Hardliner named chief of new defense innovation committee

Kim Kwan-jin

President Yoon Suk Yeol plans to appoint Kim Kwan-jin, a former defense minister known for his hardline stance against North Korean armed aggression, as the vice chairman of the soon-to-be-launched Defense Innovation Committee, according to presidential sources Wednesday.

Kim was convicted in 2019 of political meddling by ordering the military cyber command to post online comments supporting the conservative Lee Myung-bak administration during the 2012 parliamentary and presidential elections.

The Supreme Court in October last year upheld the guilty verdict regarding the political meddling charge against Kim but partially acquitted him on the charge of wrongful exercise of authority.

Yoon’s decision to appoint Kim as the vice chair of the Defense Innovation Committee, whose mandate is to guide the implementation of new technologies and cyber security protocols in the armed forces, signals his rehabilitation after a long period of criminal prosecution for his actions under previous conservative governments.

Kim was appointed defense minister under Lee in 2010 when North Korea shelled Yeonpyeong Island and the South Korean military faced criticism for its belated response to the bombardment.

As defense minister, Kim ordered South Korea’s armed forces to adopt an approach of “shoot first, report later” to send a clear signal to the North that future provocations would not be tolerated.

The North’s state media referred to Kim with expletives and released photos of soldiers using posters of his face for target practice.

He continued to head the Defense Ministry under Lee’s successor Park Geun-hye until 2014 when he was named director of the Blue House National Security Office.

Kim remained in that post until Park was impeached and eventually removed from office by the Constitutional Court in 2017 in a massive influence-peddling scandal.

Both conservative presidents were eventually jailed on corruption charges, with Park being pardoned in December 2021, while Lee was pardoned in December last year.

Kim himself was indicted of political meddling and abuse of authority in March 2018, shortly after the liberal Moon Jae-in administration was elected and vowed to “root out deep-seated evils,” referring to cozy ties between conservatives, big businesses and the military and intelligence establishment.

In addition to trying to influence public opinion by fabricating online comments, Kim was also accused of pressuring Defense Ministry officials to scale down an internal investigation into the covert operations in early 2014.

BY MICHAEL LEE [lee.junhyuk@joongang.co.kr]