The Cold War History of Wheat Flour in South Korea, 1945–1960: the Discourse of Corruption and the April Revolution of 1960

ABSTRACT

One way that the United States conducted the Cold War was through its surplus food programmes (Public Law 480), which fed the hungry and supported anticommunist regimes. Consequently, South Koreans consumed over fourteen times more wheat flour by 1960 than during the preceding Japanese colonial period. This study presents a nuanced exploration of 1950s South Korea, using wheat flour — a central commodity in US aid — as a focal point to unravel complex political dynamics. It challenges the traditional binary narrative of authoritarianism versus liberalism, demonstrating how the Rhee regime’s promotion of wheat flour consumption reflected multifaceted strategies of corruption. This article underscores the unintended consequences of US aid, highlighting the intricate interactions between foreign assistance and local political, economic and social forces. By analysing the local responses to wheat flour distribution, it reveals how US aid, while aimed at bolstering anticommunism, inadvertently facilitated corruption and influenced public sentiment.

kEYWORDS:

• Cold War
• foreign aid
• Public Law 480
• South Korea
• The United States
• corruption
• democracy
• hegemony

Acknowledgment

The article is a revised version of a chapter in my PhD dissertation, Chapter 5. ‘Feeding Corruption: Failed Naturalization of Wheat and the April Revolution of 1960’.¹¹⁷

Notes

¹ Andrew J. Gawthorpe, To Build as well as Destroy: American Nation Building in South Vietnam (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2018); Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, ‘The Collapse of Afghanistan’, Journal of Democracy 33:1 (January 2022), 40-54.

² Yunbosŏn Minjujuŭi Yŏn’guwŏn, p’yŏn, Yunbosŏn’gwa 1950nyŏndae Han’guk Chŏngch’i (Seoul: Han’guk’ak Chungang Yŏn’guwŏn Ch’ulp’anbu, 2021); Yŏnsedaehakkyo Yisŭngman Yŏn’guwŏn, p’yŏn, Unam Yisŭngman Chŏnjip 1-10 (Seoul: Yŏnsedaehakkyo Taehak Ch’ulp’an Munhwawŏn, 2019-2023); Moon Chung-in [last name, first name, for Korean authors who published in Korean] and Kim Sejung, eds., 1950-yŏndae Hanguksa ŭi Chaejomyŏng (Seoul: Sŏnin, 2004); Sŏ Chungsŏk, Cho Pongam kwa 1950-yŏndae I: Cho Pongam ŭi Sahoe Minjujuŭi wa P’yŏnghwa T’ongillon (Seoul: Yŏksa Pip’yŏngsa, 1999); Park Tae Gyun, Cho Pongam Yŏngu (Seoul: Ch’angjak kwa Pip’yŏngsa, 1995).

³ Steven Chung, Split Screen Korea: Shin Sang-ok and Postwar Cinema (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014); Theodore Hughes, Literature and Film in Cold War South Korea: Freedom’s Frontier (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012); Kwon Boduerae et al., Ap’ŭre kŏl “Sasanggye” rŭl ilkta: 1950-yŏndae munhwa ŭi chayu wa t’ongje (Seoul: Tongguk taehakkyo ch’ulp’anbu, 2009).

⁴ Chung-in Moon and Sang-young Rhyu, ‘Overedeveloped State and the Political Economy of Development in the 1950s: A Reinterpretation’, Asian Perspective 23:1 (1999), 180.

⁵ K. Okada and S. Samreth, ‘The Effect of Foreign Aid on Corruption: A Quantile Regression Approach’, Economic Letters 11 (2012), 240-3.

⁶ Kong Che-uk, ‘kukkadongwŏnch’eje shigi ‘honbunshik changnyŏ undong’kwa shiksaenghwarŭi pyŏnhwa’, kyŏngjewa sahoe 77 (2008), 107-138.

⁷ Yun Sang Hyun (Yun Sanghyŏn), ‘Chayujuŭiŭi 4wŏrhyŏngmyŏng Nerŏt’ibŭwa Sahoe Shimni: [Tongailbo]wa [Sasanggye]ŭi Pigyorŭl Chungshimŭro [The Narratives and Mentality of the April Revolution by the Liberals: Focusing on the Comparison between Dong-A Ilbo and Sasanggye]’, Inmunnonch’ong 77:4 (2020), 153-92.

