Despite its prominent position in US-South Korea relations in the late 1970s, the Koreagate scandal remains an understudied episode in the alliance. The allegation that members of the US Congress were receiving bribes from Korean officials and agents first surfaced in 1975 during hearings on the human rights situation in South Korea (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1975, 177-185). These accusations led to subsequent Congressional hearings on the activities of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA) in the US in 1976 (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1976). The scandal took on international importance following the Washington Post article entitled “Seoul Gave Millions to U.S. Officials” on the eve of the 1976 presidential election (Cheshire and Armstrong 1976). For the next two years, several Congressional committees investigated accusations that members of Congress accepted bribes from Korean embassy officials and KCIA agents, in particular Park Dong-seon (Tongsun Park), as well as the suspicion that the Korean government was engaging in nefarious activities to boost its image and silence critics in the US.¹

Despite thousands of pages of spilled ink, however, the investigations netted very little. Only one member of Congress—Richard Hanna (D-CA)—received jail time for his wrongdoings. Very few members of Congress were found to have received substantial sums from Korean agents. And by 1978, the pages of the Washington Post instead argued that the scandal had been blown out of proportion by the media in the hopes of uncovering the next great political scandal after Watergate—from which “Koreagate” earned its moniker (Babcock 1978).

Perhaps as a result of the underwhelming conclusion to the investigations, Koreagate has not figured prominently in most scholarly inquiries of US-South Korea relations. Some scholars have situated it within the bilateral relationship and analyze its impact on the alliance alongside the troop withdrawal and human rights issues that plagued US-South Korea relations during the Carter administration (Nam 1986, 156-158; Cha 1999, 151; Work 2019, 353-379). Chae-Jin Lee (2006, 95-102) provides more detail than most, but again limits his focus to the period of the investigations (the late 1970s) rather than the years during which the influencing scheme was unfolding (the early 1970s). In other words, the fallout of the scandal has been investigated by scholars, but the actual implementation of the lobbying and influencing scheme has received little attention following Congressional hearings in the 1970s.

The absence of any in-depth study on Koreagate or the Korea influencing campaign of the 1970s is all the more curious given the extensive literature on other countries’ so-called “Lobbies” in the US. Research has shown that the “China Lobby,” meaning that of the Republic of China, first appeared in the 1930s (Park 2003; Blackwell 2010; Erskine 2018). Similar to the description offered below of the Korea influencing campaign of the 1970s, Koen (1960, 31) refers to the China Lobby as a “pressure group” as its activities expanded beyond Congress and the strict definition of “lobbying.” The “Japan Lobby” (re-)emerged immediately after Japan’s defeat in the Pacific War (Schonberger 1977; Angel 2001). Robert Angel (2000), while recognizing his own role in it, breaks down the Japan Lobby into various groups including the Japanese government, official lobbyists for Japan in the US, and, again similar to the below description of the Korea Lobby, a wider network of Japanese experts and those with interest in the country. Jeff Kingston (2019) argues that the Japan Lobby has been very active recently in using its networks to put forth its preferred view of twentieth century history issues in the US. Another well-known “Lobby” is that of Israel. John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt (2006) have argued that US policy towards Israel is decided in large part by the working of the lobby rather than based on US national interests.

This study seeks to move away from the well-worn story of Koreagate—namely, the Congressional lobbying scheme implemented by Park Dong-seon with the approval of the Park Chung Hee government—and in doing so investigates a severely understudied episode in US-South Korea relations while also contributing to the body of literature on foreign lobbies in the US. It turns the focus to the broader influencing campaign that was implemented alongside the Congressional lobbying efforts by the Korean government. The influencing campaign was originally investigated by the Subcommittee on International Organizations in the House of Representatives beginning with the above-mentioned hearings in 1976 and then again from 1977 to 1978. The later investigations culminated in a report entitled Investigation of Korean-American Relations. Aside from a long review of US-South Korea relations up through the mid-1970s, the report also digs into “educational, informational, and cultural activities” of the Korean government in the US. This portion of the report outlines how the Korean government “attempted to shape public opinion and improve the image” of South Korea in the US (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 259). In short, we know an image campaign existed, but no systematic analysis of it has been attempted. Thus two questions are important to answer: what types of activities did the Korean government implement and how successful were these efforts?

To answer these questions, this article applies the theory of “authoritarian image management” to the influencing campaign orchestrated by the Korean government (Dukalskis 2021). I argue that although this theory was built based on the actions of authoritarian governments in the post-Cold War era, it applies equally to the South Korean case in the 1970s. Moreover, rather than relying exclusively on the findings of Congress in the 1970s, this article uses archival materials from the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) to provide new evidence about the image management campaign. This article thus not only enlarges the scope of the authoritarian image management theory by expanding its applicability to a wider range of cases, but also sheds new light on the Korean government’s actions in the 1970s by showing its image management campaign included elements not uncovered or not publicly revealed by Congress in the late 1970s. Based on this new documentation, I argue that the Korean government’s image management scheme was mostly unsuccessful, and these past failures should be considered in scholarship analyzing contemporary authoritarian image management efforts.

To this end, the following section discusses the authoritarian image management theory and its applicability to the South Korean case. The subsequent sections discuss two key areas that Congress investigated in the 1970s—the American media and academia—as well as the role of South Korean honorary consuls in local communities the US which has not yet been covered in the literature.

The practice of states projecting an image of themselves to other states and their citizens has been researched under many names. “International public relations” is defined by Michael Kunczik (1997, 12) as “the planned and continuous distribution of interest-bound information by a state aimed (mostly) at improving the country’s image abroad.” A similar concept is that of “nation branding,” which Melissa Aronczyk (2013, 16) argues helps nation-states “compete for international capital in the areas such as tourism, foreign direct investment, import-export trade, higher education, and skilled labor” as well as convey an “image of legitimacy and authority in diplomatic arenas.” The drawback of these concepts is that they do not necessarily encapsulate the nefarious methods that authoritarian states may use to manage their image abroad. While authoritarian states may certainly project images through public relations firms or try to construct their own brand, scholars have shown how authoritarian states go beyond the passive projection of images to directly craft narratives about their state by laundering their reputation through institutions in other states (Cooley, Prelec, and Heathershaw 2022; Cohen and de Oliveira 2022), lobbying officials in target countries (Cooley and Heathershaw 2017, 77-78), or even repressing their citizens abroad (Glasius 2018).

