SEOUL, South Korea — Doom looms for South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol as his last shred of political support collapsed Friday, while the army said it had followed his orders with surprise and reluctance, and would not do so again.
Meanwhile, new information about allegedly fraudulent election results offers a possible motive for Mr. Yoon’s extraordinary attempt at an autocoup late Tuesday, when he declared martial law.
That was overturned by a National Assembly vote within hours. The president, who has not been seen in public since Tuesday night, nor spoken out to justify his decision, is now deeply isolated and facing a dark future.
A range of prior motivations have been put forward for his extraordinary behavior.
One is a belief that the deeply unpopular president sought to preempt a likely impeachment in the months ahead by disempowering the Assembly. A more outlandish theory is that he had consulted a shaman.
Seoul remained peaceful Friday, though demonstrations in multiple locations called for Mr. Yoon’s resignation or impeachment.
New heroes have emerged, including a man who blocked the passage of a military vehicle on Tuesday night, and a female opposition staffer who thrust aside a soldier’s rifle at the height of tensions.
Humor, too, is in play. One online meme shows a bottle of soju, Korea’s grain spirit, with text indicating different degrees of drunkenness: The last is a declaration of martial law.
Yoon’s party turns
The head of Mr. Yoon’s People Power Party, Han Dong-hoon, announced Friday that he wants the president’s powers removed as swiftly as possible.
Mr. Han’s posture appears to remove the last obstacle to Mr. Yoon’s impeachment. A related vote will be put before the National Assembly on Saturday evening.
It is a striking reversal of Mr. Han’s position. On Thursday, he had stated that the right-wing party would not support impeachment.
It is widely believed that if Mr. Yoon is impeached, turned over to the Constitutional Court and judged guilty, the leftist Democratic Party of Korea would win the subsequent presidential election.
Though it is the ruling party, the PPP is a minority in the Assembly. Even so, if party members vote against impeachment, which requires a two-thirds majority to pass, they would — just — have the numbers to stymie it.
Mr. Han revealed the alarming reason for his new stance Friday, speaking to media at a table he shared with grim-faced lawmakers.
“Yesterday, I said that I would make efforts to ensure that the impeachment motion would not pass so as to prevent harm to the Korean people and our supporters from turmoil we weren’t prepared for,” he told a press conference. “But given newly revealed facts, I believe it is necessary to swiftly suspend President Yoon from exercising his powers.”
Mr. Han revealed that Mr. Yoon had tasked the head of the Defence Counterintelligence Command to arrest lawmakers, who the president accused of being “anti-state forces.”
Persons rounded up were to be held at a facility in Gwacheon, Mr. Han revealed.
Gwacheon is a partly disused government complex on the outskirts of the capital, Seoul. Tuesday’s martial law decree included provisions for arrests without warrants.
Separately, the unwillingness of elite units of the South Korean army to support Mr. Yoon’s bizarre gambit — a gambit that harked back to Korea’s decades of authoritarian rule, which ended in 1987 — was made clear.
Army backs down, won’t follow similar orders
The army’s oldest special forces unit, the 1st Special Forces Brigade, as well as its tier-1 707th Battalion — Korea’s equivalent of the U.S. Army’s Delta Force — and a special unit of the Capital Defense Command were all deployed to seize the National Assembly and detain lawmakers.
Korean special forces have a dubious reputation. In 1980, they killed hundreds of pro-democracy protesters in the city of Gwangju, leaving a dark stain on the Korean political consciousness.
On Tuesday, they acted with far more restraint.
If they had forcibly prosecuted their mission, lawmakers would have been unable to vote down Mr. Yoon’s martial law declaration.
However, furious citizens massed outside the chamber and jostled with troops, while lawmakers forced their way in. CCTV footage shows troops inside being confronted by unarmed lawmakers and backing down.
The head of the army’s Special Warfare Command, Gen. Kwak Jong-geun, was questioned by opposition lawmakers on Friday. A transcript of his comments has been seen by The Washington Times.
The general revealed that he had been tasked with an “anti-terrorist” mission but that he refused to issue troops with live ammunition.
He also told his soldiers not to drag lawmakers out of the chamber, despite knowing that represented disobedience to orders — orders he deemed “illegal.”
The 190 lawmakers at the scene voted unanimously to overturn Mr. Yoon’s decree of martial law. With that, the autocoup was over, in less than three hours.
Three hours later, early on Wednesday morning, Mr. Yoon accepted the outcome.
Soon after speaking, Gen. Kwak was relieved as head of the Special Warfare Command by acting Defense Minister Kim Seon-ho. Mr. Kim said an investigation is being prepared to probe the actions of all troops engaged on Tuesday night.
The plot is widely believed to have been conceived by then-Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun, who, Gen. Kwak stated, delivered orders to the special forces. Mr. Kim is a close confidante of Mr. Yoon.
He was replaced as defense minister yesterday by Kim Seon-ho (no relation), his former deputy. He is banned from exiting the country.
Rumors of a second martial law declaration circulated on Friday morning. The acting defense minister, in an emergency press conference, said the rumors were false and also that troops would refuse to follow similar orders.
Was election interference an issue?
Gwacheon figured in news other than Mr. Han’s revelation that a detention facility was being prepared there.
It has emerged that, at the same time commandos were moving upon the National Assembly, other special units were tasked to take and hold the National Election Commission, also in Gwacheon, and its sub-offices in two other locations.
Their mission was to seize the facility and ensure no equipment was removed, Gen. Kwak reported. After martial law was revoked, troops departed.
The aim of the operation, according to Mr. Kim, the former defense minister, was to probe allegations of past election fraud. The Times has been advised that absent a military operation, the NEC was sacrosanct: Any official probe would likely have been stalled by the National Assembly.
Unverified allegations have arisen that prior election results, including April’s National Assembly elections at which the PPP lost seats, had been in error, or manipulated.
While none of these allegations have been proven, questions have arisen overseas about the reliability of Korean-made electoral equipment. Korean-made voting machines were used in problematic elections held in both the Democratic Republic of Congo and Iraq.
In yet another side operation, Gen. Kwak revealed that the “News Factory” — the outlet of a prominent anti-Yoon YouTuber — was also raided by special forces.
Absent a last-minute resignation by Mr. Yoon, National Assembly impeachment deliberations are expected to start at 7 p.m., Korea time, on Saturday.
• Andrew Salmon can be reached at asalmon@washingtontimes.com.
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