⁸ Jong-sung You, Democracy, Inequality and Corruption: Korea, Taiwan and the Philippines Compared (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015); Quee-young Kim, ‘From Protest to Change of Regime: The 4-19 Revolt and the Fall of the Rhee Regime in South Korea’, Social Forces 74:4 (June 1996), 1179-1208.

⁹ Charles Kim, Youth for Nation: Culture and Protest in Cold War South Korea (Honolulu: Hawaii University Press, 2017).

¹⁰ Namhee Lee, The Making of Minjung: Democracy and the Politics of Representation in South Korea (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2007), 106.

¹¹ Jung-en Woo, Race to the Swift: State and Finance in Korean Industrialization (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991), 52-60.

¹² Choi Jin-seok, ‘Minjujuŭiŭi Kiroe Sŏn 1950, 60nyŏndae Ashia Chishigin: [Sasanggye]ŭi Munhwajayuhoeŭi kwallyŏn Hwaltong ŭl Chungshimŭro [Asian Intellectuals in the 1950s and 1960s at the Crossroad of Democracies],’ Sanghŏ Hakbo 59 (December 2020), 203-236; Christina Klein, ‘Cold War Cosmopolitanism: The Asia Foundation and 1950s Korean Cinema’, Journal of Korean Studies 22:2 (Fall 2017), 281-316.

¹³ Gregg Brazinsky, Nation Building in South Korea: Koreans, Americans, and the Making of a Democracy (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2007).

¹⁴ In this article, the term ‘site of investigation’ refers to both physical and metaphorical locations where we gather and analyze historical evidence, using specific historical details―such as the distribution channels of wheat flour―as entry points to broader historical narratives. Unlike a ‘case study,’ which typically examines a single instance to demonstrate a general principle, a ‘site of investigation’ entails a more exploratory and comprehensive examination. This approach aims to uncover the interplay of various historical forces within a particular setting, evoking a process of discovery similar to an archaeological dig, yet with a wider analytical scope. Such an open-ended inquiry is characteristic of material history and microhistory, where minute particulars illuminate broader societal contexts and historical trends. This usage, inspired by my readings in these fields, aligns with the methodologies described by scholars like Carlo Ginzburg in The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992). Although no singular source explicitly defines ‘site of investigation,’ its application here enhances our understanding of qualitative historical research.

¹⁵ Kim Iryŏng, ‘Yi Sŭngman Chŏngbu ŭi Suipdaech’e Sanŏphwa Chŏngch’aek kwa Rent Ch’ugu mit Pup’ae kŭrigo Kyŏngche Paljŏn,’ in Moon Chungin and Kim Sejung, eds., 1950-yŏndae Hanguksa ŭi chaejomyŏng (Seoul: Sŏnin, 2004), 603-29.

¹⁶ Katarzyna Cwiertka, Cuisine, Colonialism and Cold War: Food in Twentieth-century Korea (London: Reaktion Books, 2012).

¹⁷ George Solt, The Untold History of Ramen: How Political Crisis in Japan Spawned a Global Food Craze (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2014), 74. Solt cites the work of Suzuki Takeo, a food historian.

¹⁸ Ryu, In Soo and Oh, Nam Whan, ‘Bread Baking Characteristics of Korean Wheat Varieties seen from their Amino Acid Composition’, Korean Journal of Food Science and Technology 12:3 (1980).

¹⁹ CINCREP Seoul To ICA, 3 February 1956, 1301/ i.n.1261, #49, Korea Commodities: Agricultural Surplus, 1956, Office of Far Eastern Operations, RG 469, National Archives at College Park (NACP), MD.

²⁰ Tonga, 16 January 1934; Tonga, 22 April 1934. Prior to the Total Mobilization period, Koreans consumed approximately 2.2 million p’odae of wheat flour annually, equivalent to 44,000 metric tonnes, assuming one p’odae is 20 kg. When this figure is divided according to the 1945 population distribution – 16 million in what later became South Korea and 9 million in North Korea – the consumption for the southern region amounts to 28,160 metric tonnes. This contrasts sharply with the average annual consumption between 1956 and 1959 in South Korea, which was 407,161 metric tonnes. This figure is about 14.5 times greater than the southern region’s consumption in 1934.