For this reason, Alexander Dukalskis developed the concept of “authoritarian image management.” Dukalskis (2021, 36) argues the concept of authoritarian image management “comprises efforts by [authoritarian states] and/or [their] proxies to protect and/or enhance the legitimacy of the state’s political system outside its borders.” The distinction between authoritarian image management and other concepts described above such as “branding” or “public diplomacy” is necessary, Dukalskis (2021, 3-4) argues, because “they leave out deception and the harsh—even occasionally murderous—realities of authoritarian image management.” In developing his theory, Dukalskis (2021, 40) posits that authoritarian states’ image management activities may be classified in two dimensions. First, authoritarian states’ management strategies may be promotional or obstructive. Promotional activities attempt to project a positive image of the authoritarian state, while obstructive activities aim to silence critics and remove negative information. The second dimension outlines the target audience of the image management activities. Audiences can either be diffuse—targeting public opinion at large in the target state—or specific—targeting specific individuals, often political elites and opinion-shapers.

An important question to address at this point is why this theory is applicable to the Korean influencing campaign of the 1970s, especially given that Dukalskis mainly applies the concept to post-Cold War regimes. According to Dukalskis (2021, 21-22), in the contemporary era in which democracy has become largely viewed as the only legitimate political regime, authoritarian countries have struggled to legitimize their rule and face an existential threat in the form of democracy promotion. This has led authoritarian regimes to undertake these image management campaigns to justify their approaches in the court of public opinion which is increasing difficult to silence in the age of modern communication technologies. Interestingly, South Korea in the 1970s faced the same problem that contemporary dictatorships face today. As part of the “free world,” authoritarian US allies often sought to give the impression they were democratic, if only for the sake of appearances. Also, particularly from the 1970s on after a vigorous international human rights movement began in the US, authoritarian US allies faced increasing criticism from Congress and US civil society as well as robust democracy movements within their own countries that were often transnationally linked to groups in the US (Keys 2014; Snyder 2018). Increased concern about international human rights in the US coincided with Park Chung Hee’s decision to implement, and brutally suppress opposition to, the authoritarian Yusin system in South Korea. These divergent trends in the US and South Korea produced a context in which the Park regime was forced to undertake an authoritarian image management campaign.

Moreover, this approach is warranted given the differences with other countries “Lobbies” during the Cold War. The China Lobby’s main goal was to ensure continued support for the Nationalist government and assistance in defeating the Chinese Communist Party in the Chinese Civil War, and then later demand help for the Nationalist government’s desire to retake mainland China (Koen 1960). The Japan Lobby’s initial goal was to secure American assistance for its rapid economic growth program in the post-war years (Angel 2001). The Israel Lobby likewise seeks continued US support for Israel’s security (Mearsheimer and Walt 2006). The South Korea case is different in that a main goal of the influencing campaign was to ensure the survival of the Park Chung Hee regime which was faced with criticism for its human rights abuses. Moreover, descriptions of the other “Lobbies” often highlight the existence of American groups or organizations that were active in supporting the goals of the foreign lobby, such as the American Chinese Policy Association (Blackwell 2010) or the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (Mearsheimer and Walt 2006). As we will see in the following, the Korean effort was initiated and driven by the Korean government with sporadic rather than well-organized assistance from groups of Americans.

The Korean government influencing campaign also differs from a more traditional case of “public diplomacy” which can be defined as “the means by which governments, private groups, and individuals influence the attitudes and opinions of other peoples and governments in such a way as to exercise influence on their foreign policy decisions” (as quoted in Ayhan 2019, 65). Discussions in Congress and the US on the human rights repression in South Korea represented an existential crisis for the Park regime. The withdrawal of support for Park Chung Hee by the US government would have emboldened democratic forces or encouraged a military coup against him. The Park regime’s sensitivity to the possibility of US intervention in domestic Korean politics was on display when Kim Young Sam, leader of the opposition party, was expelled from the Korean National Assembly when he made public remarks to the New York Times calling on the US to rebuke Park (Sohn 1989, 160-166). When discussing the possibility of military aid cuts allies in Congress, the Korean government stated that the loss of aid was of secondary importance to language that indicated the aid cut was because of the human rights abuses of the regime, demonstrating the existential nature of the human rights issue and the need for an influencing campaign.² Although the Park regime during its influencing campaign claimed to be working for the national interest, as historian Hyung-A Kim (2004, 209) argues, Park was “convinced” that his “personal ambitions and the national good…could be achieved only through the [authoritarian] Yusin system.” Because of this, the influencing campaign was not purely designed to further Korean national interests by influencing the foreign policy of the US. It was foremost implemented to preserve the Park regime.

For these reasons, I argue the “authoritarian image management” concept developed by Dukalskis (2021) is a suitable framework for analyzing the Korean influencing scheme of the 1970s. In the following, the Korean image management campaign is described and analyzed based on the authoritarian image management concept in the areas of the US media, academia, and local communities. In describing the influencing campaign, Dukalskis’ conceptualization of the promotional-obstructive activities and diffuse-specific audience dimensions are employed to classify the various actions of the Korean government.

Although the origins of the Koreagate scandal have been traced back to the decision by the Nixon administration to withdraw 20,000 troops from South Korea in 1970, the wider authoritarian image management campaign that the Park Chung Hee regime implemented has its origins in the declaration of the Yusin Regime on October 17, 1972 (Boettcher 1980, 96). While it is easy to understand why Park Chung Hee may have deemed a lobbying campaign in Congress necessary in 1970 due to recognition that Congress would be the body authorizing the spending on the promised \$1.5 billion military modernization package to compensate for the departing US troops, it was not a priority to wage a campaign against the US media. This changed, however, with the promulgation of the Yusin Constitution. Just weeks after the Yusin announcement on October 17, 1972, an editorial penned by Gregory Henderson (1972)—a former Foreign Service Officer who served in Korea and an influential American expert—entitled “South Korea: Witnessing the Rape of Democracy” appeared in the New York Times, foreshadowing the negative press the Park regime would receive in the coming years.

In the ensuing years, the South Korean government would use a variety of tactics to manage its image in the American media. These activities can be classified according to the framework outlined above and include both promotional and obstructive methods that targeted diffuse and specific audiences. Another way to conceive of the media’s place in the image management campaign of the Korean government would be that the media was both a target and a tool. That is, specific figures in the media were a target of the Korean government’s activities, but by targeting specific media figures it was hoped that the media would become a tool to engage in image management activities that targeted diffuse or other specific audiences.

