pp. 133–34.

77 Ibid., pp. 195–96.

78 The above events are recorded in ibid., pp. 102–05.

79 Ibid., pp. 103–05.

80 Ibid., p. 197.

81 Ku, “Recollections.”

82 Geoado Island is still in use as a launch site for South Korean missile tests. President Park Geun-hye observed the test of a Hyunmoo 2C launched from the island in 2015. Recent activity suggests the site will remain active in the near future: since 2016, a tall structure has been built in a depot area adjoining the launch pad, possibly for erecting missiles prior to testing.

83 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 198.

84 Ku, “Recollections.”

85 Onsite living facilities and amenities were still virtually nonexistent at the time of the televised September 1978 test. Leading up to the exhibition, ADD researchers had to conduct flight tests and prepare the site in quite rugged conditions.

86 Ku, “Recollections.” Among all the overseas test sites Ku visited, Kwajalein made the biggest impression on him. During his visit there, he witnessed an accuracy test of a Minuteman II missile equipped with multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicles. The missile was launched from an Air Force base in California, and the intended target was a coral lake at Kwajalein. One of the officers overseeing the test remarked confusingly that “we’re always conducting joint tests with [the Soviet Union].” In response to Ku’s befuddlement, the officer explained that, without fail, Russian intelligence-gathering vessels disguised as deep-sea fishing boats would congregate in the area any time there was a test. Sure enough, three of them had shown up on the radar screen.

87 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 199.

88 Huntsville is adjacent to Redstone Arsenal, and it thus seems likely that the ADD’s connection with Teledyne grew out of interaction with MICOM, initially facilitated by Hardin. Hardin’s connection to the ADD did not end when he and his team left in 1972: he invited Lee and Shim to visit him in the United States at least once after this, including a visit to the Department of Defense in 1974. A photograph from this trip is reproduced in An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 117.

89 “Environmental” in this context refers to recreating and testing the high-stress conditions that missile components encounter during flight.

90 See An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 136–44. The rocket was called the Hongneung, named after the neighborhood of ADD offices in Seoul. The ADD performed two static tests of the rocket’s motor and one flight test, which was conducted in December 1974. The project was abandoned because the polysulfide-based solid propellant produced for the motor—made in an ADD pilot plant that was later moved to Daejeon—did not have a high enough specific impulse for the range and size of missile specified by ADD development plans.

91 An October 1974 cable from the State Department’s Korea Office to the US Embassy in Seoul notes that both Lockheed and McDonnell Douglas had approached the State Department to discuss deals with the ADD in August 1974. Department of State to Embassy Seoul, Telegram 235056, October 25, 1974, 1974STATE235056, <https://aad.archives.gov/aad/createpdf?rid=223234&dt=2474&dl=1345>.

92 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 150; Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 561.

93 The McDonnell Douglas deal is described in detail in An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 150–56 and in Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, pp. 560–62. While these two sources broadly corroborate each other in their descriptions of the ADD–McDonnell Douglas deal, the prices and content for each stage of the contract differ significantly. An, Kim, and Jo list the final cost of the first joint research and development phase as $1,630,000 (lowered from an original amount of $1,800,000) and the combined cost of the two prototypes from McDonnell Douglas as $20,000,000 (pp. 152, 156). Oh, on the other hand, says that McDonnell Douglas proposed a net cost for the entire contract of $30,000,000, and the first phase, a joint feasibility study, was negotiated later for $1,800,000 (p. 561). I have given more weight to An, Kim, and Jo in my narrative because of the exhaustive scope and detail of their work as well as Lee’s endorsement of the book, important given his significant involvement in arranging and negotiating the contract. An, Kim, and Jo also produce a facsimile of some physical evidence: a letter of credit for $1,630,000 to McDonnell Douglas, dated August 11, 1975 (p. 153).

94 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 566.

95 A functional 4-feet-by-4-feet wind tunnel first came online at Daejeon on May 11, 1977. The ADD bought it from Fluidyne, an American aerodynamic testing and research firm. The president of Fluidyne at the time was also a professor at the University of Minnesota and decided to add to the deal a small 1-foot-by-1-foot wind tunnel from a university-affiliated lab. The smaller tunnel, brought to the United States from Germany after World War II, had been used by Rudolf Hermann, a German wind-tunnel pioneer, in the development of the V-2 rocket. See An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 178–82.

96 Ibid., p. 154.

97 For a brief history of American solid rocket propellant development, see J.D. Hunley, “The History of Solid-Propellant Rocketry: What We Do and Do Not Know,” American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Meeting Paper, June 1999, <www.nasa.gov/centers/dryden/pdf/88635main_H-2330.pdf>.