²¹ Bill Winders, ‘US agricultural policy and the globalization of world agriculture’, in Guy M. Robinson and Doris A. Carson, eds., Handbook on the Globalisation of Agriculture (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2016), 157-74.

²² PL 480 imports, 1959 (3992), #10 Counterpart; P582. RG 286, NACP.

²³ CINCREP, Seoul, To ICA, 6 August 1957; Korea Commodities- Flour (1425), #66, Subject Files 1950-1959, Headquarters, Office of Far Eastern Operations, RG 469, NACP.

²⁴ Chun Ye Yong, ROK Minister of Reconstruction to Walter D. McConaughy, U.S. Embassy, Seoul, 13 July

1960, 1710, Agricultural Surplus, #139, Subject Files 1950-1959, HQ, RG 469, NACP.

²⁵ Kang Mangil, ed., Hanguk Chabonjuŭi ŭi Yŏksa (Seoul: Yŏksa Pip’yŏngsa, 2000), 287.

²⁶ Jane Dixon, ‘A Cultural Economy Model for Studying Food Systems’, Agriculture and Human Values 16 (1999), 151-60.

²⁷ A. Arce and T. K. Marsden, ‘The Social Construction of International Food: A New Research Agenda’, Economic Geography 69-3 (1993), 293-311.

²⁸ Dajeong Chung, ‘Cold War Diplomacy of Donations: To Shape the South Korean Perception of the United States, 1954-1966’ (unpublished manuscript, 2023).

²⁹ Solt, The Untold History of Ramen. The case of Japan shows a parallel story of resistance to US wheat flour in the post-1945 period.

³⁰ Alexander Nutzenadel and Frank Trentmann, Food and Globalization: Consumption, Markets and Politics in the Modern World (Oxford: Berg, 2008), 3-7. Globalisation happens in the process of interaction between the local and the global.

³¹ Arjun Appadurai, ed., The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 31. Appadurai argues that consumption is politically and socially constructed.

³² Instant ramen was invented by the Japanese Momofuku Ando in 1958. In 1963, Samyang imported the machines from Japan and began producing lamyŏn in South Korea. Powdered milk was another main US food aid product under Section 402 of the Mutual Defense Treaty.

³³ David Sutton, Remembrance of Repasts: an Anthropology of Food and Memory (Oxford: Berg, 2001), among others. Commodities carry with them societal meanings, symbols, and memories.

³⁴ Tonga, 31 July 1924; Tonga, 10 February 1925.

³⁵ Letter from a reader, Tonga, 31 July 1924.

³⁶ Solt, The Untold History of Ramen, 43-71. The recipients in Japan also initially found wheat flour food unfamiliar.

³⁷ Kyŏnghyang, 7 October 1946.

³⁸ Kyŏnghyang, 3 November 1946.

³⁹ Kyŏnghyang, 4 January 1948.

⁴⁰ Tonga, 14 January 1950; Tonga, 11 March 1950.

⁴¹ International Committee on Nutrition for National Defense (ICNND), Nutrition Survey of the Armed Forces and Civilians on South Korea (U.S. Department of Defense, 1957). New York Library Archive, New York.

⁴² Memorandum from William H. McCahon to G.D. Osborn, Program Coordination Division, 7 October 1953, (1509) Korea-Relief-CARE, Subject Files, 1950-1959, Box #67-89, Headquarters, Office of Far Eastern Operations, UD422, US Foreign Assistance Agencies, RG 469, NACP.

⁴³ International Committee on Nutrition for National Defense, Nutrition Survey, 5.

⁴⁴ Ibid., 17.

⁴⁵ Edwin M. Cronk, First Secretary of U.S. Embassy, Seoul to the Department of State, Washington, 13 September 1957, Foreign Service Dispatch No. 192, 8956.11/9.1357, or XR 8956.313, ‘Transmittal of, and Comments on, Tax Advisory Group’s Special Report on the Imposition of a Commodity Tax of Flour’, 1420, #66, Commodities F, Subject Files 1950-1959, RG 469, NACP.