A very clear picture of the targeted promotional and obstructive activities of the Korean government’s image management campaign emerges from documents from MoFA archives. Immediately following the Yusin proclamation, MoFA officials requested meetings with influential media outlets such as the New York Times.³ On October 19, MoFA officials were already meeting with a “general editor” from Newsweek to “explain the government’s position” on the Yusin proclamation, and “quarreled” with Newsweek Tokyo foreign correspondent Bernard Krisher who would become a specific target of the Park regime’s aggressive push to censor foreign media in 1974 (discussed below).⁴

By October 20, the South Korean embassy in Washington had produced a report entitled “Plans for Special Activities” (Teukbyeolhwaldong gyehoek).⁵ The main goals of the “special activities” were to improve understanding of the Yusin declaration and reconfirm the friendly ties between the US and South Korea. The targets of the activities included the Nixon administration, Congress, media, academia, and organizations related to economic relations between the two countries. The report even specified persons of interest and assigned these specific targets to ROK officials in the US including Ambassador Kim Dong-jo. The Korean official assigned to the media was Lee Jae-hyeon who, according to this report, had already contacted seventeen media figures from outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Reuters, and Associated Press, and planned to contact seven more. Additionally, the embassy in Washington distributed thousands of copies of promotional materials to media outlets as well as government officials, academics, and international organizations.

One interaction between Ambassador Kim Dong-jo and Editor-in-Chief of Foreign Affairs William P. Bundy on November 2, 1970 provides clues about how many of these meetings likely progressed. Ambassador Kim began by explaining the Yusin measures and their necessity, and asked for advice from Bundy about “promoting” the new policies to “American academics and the opinion-forming elites.”6 Ambassador Kim also asked if Bundy would be interested in publishing an article in the name of President Park Chung Hee. Bundy replied that while Park is a well-known figure and the progress in inter-Korean relations in 1972 is of interest to his readers, the “recent domestic policies” make it temporarily difficult for his outlet to publish such an article. This interaction displays the multiple purposes of engaging with specific well-known media figures. Ambassador Kim Dong-jo hoped to explain the rationale for the Yusin proclamation and garner understanding for it specifically from Bundy as an influential media figure whose outlet in particular was influential in foreign policy making, use him to garner insight for successfully implementing an image management campaign, and utilize his platform in Foreign Affairs for targeting a more diffuse audience with image management content.

Although Ambassador Kim’s attempt to persuade Bundy failed, a report submitted on November 20, 1972 covered all the activities of Ambassador Kim regarding the Yusin announcement and indicate that he met with reporters or editors from Newsweek, United Press International, the Associated Press, Copley News (a now-defunct wire news service), the San Diego Evening Tribune, San Diego Union, and The Los Angeles Times. In several instances, these targeted approaches did allow the Korean government to then engage in image management activities toward a broader audience. In an undated report likely produced in mid-December 1972, the Korean embassy in Washington reported that it was able to submit four pro-Park government articles to the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Christian Science Monitor for publication, although only in one case was the editorial written with the byline of a Korean government official, allowing the Korean government to conceal their involvement.⁷ Christian Science Monitor also published an interview with Prime Minister Kim Jong-pil in February 1973.8 In this sense, the targeted promotional activities opened doors for diffuse promotional activities that targeted broader American public opinion via editorials and interviews.

However, the Park regime’s targeting of media outlets in its image management campaign at best secured some semblance of balanced coverage. If these meetings had the obstructive goal of dampening critical coverage of events in South Korea, then the attempts were a complete failure. A MoFA report form early 1974 compiled all the negative press the Park regime was receiving throughout the world and a special report was made that covered only negative press in the New York Times and Washington Post from October 1973 to January 1974.9 Bernard Krisher, Richard Halloran, and Don Oberdorfer ran stories of Korean Central Intelligence Agency (KCIA) repression and student protests in Newsweek, the New York Times, and Washington Post, respectively.¹⁰ Piercing editorials by Korea and East Asia experts Jerome Cohen, Gregory Henderson, and Edwin Reischauer in the spring of 1974 were catalysts in Congress opening hearings on the human rights situation in South Korea in the summer of 1974 (Cohen and Henderson 1974; Reischauer 1974). Patrick Chung (2014, 1147) shows that the use of the word “dictator” to describe Park Chung Hee in the American media rose markedly in the six years after the Yusin announcement.

The Korean government responded in a variety of ways to these failures. Internally it sought a scapegoat. Lee Jae-hyeon, who was the Korean embassy official initially tasked with taming the American media, claimed that in 1973 he was blamed for the outpouring of negative press and accused of being pro-North Korea. He also asserted he was going to be forcefully returned to Seoul and thus decided to defect to the US (Hankyoreh 1996). The US government accepted his request and arranged for him to be moved to Illinois, after which he became a professor of journalism at Western Illinois University. The threats against Lee backfired spectacularly as two years later Lee would give his fateful testimony before the Fraser Committee, kicking off the Koreagate scandal (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1975, 177-185).

Despite the initial failures, the Korean government did not give up on its targeted promotional activities and increased the use of targeted obstructive tactics as well. MoFA officials argued for an approach toward the American media which emphasized persuasion. A June 1974 report entitled “Measures for Coping with Critical Foreign Media” (Oegugui bipanjeok eollone daehan daecheo bangan) produced by the American Affairs Bureau of MoFA called for critical reporters to be engaged in conversation and for them to be encouraged to visit Korea.¹¹ An August 8, 1974 report stressed the point that reversing the critical trends in American media coverage of Korea could not be solved overnight. The report also added to the above suggested response measures by calling for hiring an American public relations firm, increasing foreign correspondents’ access to high-level Korean government officials so that their sources for news would not be limited to anti-government persons and inviting them to important government functions, and providing more press releases and reports to foreign media.¹² Interestingly, a handwritten note on the cover page of this report blatantly acknowledged that the Korean government needed to engage in “image building.”¹³

Despite MoFA’s suggestions, it is also clear that other government officials and agencies were not willing to let the direction of foreign media reports rest solely on promotional activities. There is significant evidence that the Korean government also engaged in targeted obstructive tactics as well. Bernard Krisher of Newsweek had several run-ins with Korean government pressure. Krisher (2006, 137-138) stated that he was followed by the KCIA while in Seoul, had his hotel room phone bugged, and his stringer was interrogated. He reported on the KCIA’s activities in a series of articles in late 1973 and early 1974.14 For another article in late 1973, Krisher interviewed a famous Japanese fortuneteller who predicted something “terrible” would happen to Park Chung Hee in 1974. Krisher (2006, 138-140) asserts the South Korean embassy in Tokyo repeatedly asked him to retract his report about the fortuneteller, and the series of articles made Park Chung Hee so angry that he ordered Krisher’s visa to be revoked. However, internal recommendations from MoFA and external pressure from the US government eventually led to a reversal of this decision.¹⁵

