Report details fate of secret agents S. Korea sent to North, then forgot

Members of the Korea Special Mission Exploits Association and the bereaved families of South Korean operatives trained for covert missions to North Korea hold a protest calling for a full accounting of past covert missions in front of Cheong Wa Dae in Jongno District, central Seoul, June 6, 2018. Korea Times file

In 1992, Kim Ho, executive director of the Korea Special Mission Exploits Association’s Gyeonggi branch, was 20 when he came across a recruitment poster for special agents that would change his life.

When Kim asked about the posting, an official promised pay high enough to buy a home and guaranteed employment afterward.

After Kim passed a physical test in the southern port city of Busan, he advanced to further screening in central Seoul’s Yongsan District, competing with roughly 400 applicants from across the country. Ultimately, about 30 finalists were sent to Sokcho in Gangwon Province.

For the next 28 months, Kim underwent brutal training without an official military service number or rank, learning skills ranging from VIP assassination to infiltration into North Korea.

When the assignment ended, however, the promised compensation never came.

“After my discharge, government officials would show up at my workplace and ask what I was doing,” Kim told The Korea Times. “That led co-workers to suspect I had been involved in something questionable, making it hard for me to keep a job.”

Kim’s story reflects the lasting toll faced by former operatives trained for or sent on covert missions aimed at infiltrating North Korea, many of whom say they were left to bear the burden for decades without recognition from the state.

South Korean operatives trained for covert missions to North Korea pose in front of a cafe in Incheon in 1954. Korea Times file

A report released Monday by the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs, based on interviews with six former special mission operatives, found they shared long-term struggles after discharge, including stress from enforced secrecy, physical and psychological suffering, and social isolation.

Under the law, they are defined as individuals who served in military intelligence units between 1948 and 2002 and either carried out high-risk intelligence missions or underwent related training, both involving “special sacrifice for the state.”

Most operatives at the time were sent in as civilians, as deploying soldiers to North Korea would have violated international law.

The government first acknowledged their presence in 2003, disclosing that 13,835 operatives had been trained and that 7,726 of them died during training or missions.

According to the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, 2,808 were deemed eligible for benefits as of June last year.

Their long-hidden plight surfaced during a parliamentary audit in 2000, leading to the passage of a compensation and recognition law in 2004. But the report said their everyday hardships remain largely unresolved.

The report identified post-discharge secrecy as a central burden, saying interviewees were warned of repercussions if they broke confidentiality.

A bereaved family member of a South Korean operative trained for covert missions to North Korea weeps during a memorial ceremony honoring 74 fallen operatives at Daejeon National Cemetery, Jan. 11, 2005. Yonhap

A former Army noncommissioned officer in his 60s recalled being warned before discharge that he could be detained at any time if he spoke carelessly.

“My military service was over, but it didn’t feel over. I was scared,” the report quoted him as saying.

They also suffered severe psychological distress from serious training injuries, humiliation and the deaths of fellow operatives.

A 2013 study by Kyungpook National University and Yeungnam University College, surveying 257 special mission operatives, found an average PTSD score of 34.3 — more than double the general population average of 15 and well above the diagnostic threshold of 17.

“The instructor told me, ‘If you die here, it will be a death without meaning. No one will care,’” said a man in his 70s who served with the Army in the 1970s and 1980s but was officially classified as a civilian.

“I felt humiliated, but the fear was stronger,” he added.

All interviewees said promises of high pay and public sector jobs went unfulfilled after discharge, leaving many in financial hardship and feeling betrayed by the state.

“I gave my youth to the country in my 20s, and my body is broken,” said a former Navy noncommissioned officer in his 80s. “We carried out missions in the shadows and were discarded.”

A former noncommissioned officer in his 40s, who trained in the 2000s, said he applied after being promised high pay and a government job, but none materialized.

The report urged recovery-oriented counseling and trauma care for former special mission operatives, proposing a reintegration system modeled on Finland’s military social worker framework, which offers dedicated post-discharge counseling.

It also said conventional veterans review standards are inappropriate for these operatives, citing their use of aliases and lack of medical records, and called for tailored review criteria.

“After decades, most operatives are elderly, in poor health and still struggling with lasting trauma,” Kim said, adding that the state has failed to provide adequate care.