⁴⁶ Mun Sujae, trans., ‘Yŏngyanghakkye ŭi Tankyechŏk Sŏngkwa’, Kajŏng Hakhoe Ji [Family and Environment Research, or Home Economics Journal] 1 (1959), 157-160. Here, Mun translates the agendas of the Nutrition Committee in the US Department of Agriculture.

⁴⁷ Cha Jae Young, ‘1950nyŏndae Mi kukmusŏng ŭi Hankuk ŏllonin kyoryu saŏp’, Hankuk Ŏllon Hakbo 58-2 (2014), 233. The US Department of State hosted South Korean journalists in educational exchange programs in the United States to promote US-aligned democratic values. Research notes that at least one journalist from Kyŏnghyang participated in this programme.

⁴⁸ Tonga Ilbosa, Minjok kwa Tŏburŏ 80 nyŏn: Tonga Ilbo 1920-2000 (Seoul: Tonga Ilbosa, 2000), 326.

⁴⁹ Kyŏnghyang, 6 February 1959.

⁵⁰ Despite early attempts by the USAMGIK to import livestock such as Berkshire pigs, boars, cows and eggs from the United States, and establish 4-H farms in areas including Cheju Island, the meat industry in South Korea remained underdeveloped. Efforts by the South Korean state to build the livestock industry in the late 1950s also had limited success.

⁵¹ Tonga, 2 May 1926.

⁵² Kyŏnghyang, 10 July 1958.

⁵³ Jung-en Woo, Race to the Swift, 52-60.

⁵⁴ Public Law 83-480. 68 Stat. 454 (Chapter 469), 10 July 1954, S.2475 (83^rd Congress).

⁵⁵ Mitchel B. Wallerstein, Food for War—Food for Peace: United States Food Aid in a Global Context (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1980).

⁵⁶ ‘Authorization for Sale of Agricultural Commodities: Table III. Status of foreign currencies under (Sec. 104) Public Law 480 as of Sept. 30, 1960 (3636, also see 3633-5)’, PL 480 Legislation- S. 1028 App. 5/4/61. Addi. Auth. for sale of Agricultural Commodities under Title I FY 61, #1, Food for Peace, P 153, RG 286, NACP.

⁵⁷ Harriet Friedmann, ‘The political economy of food: the rise and fall of the postwar international food order’, American Journal of Sociology 88 (1982), S248-86. Friedmann argued that the surplus agricultural product trade was to further US commercial interests; Helen C. Farnsworth, ‘Imbalance in the World Wheat Economy’, Journal of Political Economy 66-1 (February 1958), 22; Harriet Friedmann, ‘The origins of third world food dependence’, in H. Bernstein, B. Crow, M. Mackintosh and C. Martin, eds., The Food Question: Profits Versus People (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1990), 18. The US government faced criticism from other food-exporting countries because it was dumping its surpluses, thereby distorting international market prices.

⁵⁸ Bruce F. Johnston, ‘Farm Surpluses and Foreign Policy’, World Politics 10-1 (October 1957), 1-6.

⁵⁹ United States Operations Missions to Korea, ’Food for Peace Program in Korea, 1955-1967’ (November 1967), 1-14.

⁶⁰ CINCUNG TOKYO SDG Lemnitzer To DEPTAR Washington DC, 31 October 1955 (1269), #29, UD 422. RG 469, NACP.

⁶¹ From Hollister, ICA, To CINCREP, Seoul, 14 December 1956, (1406-8, and also see 1315, 1323, 1329, 1408, 1707, 1713 and 1714), #62. Korea- Relief, Subject Files, 1950-1959, UD 422, Headquarters, Office of Far Eastern Operations. See also [Korea P.L. 480 Program FY 56], 27 October 1955 (1269), Korea- Commodities, Agricultural Surplus #29, UD 422 Office of Far Eastern Operations, Korean Subject Files, 1953-1959. See: [Agricultural Surplus] July 1960 (1713), #139, Subject Files, 1950-1959. RG 469, NACP.