The Krisher episode of early 1974 demonstrated the potential for blowback when the Park regime’s efforts to obstruct American media from publishing critical reports was direct and public. Based on this result and the suggestions of MoFA, the South Korean government adopted more subtle and indirect forms of obstruction. For example, when the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) decided to air a British Broadcasting Company (BBC) documentary on the so-called “People’s Revolutionary Party (PRP) case,” the Korean government used an ally in Congress, Rep. Charles Wilson, to plead its case. Wilson wrote to ABC President William Sheehan, arguing that the documentary “gives an unfair, lopsided view” of South Korea and requested that time on the program be given to interview “persons who believe that the BBC film is inaccurate, misleading, and in some instances, a deliberate overstatement of the true situation in the Republic of Korea.”16 Following a critical editorial by Professor Jerome Cohen in the Los Angeles Times in September 1976, the Korean government relied on former Associated Press report O.H.P. King to write a rebuttal. This document also indicates that King, who had spent time reporting in Korea during the Korean War, was an official advisor to the South Korean Ministry of Culture and Information.¹⁷ The case of O.H.P. King illustrates how friendly American media figures could move beyond being targets and become tools in the image management campaign.

Despite a relaxed approach towards media obstruction in the late 1970s, obstructive targeting was more severe for Korean nationals working for American media outlets. Kim Myong Sik (2006, 165-166), a correspondent for Reuters in the 1970s, recounts a story of his colleague, Lee Si Ho, being detained for keeping a flyer he was handed by a dissident during a democracy protest. According to Kim, it took an appeal by Washington Post correspondent Don Oberdorfer to get Lee released from interrogation. Shim Jae Hoon (2006, 195-196), who worked for the New York Times in the 1970s, was interrogated in early October 1979 for the infamous New York Times interview with Kim Young Sam, mentioned above, in which the opposition leader urged the US government to intervene on behalf of democracy protesters against Park Chung Hee. Shim believed that had Park not been assassinated later that month he would have been arrested alongside Kim Young Sam for subversion. Critical reports in the American media remained a problem for the Park regime throughout the 1970s. As we have seen in this section, the Korean government sought to alleviate this problem both through promotional and obstructive tactics. Specific media outlets and figures were targeted, but these meetings had the dual purpose of seeking to open media outlets to pro-Korea material that could then target a diffuse audience.

The case of academia in relation to the South Korean image management campaign is quite different from that of the media. For one, the Korean government had a different tool for engaging academics: funding. Moreover, it is interesting to note that many academics were eager to assist the Korean government in its image management campaign given their shared worldviews, although there is no evidence an organized effort to support the Korean government was made by American academics.

The use of funding to encourage academia to produce research or convey opinions favorable to the South Korean government is a subject that was covered heavily in the Congressional investigation by the Fraser Committee in the late 1970s. One example is that of Western Michigan University and Professor Andrew C. Nahm. The Fraser Committee investigation found that Nahm had accepted a \$700 donation from Ambassdor Kim Dong-jo in November 1972, just after the Yusin proclamation, to support an academic conference on Korea. In return, Nahm published a “Letter to the Editors” in the New York Times which took a favorable view of the Yusin regime. Consequently, a large grant of \$17,500 was given to the Center for Korean Studies at Western Michigan University in 1973 after a similar request in 1972 had been denied. The Congressional investigation found that in subsequent years, as Western Michigan University continued to receive funding from the Korean government, “Korean domestic political matters were generally avoided” in research and that “publications...did not contain any material critical of the government” (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 266-269).

A similar series of events unfolded at Harvard University. During the first round of Congressional hearings on the human rights situation in South Korea in 1974, the Korean government was able to ensure that Thomas J. Coolidge, IV was called to testify.¹⁸ Coolidge was the chairman of Bay Orient Enterprises and described as a prominent figure in US-Korea trade relations (The Harvard Crimson 1978). But more importantly he was also the chairman of a fundraising committee for Harvard University’s East Asian Research Center and spent many years living in Korea as part of his business dealings (Subcommittees on Asian and Pacific Affairs and International Organizations and Movements 1974, 96). His statements during the hearing supported the Korean government’s position which was to argue against US troop withdrawal or aid cuts in response to human rights abuses (Subcommittees on Asian and Pacific Affairs and International Organizations and Movements 1974, 96-98). While Coolidge’s remarks were not necessarily controversial, disturbingly, months after his testimony, Coolidge met with Kim Jeong-yeom, the Chief of Park Chung Hee’s Blue House Secretariat, and received a promise for a \$1 million donation from the Korean government that would be funneled through the Korean Traders Association to Harvard (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 270-271). The Fraser Committee investigation found that the Korean government subsequently sought to limit the scope of the grant to research on the Korean economy, and that a Korean daily newspaper, the Joongang Ilbo, had reported that the Korean government hoped the donation would limit criticism from Harvard professors such as Jerome Cohen and Edwin Reischauer (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 272-274). In short, the Korean government was able to secure promotional testimony from Coolidge in Congress, and hoped its grant would serve a dual purpose of promoting research favorable to the Park regime and silencing critics at Harvard.

The Fraser Committee investigations also found that several academics were offered individual research grants by the Korean government during this time. For example, Lee Chong Sik of the University of Pennsylvania was offered \$3,000 and Robert Scalapino of the University of California was offered \$5,000 (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 287). However both declined the offers suspecting that the funds were indeed tied to a government effort to encourage research findings friendly to Korean government positions. It was also found that the Korean government worked closely with the Hudson Institute to hold academic conferences that took overall views friendly to the Korean government; the Korean government was also alleged to have had veto power over the conference’s speaker list (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 289-290). The Korean government even formed its own research institute, the Research Institute on Korean Affairs. The start-up funds for the institute were reportedly received directly from Park Chung Hee and subsequent funding was laundered so as to hide the Korean government’s involvement (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 290). Although these are only a few examples of the numerous noted in the Fraser Committee’s findings, we can see that the Korean government sought to utilize funding for academia to both promote Korean government positions on certain issues and obstruct critics.

