Kim Jong-dae on US CIA Surveillance: "Serious Intelligence Disaster... Why Are They Being So Cautious?"

Former Justice Party lawmaker and military/security expert Kim Jong-dae called the revelation that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has been eavesdropping on the South Korean government "a very serious incident and an intelligence disaster," saying, "A large amount of information that could not have been collected without wiretapping was gathered."

On the 10th, Kim appeared on CBS Radio's 'Kim Hyun-jung's News Show' and said regarding the leaked documents, "This is an analytical report compiled by the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff using information collected from all U.S. intelligence agencies, namely the CIA, the National Security Agency (NSA), and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), from multiple sources."

President Yoon Suk-yeol and U.S. President Joe Biden are having a conversation after concluding the 7th Global Fund Replenishment Conference held last September at a building in New York, USA. Photo by Yonhap News

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Earlier, on the 8th (local time), The New York Times (NYT), The Washington Post (WP), and others reported via social media that leaked U.S. military confidential documents related to the Ukraine war revealed circumstances of wiretapping and eavesdropping on allies including South Korea. The documents contained discussions between former National Security Office chief Kim Sung-han and diplomatic secretary Lee Moon-hee about whether to provide weapons to Ukraine, breaking South Korea's existing principle of not supplying lethal weapons.

Regarding this, former lawmaker Kim pointed out that the leaked documents included conversations among the three?former diplomatic secretary Lee, former National Security Office chief Kim, and defense secretary Im Ki-hoon?and suggested that the wiretapping might have occurred at a meeting place rather than over the phone.

He said, "If multiple people expressed opinions clearly at the same table, this seems more like an internal National Security Office meeting rather than wiretapping a landline phone," adding, "It appears that some special acoustic eavesdropping was used to capture the meeting scene." He further added, "It seems reasonable to infer that the U.S. government has seen almost everything, especially regarding sensitive diplomatic and security situations."

This is officially the third time that the U.S. has been revealed to have wiretapped South Korea. Kim criticized, "The U.S. never changes its habits. Every time such an incident occurs, they say they will never eavesdrop on allies again and will prepare measures to prevent recurrence, but nothing has changed."

Kim also criticized the South Korean government's response to the illegal wiretapping controversy as inadequate. He said, "Issuing a statement first as if we understand the situation is inappropriate from both a diplomatic and sovereignty perspective," adding, "A country that does not know how to get angry is not a country. It becomes a global pushover."

Regarding the presidential office's stance to review countermeasures by examining other countries' cases and precedents, he raised his voice, saying, "Why should we care about other countries' opinions? Our government should first take a strong stance and then observe the global public opinion."

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