⁶² Kim Yanghwa, ‘Migugŭi Taehanwŏnjowa Han’gugŭi Kyŏngjegujo’, in Song Kŏnho and Pak Hyŏnch’ae, eds., Haebang40nyŏnŭi Chaeinshik (Seoul: Tolbegae, 1985), 262-65; Pak Hyŏnch’ae, ‘Miingyŏnongsanmurwŏnjoŭi Kyŏngjejŏk kwigyŏl’, in Chin Tŏkkyu and Han Paeho, eds., 1950nyŏndaeŭi Inshik (Seoul: Han’gilsa, 1990), 277-295.

⁶³ ‘ATTN: E.D. White, R. Steward, Justin Williams’, [Korea PL 480 Program FY 56], 27 October 1955 (1269), #29. Kor- Commodities, Agricultural Surplus, 1955, UD 422, RG 469; FY 56 Title I Agreement, Nathan/Davis/Tyson: mbm, to 12/11/56. 1406, #62. Korea- Relief; UD 422, Headquarters, Office of Far Eastern Operations. Subject Files, 1950-1959. Also see 1315, 1408, 1323, 1408, 1707, 1714, 1329. RG 469, NACP.

⁶⁴ Woo, Race to the Swift, 63-8.

⁶⁵ Chung, ‘Cold War Diplomacy of Donations’. Also, note that the Title III Voluntary Agency Program was reorganised into Title II under the Food For Peace Act of 1966.

⁶⁶ Dajeong Chung, ‘From Dependency to Self-Sufficiency: American Relief Food in the Korean Peripheries in the 1960s’, in Gregg Brazinsky, ed., Korea and the World: New Frontiers in Korean Studies (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2019), 39-67.

⁶⁷ Tonga, 19 April 1959.

⁶⁸ Tonga, 6 May 1959.

⁶⁹ Kyŏnghyang, 30 July 1958. As the Armistice Treaty was signed in 1953, the two Korean states were theoretically still at war.

⁷⁰ William O. Brown, First Secretary of Embassy, Seoul, to the Department of State, Washington, ‘OPI (ROK Office of Public Information) Views on US Agricultural Surpluses’, 11 October 1955 (1279), #29, Korea- Commodities Agricultural Surplus, 1955, Korea Subject Files, 1953-59, Office of Far Eastern Operations, UD 422, US Foreign Assistance Agencies. RG 469, NACP.

⁷¹ Ibid.

⁷² Audrey-Rose Menard and Laurent Weill, ‘Understanding the Link between Aid and Corruption: A Causality Analysis’, Economic Systems 40 (2016), 260-272. Whether foreign aid causes corruption is still debated among scholars.

⁷³ Woo, Race to the Swift; Kim, ‘Yi Sŭngman Chŏngbu’, 603-629.

⁷⁴ Woo, Race to the Swift, 69.

⁷⁵ Woo, Race to the Swift, 46; Sungjoo Han, ‘South Korea and the United States: The Alliance Survives’, Asian Survey 20:11 (November 1980), 1075-1086. According to Han, US aid to South Korea was US$ 11 billion for the period from 1946 to 1973.

⁷⁶ KDI, ‘Foreign aid for postwar rehabilitation and economic reconstruction’ [accessed on 29 November 2023 at: https://www.kdevelopedia.org/Development-Overview/all/foreign-aid-postwar-rehabilitation-economic-reconstruction–201412070000346.do]; United States Operations Mission to Korea, ‘‘Food for Peace Program’, 1-14.

⁷⁷ Stephan Haggard, Byung-kook Kim, and Chung-in Moon, ‘The Transition to Export-led Growth in South Korea: 1954-1966’, The Journal of Asian Studies 50-4 (November 1991), 853-5; Woo, Race to the Swift, 66.

⁷⁸ Anne O. Krueger, ‘The Political Economy of the Rent-Seeking Society’, The American Economic Review 64-3 (June 1974), 291-303; James M. Buchanan, Robert D. Tollison, and Gordon Tullock, eds., Toward a Theory of the Rent-seeking Society (College Station, YX: Texas A&M University Press, 1980).

⁷⁹ CINCREP Seoul To CINCUNG Tokyo, 27 October 1955 (27-29), #6; P323. RG469, NACP.