A previously unknown aspect of the image management campaign, however, is the degree to which some American academics sought to actively assist the Korean government in its endeavor. The Fraser Committee was often quick to assert it was not suggesting American academics had compromised themselves by changing their views or bending to Korean pressure. For academics who assisted the Korean government this is also undoubtedly true. However, it is one thing to unknowingly become involved in a Korean government plot, and quite another to actively help with the plotting.

One figure stands out as an American academic who sought to actively assist the Korean government in its authoritarian image management campaign: Richard “Dixie” Walker. Walker is best known as the long-serving US ambassador to South Korea from 1981 to 1986. But in the 1970s, Walker was a professor at the University of South Carolina. The South Korean government contacted Walker ahead of the 1974 hearings and offered to pay for his trip to Washington (he was on sabbatical at the time in Hawaii), and even offered to then fly him to Seoul where he would visit as the “personal guest” of Minister of Foreign Affairs Kim Dong-jo.¹⁹ Walker, however, declined the Korean offer to pay for his trip to Washington, and when the Congress indicated that it would not cover his travel costs Walker opted to submit a written statement for the 1974 hearings rather than appear in person.²⁰ Walker did testify before the committee directly in 1975, again at the request of the Korean government (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1975, 185-192).

However, as with Coolidge, testimony is not the end of Walker’s involvement with the Korean government. During a meeting with Prime Minister Kim Jong-pil in Seoul in 1974, Walker stated he would send the Korean government an “extensive and detailed proposal on activities for improving public opinion about Korea in the US and promoting cooperative relations between the US and Korea.”21 Walker was not alone in his efforts. The Korean government was also in late 1974 having discussions with Frank R. Barnett, the president of the National Strategy Information Center. This institution was funded by donations from Richard Mellon Scaife, who inherited the Mellon family fortune and was dubbed by the Washington Post in 1999 as the “most generous donor to conservative causes in American history” (Kaiser 1999). The goal of Barnett’s institution was to shape “public policy through educational activities,” and the Center for Strategic and International Studies founder David M. Abshire argued that Barnett “was the outside man to develop strategic consensus with colleges, universities, lawyers, and other professionals” (Michaels 2017, 88). In other words, if the Korean government was interested in shaping American public opinion via the political elite and opinion makers, Barnett was a good person to contact.

In a letter to Korean Ambassador to the US Ham Byeong-jun on October 22, 1974, Barnett states he and “our mutual friend Dr. Richard Walker” where happy Ham had been appointed Ambassador, argued a professional public relations firm would be a waste of money, and included a five-page proposal for a “non-profit Speaker’s Bureau that could reach 500 important American audiences in the next 3 years.”22 Barnett’s proposal argued that “the Government of the Republic of Korea is under attack, in the US and elsewhere, by (a) Communist propaganda and (b) various liberal, socialist and neutralist critics.” Barnett contended that “decisions in US foreign policy (and defense policy) are made by a relatively small percentage of the total American public” and that “to preserve a politico-military alliance demands PERSONAL INTERACTION rather than the projection of clever but superficial images.”23 Speakers for the bureau were to be recruited from business circles, academia (who would be recruited by Walker), the media, religious organizations, and retired military officials, “naturally no one hostile to Seoul.” Barnett, however, warned that the Korean government would have to accept a measure of criticism from some speakers as full-throated endorsement of all Korean government policies would not be credible.

In January 1975, Walker sent his own proposal to the Korean government. This proposal was made on behalf of MultiNational Consultants, Inc., the president of which was Robert H. Parsley.²⁴ Parsley was also on the board of directors of Frank Barnett’s National Strategy Information Center, and the address for MultiNational Consultants was actually the same as the law firm Butler, Binion, Rice, Cook & Knapp where Parsley was employed (Committee on Foreign Relations 1984, 365). The proposal called for a one-year contract and the Korean government was to pay \$150,000 for the company’s services.

The plan was to bring together an initial group of consultants who would then conduct several activities including an independent briefing operation which would circulate “briefing papers” to influential Americans concerned with Korea, a movement to contact national organizations in hopes of them considering Korea and Korean-American relations in their activities, an operation to hold “public affairs or academic” “Korea conferences,” and also a meeting between Korean officials and the consultants after which the consultants would write a paper for the Korean government suggesting projects that could “assist the political and psychological posture of the Republic of Korea.” As consultants, Walker proposed himself, Barnett, Frank N. Trager (New York University), Franz Michael (George Washington University), and Robert Pfaltzgraff (Foreign Policy Research Institute). Michael, like Walker, had submitted a statement to the Congressional hearings on human rights in South Korea in 1974 and testified in person in 1975; he was viewed by the Korean government as a “pro-Korea” witness. Trager worked with Barnett as a part of the National Strategy Information Center, and Barnett had a long relationship with Pfaltzgraff as well (Michaels 2017, 79, 89). In essence, Walker had taken Barnett’s proposal for a “speaker’s bureau” and dramatically enlarged the scope of this cooperation between American academics and the Korean government.

The proposals developed by Barnett and Walker indicate a desire on the part of the Korean government to engage with friendly American academics to promote their preferred image in American academia and to political elites. However, MoFA’s review of Barnett’s and Walker’s proposals indicate that they were concerned the efforts proposed would overlap with those being conducted by a public relations firm, Hill and Knowlton, which the Korean government had already decided to hire.²⁵ Therefore it was decided that MoFA would request Walker rework his proposal to focus more exclusively on influencing American academics rather than broader audiences.²⁶

Following this request, however, no available document shows any follow up by Walker nor any record of the project being implemented. Another proposal by Edwin Feulner—who at the time was the executive director of the Republican Study Committee in Congress, a founding trustee of the Heritage Foundation in 1973, and later the institution’s president beginning in 1977—proposed a project to the Korean government for visiting congressional staff members. Feulner’s document indicates he had knowledge of Walker’s proposal, but he refers to it as such which indicates that it was not in operation as of late 1975.27 Feulner’s project is also another example of collaboration between conservatives located on the precipice between policymaking and academia with the intention of improving the image of the Korean government in the eyes of the American political elite. But the ambiguity of the proposal in terms of exactly who in the US would manage such an effort makes it difficult to strictly categorize it as a collaboration between the Korean government and American academia.