98 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 239.

99 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 563.

100 An, Kim, and Jo note that, after the SNPE deal was concluded, the ADD also imported small amounts of raw materials from the United States to conduct comparative research. The primary input ingredients for ADD propellant during this period, however, appear to have been French. An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 171–72.

101 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 563.

102 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 162; Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 564. Once again, An, Kim, and Jo and Oh give widely diverging prices for the contract: the former say $20,000,000 while the latter says $30,000,000. For the same reasons as above, I suspect An, Kim, and Jo’s is the more authoritative account.

103 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 162; Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, pp. 563–64.

104 The businessman was Lee Bong-hun, who was then working at a trading firm called Pacific International and who would become the president of Seoul Telecom in the 1990s.

105 Oh, Hangukhyeong gyeongje geonseol, p. 564.

106 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 171.

107 Ibid., p. 169.

108 Ibid., pp. 169–70.

109 Ibid., p. 168

110 Ibid., p. 188.

111 Ibid.

112 Ibid., p. 254.

113 Ku, “Recollections.”

114 Memorandum for the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs, from William P. Clements, “Proposed Lockheed Sale to the Republic of Korea (ROK),” January 23, 1975, National Security Adviser Presidential Country Files for East Asia and the Pacific, Country File: Korea, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.

115 Ibid. Clements is unclear about the status and content of the McDonnell proposal and the DOD’s position on it. He states that “DOD does not intend to support the McDonnell proposal as we have heard it,” suggesting the possibility that it was under revision. An April 1975 cable from the State Department’s Korea Office also mentions that McDonnell Douglas had been engaged in further discussion with the ROK about the Nike Hercules Improvement Program. McDonnell Douglas had apparently requested that consideration be delayed “until the results of later discussion with [the ROK government] on program can be incorporated into new request,” which “appears more in line with air defense mission.” Korean sources available to the author make no mention of these later discussions, although it may be plausible that the McDonnell Douglas proposal was tweaked in this manner to improve its chances of approval. There is little doubt, however, that the ADD’s intent from beginning to end was to design an improved surface-to-surface version of the Nike Hercules.

116 “US Department of State Memorandum, Sale of Rocket Propulsion Technology to South Korea,” February 4, 1975, History and Public Policy Program Digital Archive, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, National Security Adviser Presidential Country Files for East Asia and the Pacific, Box 9, Korea (3), obtained by Charles Kraus, <https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/114634>.

117 Memorandum for Mr. Richard Smyser, National Security Council, from Morton I. Abramowitz, “Lockheed Sale to South Korea,” March 5, 1975, Box 9, National Security Adviser Presidential Country Files for East Asia and the Pacific, Country File: Korea (1), Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library. Abramowitz was correct that the ADD was unable to manufacture many sensitive electronic components needed for guidance and control systems, but the ADD simply imported much of this technology from Europe and assembled it domestically. In this instance, Abramowitz accurately assessed the ADD’s capabilities but misjudged the availability of technology from overseas. This misjudgment about guidance technology was the inverse of Clements’s regarding fuel-production equipment. Both miscalculations worked to the ADD’s advantage.

118 Ibid.

119 By August 1975, Park had given up on indefinite US military support, and even stated in an interview with the New York Times that he expected to have a military capability sufficient to defend against a North Korean attack without American ground support by 1980. Accordingly, in negotiations with the United States, Park abandoned his entreaties for continued US military presence in South Korea. Instead, he switched tactics and began pressing the US government to provide enormous amounts of financial and technical support for South Korean military modernization. During SCM meetings on August 26 and 27, 1975, Park and Defense Minister Suh Jyong-chul outlined an ambitious military-force-improvement plan ranging from South Korean acquisition of submarines to the provision of twenty-one American F5-E fighters. Suh also repeatedly emphasized that the force-improvement plan would entail $1 billion in American Foreign Military Sales credit over the following five years. Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger responded negatively to questions about submarines and advanced fighters, but begrudgingly acknowledged Suh’s insistence on the need for $1 billion worth of US assistance. See Richard Halloran, “Park Sees Seoul Needing U.S. Force Only till 1980,” New York Times, August 21, 1975, <www.nytimes.com/1975/08/21/archives/park-sees-seoul-needing-us-force-only-till-1980-park-says-south.html?searchResultPosition=3>; “Memoranda of Conversations between James R. Schlesinger and Park Chung Hee and Suh Jyong-chul,” August 26, 1975, History and Public Policy Program Digital Archive, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, National Security Adviser Presidential Country Files for East Asia and the Pacific, Box 9, Korea (11), obtained by Charles Kraus, <https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/114633.> See especially pp. 6–7.