⁸⁰ From Mr. St. Louis, OPP, to Mr. Wood, OEC, ‘Status of Proposed Flour Mill for Tongrip Company’, 15 March 1956 (25-26), #6, P323, RG 469, NACP.

⁸¹ Tonga, 8 March 1960.

⁸² Tonga, 2 November 1959; Tonga, 12 July 1960.

⁸³ Kyŏnghyang, 15 April 1959; Tonga, 16 April 1959.

⁸⁴ Tonga, 19 April 1959.

⁸⁵ Kyŏnghyang, 13 September 1958.

⁸⁶ Kyŏnghyang, 3 September 1957; Kyŏnghyang, 30 July 1958; Kyŏnghyang, 16 April 1959.

⁸⁷ Kyŏnghyang, 15 June 1958.

⁸⁸ Kyŏnghyang, 14 January 1959.

⁸⁹ Kyŏnghyang, 30 January 1959.

⁹⁰ Kyŏnghyang, 19 April 1959.

⁹¹ Im Kŭnsu, Ŏllon kwa yŏksa (Seoul: Chŏngŭmsa, 1984); Ch’a Paekŭn et al., Uri Sinmun 100 nyŏn (Seoul: Hyŏnamsa, 2001).

⁹² Tonga Ilbosa, Minjok kwa Tŏburŏ 80 nyŏn, 324-335, 326. The 1959 subscription numbers are cited from Taehan Sinmun Yŏngam.

⁹³ Ch’a et al., Uri Sinmun, 200-201; Tonga Ilbosa, Minjokkwa tŏburŏ 80nyŏn: Tonga Ilbo 1920-2000 (Seoul: Tonga Ilbosa, 2000), 335; Kyŏnghyang, 11 January 1959.

⁹⁴ Sŏ, Cho Pong-am, 161-62.

⁹⁵ Tonga, 5 January 1960; Chosŏn, 1 March 1960.

⁹⁶ Kyŏnghyang, 18 January 1958; Kyŏnghyang, 23 January 1958; Tonga, 1 May 1958.

⁹⁷ Kyŏnghyang, 23 January 1958; Tonga, 29 April 1958.

⁹⁸ Kyŏnghyang, 3 May 1958.

⁹⁹ Tonga, 31 January 1958.

¹⁰⁰ Kyŏnghyang, 27 January 1960.

¹⁰¹ Pusan Ilbo, 2 May 1957.

¹⁰² Kyŏnghyang, 4 June 1957.

¹⁰³ Tonga, 1 April 1958.

¹⁰⁴ Cha, et al., Uri Sinmun 100 nyŏn, 190-201.

¹⁰⁵ Sŏ, Cho Pong’am, 467, 468-82.

¹⁰⁶ Woo, Race to the Swift, 71-72.

¹⁰⁷ Tonga, 8 March 1960.

¹⁰⁸ Tonga, 1 April 1960.

¹⁰⁹ Tonga, 12 March 1960.

¹¹⁰ Tonga, 12 April 1960.

¹¹¹ Kim Sŏnghwan, ‘Kobau Yŏng’gam’, July-December 1960.

¹¹² Sŏul Kyŏngche Sinmun, from 1 September 1960 to 14 February 1961.

¹¹³ Chŏnghwan Ch’ŏn et al., Hyŏngmyŏng kwa Usŭm (Seoul: Aelp’i, 2005). The book reproduces the image of the cartoon from Sŏul Kyŏngche Sinmun, 25 September 1960.

¹¹⁴ Priority cablegram from Moyer, Seoul Far East Program, to Sheppard, ICA, 3 January 1961 (1671), #139, HQ. RG 469, NACP.

¹¹⁵ Dajeong Chung, ‘From Dependency to Self-Sufficiency’.

¹¹⁶ Green, acting U.S. Economic Coordinator in Seoul, to the Secretary of State, Washington, No. 406, 30 September 1960, 1692, Agricultural Surplus, #139, HQ, Subject Files, 1950-1959, RG469, NACP.

¹¹⁷ Dajeong Chung, Foreign Things No Longer Foreign: How South Koreans Ate US Food (Columbia University: PhD thesis, 2015).