It is difficult to appraise the impact of these collaborations between the Korean government and willing American academics, mainly because there is no clear evidence that these proposals were ever implemented. Here there are two possibilities. The most likely is that the proposals were never acted upon. With Lee Jae-hyeon’s testimony in the summer of 1975, which Walker witnessed in person as he was also testifying that day, it would have been a dangerous proposition for Walker and other American academics to become deeply involved with the Korean government. On the eve of the Koreagate scandal, image management may have appeared futile to many, and Walker, Barnett, and others may not have wanted their professional reputations openly associated with the brewing scandal.

The second but less likely possibility is that these proposals were put into action but related documents remain classified. There are reasons to speculate this may be the case. First, Korean government documents indicate that should Walker’s plan or something similar be put into motion, it should be carried out via a “private” Korean organization rather than a contract concluded directly between Walker (and associates) and the Korean government.²⁸ If this is the case, documents about the implementation of the proposal may not be included in the MoFA archives. Second, Walker in his proposal demanded that the project be “treated with complete confidentiality” and that the American experts who work on the project not be “regarded as answerable agents or representatives of the Republic of Korea.”29 We can imagine that such language was included to exempt Walker and other American academics from having to register as foreign agents under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. Therefore, given the dubious legal nature of the proposal, implementation of the project may have warranted greater secrecy and thus documents may remain classified.

The Korean government’s promotional and obstructive image management tactics activities that were uncovered via the Fraser Committee hearings undoubtedly backfired. It was the authoritarian repression of democracy activists that originally brought the Park Chung Hee regime to the attention of many Americans in the early 1970s. When it became known that their authoritarian tactics were being used in the US, this further tainted the regime’s image, mitigating any victory they may have achieved via promotional activities with American academics. But perhaps the most concerning part of the review here is the enthusiasm on the side of some American academics. Despite widelyreported human rights abuses occurring in South Korea, some conservative academics, including Richard “Dixie” Walker who would go on to represent the US in South Korea as ambassador, sought to assist the South Korean government in its image management campaign and profit from it financially.

As the efforts with the US media suggest, the Korean government was not content to only engage high-level American officials or opinion leaders, it wanted to impact American public opinion at large. In theory, if the American people were friendly towards South Korea, there would be less incentive for members of Congress to criticize South Korean human rights abuses or deny the country military aid. To further this effort to improve the average American’s view of Korea, the Korean government sought a mechanism for reaching out to people throughout the US.

In this vein, MoFA came up with the idea to use honorary consuls as agents in its authoritarian image management campaign. The plan seemed good in theory: the Korean government would appoint honorary consuls in major American cities throughout the country and use them as public diplomacy agents of sorts to improve the image of the Korean government. Moreover, although this differed in practice, honorary consuls were willing agents of the Korean government and thus did not need to be “convinced” of anything as academics or the media elite needed to be. Thus the Korean government could skip directly to using them as agents in its campaign. However, the contributions of the honorary consuls in the authoritarian image management campaign were less than impressive.

“Honorary consuls” are regulated by international law, mainly the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. According to Staszewski (2002, 138-139), honorary consuls are typically citizens of the host country rather than the sending country, do not receive fixed wages, are not trained by nor bound by contract with the represented country, and enjoy fewer privileges and immunity rights than professional consuls. These characteristics encapsulate well South Korea’s honorary consuls in the US in the 1970s: almost all were Americans not of Korean descent and they were provided little money by the Korean government to cover their expenses. A 1976 report indicates that South Korea began appointing honorary consuls in the US in 1968, and by 1976 had honorary consuls in nineteen US cities (including San Juan, Puerto Rico) and two in both Dallas and Portland.³⁰ In this respect the honorary consuls were, in theory, well-positioned to positively impact American public opinion throughout the country.

Even before the Yushin declaration in October 1972, a MoFA report was already imagining honorary consuls as agents of public diplomacy. The Korean embassy in the US submitted a report in July 1972 entitled “Proposals by the Embassy in the United States for Strengthening Activities in Local Areas and Utilizing Honorary Consuls” (Jumi daesagwanui jibanghwaldong ganghwawa myeongyeyeongsa hwaryongbangan).³¹ The plan stipulated that honorary consuls in the United States should accomplish several goals including contributing to the advancement of diplomatic initiatives of South Korea in the US, widening the area of operations for the embassy, strengthening information activities in each region to boost the base of pro-Korean public sentiment throughout the country so that that sentiment is reflected in Congress, and to strengthen the market for Korean exports. A similar report in 1974 provided more specific plans including inviting some honorary consuls to Korea, hosting public relations events including at least one “Korea Night” event a year, having embassy officials meet with journalists in each honorary consul’s region, and producing promotional material about the Saemaul Undong (New Village Movement) to garner assistance for its implementation.³² However, once the Korean government’s image began to be tarnished by the hearings on human rights in Congress, reports on response measures to the hearings suggested that honorary consuls be “persuaded to be involved in activities related to Congress and the media.”33 In this sense, honorary consuls were not seen as merely benign agents of public diplomacy by the Korean government; it was hoped they would actively cooperate in their broader image management program by promoting positive images of Korea in the US and by applying obstructive pressure against elements that were seen as oppositional to the Park regime.

Despite these ambitious plans, honorary consuls were not an effective tool in the Korean government’s image management plans and seem to have had little impact on American public opinion at large. According to a report entitled Honorary Consuls’ Activity Situation, 1976” (76nyeon myeongyeyeongsa hwaldong sanghwang), honorary consuls were not exceptionally active.³⁴ One of the main markers of success was newspaper articles on Korea published by each honorary consul. In theory, contributions to local newspapers could further the Korean government’s goal of promoting a positive image of itself to the general American public. However, only five out of twelve honorary consuls covered in the report (meaning several were either not covered or had no output whatsoever) had an article published, with only one of these, Dwight Hamilton of Denver, having two published.

Achievements in the obstructive activity realm were even more sparse. Here the main goal was to write members of Congress to dissuade them from taking negative positions on South Korean human rights and military aid issues. Only Raymond Kell of Portland was active politically, with the report noting he had sent one letter to each of his representative and senator. But over the course of an entire year, the writing of two letters by all of the Korean honorary consuls would not seem to qualify as a success. It is possible this report was not completely comprehensive. For example, Donald Fraser kept a letter from South Korean Honorary Consul George Dayton of Minneapolis which criticized him for being pro-North Korea.³⁵ But we should expect that the Korean officials compiling this report would have an incentive to be as comprehensive as possible to show the success of their image management activities, and the lack of material to report would not have reflected well on their performance.