120 Embassy Seoul to Department of State, Telegram 033850, 1975SEOUL033850, <https://aad.archives.gov/aad/createpdf?rid=228213&dt=2476&dl=1345>.

121 Ibid.

122 Embassy Seoul to Department of State, Telegram 033922, 1975SEOUL033922, <https://aad.archives.gov/aad/createpdf?rid=228213&dt=2476&dl=1345>

123 “Memoranda of Conversations between James R. Schlesinger and Park Chung Hee and Suh Jyong-chul,” August 26, 1975, History and Public Policy Program Digital Archive, Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, National Security Adviser Presidential Country Files for East Asia and the Pacific, Box 9, Korea (9), obtained by Charles Kraus, <https://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/114633.>

124 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 165–66.

125 Ibid., 185.

126 Ibid., 186.

127 Ibid., 172–73.

128 Ibid., 254.

129 Embassy Seoul to Department of State, Telegram 09594, December 6, 1976, 1976SEOUL09594, <https://aad.archives.gov/aad/createpdf?rid=66450&dt=2082&dl=1345>. The briefing, however, was conducted in Korean, so it is difficult to know what may have been garbled or lost in translation.

130 Department of State to Embassy Seoul, Telegram 307570, 1976STATE307570, <https://aad.archives.gov/aad/createpdf?rid=66325&dt=2082&dl=1345>.

131 In fact, the United States refused to grant an export license for the IBM 370/158 system, and the ADD settled for a slower IBM 370/148 in mid-1977. An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 192.

132 Ibid., pp. 230–31.

133 See Jeffrey B. Gayner, “Withdrawal of U.S. Ground Forces from Korea,” June 15, 1977, Heritage Foundation, <http://s3.amazonaws.com/thf_media/1977/pdf/bg16.pdf>.

134 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 213; Ku, “Recollections.”

135 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 262–63; Ku, “Recollections.”

136 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 260.

137 Ku, “Recollections;” An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 267.

138 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 265; Ku, “Recollections.”

139 Ku, “Recollections.”

140 Ibid.

141 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 270.

142 No sources available to the author confirm this, but, given the continued presence, or at least availability, of LPC engineers for consultation by the ADD, it seems plausible that the original team of six advisors sent by LPC to help with the propellant plant at the beginning of 1976 (An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 185) later became the team of six officially sanctioned advisors-cum-monitors (mentioned in Shim, Baekgom, p. 251) sent to Daejeon after the United States agreed to support the ADD’s missile program.

143 Silicone gel was probably used during the curing process of the Baekgom’s fuel grains to lubricate the mandrel (a cylindrical object around which solid fuel is cured to create a hollow, lengthwise bore through the grain’s center) and ease its removal from finished motors. A thin layer of leftover gel or oil could then have insulated the inner surface of the motors, inhibiting ignition. Michael Elleman, director of Non-Proliferation and Nuclear Policy Program, International Institute for Strategic Studies, email correspondence with author, June 21, 2019.

144 Solid-rocket propellant is essentially an explosive and can ignite if exposed to impact or friction. Iran’s development of solid-fueled missiles was set back significantly when a solid-propellant explosion killed one of the program’s leading researchers. See “Iranian Missile Expert Killed in Explosion,” November 13, 2011, The Guardian, <www.theguardian.com/world/2011/nov/14/iran-explosion-missile-expert>.

145 An, Kim, and Jo., Baekgom, pp. 272–73.

146 This section heading is lifted almost verbatim from similar sections in ibid., p. 275 and Ku, “Recollections.”

147 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, pp. 275–76; Ku, “Recollections.”

148 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 277.

149 Ibid.

150 Ku, “Recollections.”

151 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 278.

152 In the story, Columbus illustrates this point by challenging his compatriots to balance an egg upright on top of a table. After watching them struggle for a few moments, Columbus balances an egg by simply smashing it to create a flat surface on the bottom.

153 Ku, “Recollections.”

154 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 284.

155 “Moon, Trump agree to remove limit on payload of S. Korean missiles,” Yonhap News, September 5, 2017, <https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20170905000500315>.” South Korean officials have also emphasized that the most recent guidelines allow them to increase the payload of their missiles at the cost of flight range (up to 1,000 kilograms and 550 km). See Daniel Pinkston, “The New South Korean Missile Guidelines”; “South Korea: Missile.”

156 An, Kim, and Jo, Baekgom, p. 187.

157 Ibid., p. 188.