[Interview] Soldiers’ Cold War recollections

Baek Yeong-suk, head of the Imjin River Art Troupe

Former military veterans from North and South Korea recall how their minds have opened to the idea of Korean unification

Baek Yeong-suk, head of the Imjin River Art Troupe

Yong Seong-jung, soldier turned DMZ peace guide

“When I go into the DMZ, I don’t have any fears about getting shot. Inter-Korean relations might seem frozen, but I think that as soon as we break the ice, exchange will really take off,” said Yong Seong-jung, 54.

During an interview with the Hankyoreh at the DMZ tour information center at Imjingak, Paju, Gyeonggi Province, on Nov. 25, Yong was asked how he’d changed since becoming a “DMZ peace guide” this past July.

After joining the army at the age of 20 in 1985, Yong served for 31 years and was discharged at the rank of sergeant major in 2016. Until becoming a peace guide, Yong said, he’d been pretty uptight and had been repulsed by the very word “peace.”

When university students rallied at Imjingak in the early 1990s and chanted, “Go north, come south,” Yong, who was stationed at a police-army joint situation room, used to fantasized about arresting such “commies.”

“I’d joined the army during a military dictatorship when there was rampant hostility toward North Korea and was brainwashed for 10 years. The result was that I wasn’t open to the talk of peace and reconciliation during the administrations of Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun.”

Given Yong’s assumption that North Korea should be absorbed into the South Korean system, he often found himself tongue-tied while leading peace tours on the front lines and even thought about quitting. But through his studies, he was able to open his mind ― which had been closed for three decades ― and broaden the horizons of his thinking.

“I think that unification is right ahead of us, closer than it’s ever been before. The mood for peace will persist, and we’ll never return to the extreme conflict of the past,” he said.

Yong Seong-jung, a DMZ peace guide

Baek Yeong-suk defected after 10 years in N. Korean army

“In North Korea, both men and women want to join the army, since that helps them get a good job and join the Workers’ Party of Korea when their service is over. Even smart people can’t get into the army without good songbun [social status], and for women, joining the army is harder than getting into college,” said Baek Yeong-suk, 55, head of the Imjin River Art Troupe.

Baek sat down with the Hankyoreh on Nov. 26 at the office of a Paju association for North Korean defectors. She enrolled in the North Korean military at the age of 17; after 10 years of service with the IV Corps, in Haeju, South Hwanghae Province, she left the military with the rank of captain.

The Imjin River Art Troupe, which performs in Paju, is composed of 20 female defectors from North Korea. Baek said she made up her mind to join the military after graduating high school because of her family’s financial hardships.

“As a new recruit, we were put through rigorous training. In the winter, they had us dig trenches in the ice with shovels and pickaxes, and we sweated so much that our coats were caked with salt,” she said.

“Even though North Korea is a poor country, soldiers maintain a strictly martial spirit in their work and are ready to fight to the last drop of blood for the party, the nation, and the people. The mood there is much different than the South Korean military.”

Baek married a soldier from the same unit and had two sons. After her husband died of disease, she defected with her sons, passing through China to begin a new life in South Korea in 2009. For three years, she put her nose to the grindstone, working at a bread factory during the week and at a restaurant on the weekends, without taking a single day off. Today, she enjoys the fruits of success: she runs her own restaurant and has set up the art troupe in order to help South and North Koreans see beyond their differences.

“Even when the North Koreans are talking about peaceful coexistence, you have to assume they’re always on a combat footing. If South and North Korea truly want to move down the road toward peace, they just need to allow free travel.”

By Park Kyung-man, North Gyeonggi correspondent

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