To further assess the usefulness of honorary consuls in the Korean government’s image management activities, I conducted a search of newspaper databases using the honorary consuls’ names as keywords. The most common type of articles found were stories about the Korean ambassador, either Kim Dong-jo or Ham Byeong-jun depending on the year, visiting a city and holding an event with an honorary consul. The Korean ambassador would often sit down with local reporters in an attempt to garner favorable local press coverage.³⁶ Sometimes local newspapers would do an exposé on an honorary consul given their prominence in the local community and would mention Korea (Denning 1974; Bean 1980). Some did discuss economic ventures with South Korea to the local press as well, which may have indirectly provided positive images of South Korea as a land of investment opportunity (Schwartz 1972; Arizona Republic 1973).

But not all press coverage of the honorary consuls was positive. Donald Clark, the honorary consul in Atlanta, was dragged through the mud by the media for his ties to South Korea after Griffin Bell was nominated by Jimmy Carter as Attorney General (Randolph and Coates 1977). Clark and Bell worked for the same law firm and the intention of the media was to insinuate that Bell may have ties to South Korea as well amid the burgeoning Koreagate scandal. Although not necessarily damaging politically for Korea, Raymond Kell was ridiculed in the local press for claiming his position as honorary consul entitled him to diplomatic immunity from a drunk driving charge, a preposterous legal argument that directly contradicts the above-mentioned Vienna Convention (Corvallis Gazette-Times 1977).

Why were honorary consuls so unhelpful in the image management campaign? One problem may have been that they were unwilling to become embroiled in a political campaign. Many were businessmen who would have limited motivations for becoming involved in political posturing. A second issue is some appear to have little knowledge of Korea. A severe case was Milo S. Smith, the honorary consul in Tampa, Florida who was appointed in 1975. According to a local newspaper report, Smith was “recommended for the job, which carries no salary, but he doesn’t know by whom” (Tampa Bay Times 1975). He went on to say that he “doesn’t speak Korean, has never been to Korea, and has no ties with the shipping industry,” indicating almost zero interest in Korea either politically or economically (Tampa Bay Times 1975). Smith’s comments also hint at a third factor: the lack of remuneration. The 1974 report on honorary consuls indicates that they received \$1,000 USD a year to conduct their activities.³⁷ When Donald Clark was questioned about his links to the South Korean government during Attorney General Bell’s confirmation hearings, he claimed he often had to spend his own money to carry out his duties as honorary consul (Randolph and Coates 1977). This suggests there was little financial incentive for honorary consuls to be vigorous in promoting the Korean government’s preferred image or be active in writing members of Congress on behalf of the Korean government.

Although the Korean government outlined an impressive plan for utilizing honorary consuls in both promotional and obstructive activities as part of their authoritarian image management campaign, the actual results were poor. The honorary consuls appear to have lacked a clear motivation for participating in the Korean government’s campaign. For the honorary consuls to be effective agents of the Korean government they would have had to been ideologues, and it appears the Korean government had few such people they could use.

This case study of the South Korean government’s authoritarian image management campaign has displayed two important points. First, the theoretical concepts developed by Dukalskis are valid not only for contemporary authoritarian governments, but also applicable to historical case studies. This study has shown how the Korean government sought to apply both promotional and obstructive image management methods to both specific and diffuse audiences. The Korean government actively engaged the American media in an effort to publish positive pieces about itself and promote a friendly image to the American people. The Korean government used funding to curry favor with American academics and colluded with some willing American scholars to consider further image management projects. And the Korean government hoped to use its honorary consuls in cities throughout the United States to both promote a positive image through favorable press coverage and cultural events as well as apply obstructive pressure on critics in government.

Second, although these activities of the South Korean government fit neatly within the theory developed by Dukalskis, it is interesting to note that they were mostly unsuccessful. The Korean government had minor successes—positive pieces did appear in the US media from time to time, it did find some allies in American academia, and at least some of its honorary consuls did engage occasionally in activities helpful to the South Korean government. However, these successes were largely overshadowed by the failures. The American media was on the whole critical of the Park Chung Hee regime in the 1970s (Chung 2014). The Korean government’s attempts to use funding with America academia became fodder for the Koreagate investigations and collaborations with friendly scholars do not seem to have been implemented. And the honorary consuls were fairly useless when it came to improving American public opinion of South Korea. When the US media broke the story of Tongsun Park and bribes to Congress in late 1976, the South Korean government at that point had no choice but to lay low and cease its image management efforts.

The findings of this article suggest multiple avenues for future research. The above comparison with the other “Lobbies” of US Cold War allies deserves to be studied further. The image of the China, Japan, and Israel Lobbies is one of success and power, which contrasts significantly with the findings here on Korea. In this vein, why was Korea uniquely bad at implementing its image management campaign? What successful elements did the other Lobbies include that South Korea did not?

The South Korean case may also prove to be continued fertile ground for research. First, there are many more accusations in the original Congressional investigations about the Korea influencing campaign that need to be pursued further. In particular, the KCIA’s actions remain a mystery, but the organization no doubt played an important role. For example, it was alleged that the KCIA sought to silence Korean critics in the US through harassment and intimidation (Subcommittee on International Organizations 1978, 93-96). Such research would undoubtedly strengthen the argument here that the 1970s Korea influencing campaign was an act of authoritarian image management. Second, although Park Chung Hee was assassinated in October 1979, he was eventually succeeded by another military government led by Chun Doo Hwan. Further research may inquire into the lessons the Korean government learned from the failures of image management in the 1970s and how those lessons were applied under the new regime in the 1980s.

¹ A concise summary of these investigations and their findings is provided in Boettcher (1980).

² “Migugui daeoewonjobeop (sugwonbeop) je4gwon (V.2 1974.7-9)” [U.S. Foreign Assistance Act (Amendment) 4 Volumes (V.2 July-September 1974)], 1974.G-0035.05.162, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA). To allow for easy location of the cited documents, materials from archives have been cited using footnotes (rather than in-text citations) per the normal convention of historians. Documents from MoFA are cited based on the document organization system of the MoFA Diplomatic Archives. First, I provide the Romanized file name (using the Revised Romanization of Korean system), followed by an English translation in brackets. Next is the year in which the document was produced, followed by the roll number, file number, and frame number of the specific document cited.

³ “Daetongnyeong teukbyeolseoneon (10wol yusin)” [Presidential Special Decree (October Yusin)], 1972.B-0016.03.129, MoFA.

⁴ “Daetongnyeong teukbyeolseoneon (10wol yusin)” [Presidential Special Decree (October Yusin)], 1972.B-0016.03.130, MoFA.

⁵ “Daetongnyeong teukbyeolseoneon (10wol yusin)” [Presidential Special Decree (October Yusin)], 1972.B-0016.03.177-195, MoFA.

⁶ “Daetongnyeong teukbyeolseoneon (10wol yusin)” [Presidential Special Decree (October Yusin)], 1972.B-0016.03.245-246, MoFA.

⁷ “Daetongnyeong teukbyeolseoneon (10wol yusin)” [Presidential Special Decree (October Yusin)], 1972.B-0016.03.335-340, MoFA.

⁸ “Daetongnyeong teukbyeolseoneon (10wol yusin)” [Presidential Special Decree (October Yusin)], 1972.B-0016.03.348-352, MoFA.

⁹ “Miguk eollonui banhangwangye gisa mit daechaek” [Anti-ROK American Media Reports and Responses], 1976.C-06-0097.14.003-047, 048-072, MoFA.

¹⁰ “Miguk eollonui banhangwangye gisa mit daechaek” [Anti-ROK American Media Reports and Responses], 1976.C-06-0097.14.007-007, 020-023, MoFA.

¹¹ “Miguk eollonui banhangwangye gisa mit daechaek” [Anti-ROK American Media Reports and Responses], 1976.C-06-0097.14.213-215, MoFA.

¹² “Miguk eollonui banhangwangye gisa mit daechaek” [Anti-ROK American Media Reports and Responses], 1976.C-06-0097.14.247-261, MoFA.

¹³ “Miguk eollonui banhangwangye gisa mit daechaek” [Anti-ROK American Media Reports and Responses], 1976.C-06-0097.14.247, MoFA. Emphasis in original.

¹⁴ Miguk eollonui banhangwangye gisa mit daechaek” [Anti-ROK American Media Reports and Responses], 1976.C-06-0097.14.074-098, MoFA.

¹⁵ “Miguk eollonui banhangwangye gisa mit daechaek” [Anti-ROK American Media Reports and Responses], 1976.C-06-0097.14.138, MoFA; Krisher, “Flashbacks,” 138. Also see Embassy Seoul to Department of State, February 26, 1974, 1974SEOUL1255, RG59.

¹⁶ “Hanguk ingwonmunjewa gwallyeonhan je saan” [Issues related to the ROK’s Human Rights Problem], 1976.B-06-0026.08.357-359, MoFA.

¹⁷ “Juhanmigun cheolsu (gamchuk) munje, 1976” [US Forces Korea Withdrawal (Reduction) Problem, 1976], 1976.2021-0178.08.098, MoFA.

¹⁸ “Miguk hawon hangukgwangye cheongmunhoe, jeon6gwon (V.5)” [Hearings on Korea in the U.S. House of Representatives, Six Volumes (V.5)], 1974.C-0071.01.117, MoFA.

¹⁹ “Miguk hawon hangukgwangye cheongmunhoe, jeo6gwon (V.1)” [Hearings on Korea in the U.S. House of Representatives, Six Volumes (V.1)], 1974.C-0070.34.132-137, MoFA; “Miguk hawon hangukgwangye cheongmunhoe, jeo6gwon (V.1)” [Hearings on Korea in the U.S. House of Representatives, Six Volumes (V.1)], 1974.C-0070.34.047-048, MoFA.

²⁰ “Miguk hawon hangukgwangye cheongmunhoe, jeo6gwon (V.1)” [Hearings on Korea in the U.S. House of Representatives, Six Volumes (V.1)], 1974.C-0070.34.166, MoFA.

²¹ “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.007, MoFA.

²² “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.010-016, MoFA.

²³ “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.010-016, MoFA. Emphasis in original.

²⁴ “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.035-058, MoFA.

²⁵ “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.061-063, MoFA.

²⁶ “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.083-084, MoFA.

²⁷ “Miguk uihoeuiwon banghan, 1975. je2gwon (V.2 10-11wol)” [US Members of Congress Visit Korea, 1975. 2 Volumes (V.2 October-November), 1975.2020-0156.08.149-152, MoFA.

²⁸ “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.064, MoFA.

²⁹ “Daemiguk teukbyeolhongbo hwaldonggyehoek” [Special Public Relations Activities Plans for the United States], 1975.L-0013.02.040-046, MoFA.

³⁰ “1976nyeondo bungmijiyeong myeongyeyeongsa hwaldong hyeonhwang” [Status of Activities of Honorary Consuls in North America, 1976], 1976.A-06-0013.07.009, MoFA.

³¹ “Myeongyeyeongsa hyeonhwang” [Status of Honorary Consuls], 1972.A-0009.03.23-25, MoFA.

³² “1974nyeondo bungmijiyeong jujae myeongyeyeongsa hyeonhwang min hwaldong bangan” [Status and Plans for Activities for Honorary Consuls in North America, 1974], 1974.A-0011.16.006-008, MoFA.

³³ “Daemiguk oegyosichaek mit eommugyehoek” [Foreign Policy Towards the United States and Work Plans], 1976.C-06-0094.03.006-007, MoFA.

³⁴ “1976nyeondo bungmijiyeong myeongyeyeongsa hwaldong hyeonhwang” [Status of Activities of Honorary Consuls in North America, 1976], 1976.A-06-0013.07.013-016.

³⁵ Donald M. Fraser Papers, Foreign Affairs/International Relations Committee Files, 151.H.3.5B, Korea, Folder 1.

³⁶ Examples of these types of articles were sometimes sent back to Seoul by the Embassy in the United States; see “Ju Mobile(miguk) myeongyeyeongsagwan gaegwan” [Opening of Honorary Consulate in Mobile (United States)], 1972.A-0009.13.010, MoFA; “Thomas, James W. ju Dallas myeongyeyeongsa immyeong, 1972.7.4” [Appointment of James W. Thomas as Honorary Consul in Dallas, July 4, 1972], 1972.A-0009.16.017, MoFA. Other examples include Trolinger (1974) and Noland (1975).

³⁷ “1974nyeondo bungmijiyeong jujae myeongyeyeongsa hyeonhwang min hwaldong bangan” [Status and Plans for Activities for Honorary Consuls in North America, 1974], 1974.A-0011.16.016-018, MoFA.