KOREA: Hard Man

Through Seoul's dusty streets, Syngman Rhee hustled from meeting to meeting in his big, blue-black Lincoln. The car was almost the only civilian vehicle moving in South Korea. As the U.S. ban on petroleum supplies took effect (TIME, Nov. 15), buses halted, fishing boats lay idle, politicians bicycled to work. Rice piled up on the farms for lack of trucks, while in town 25,000 factory workers were unemployed and hungry. In Seoul's tearooms the word went round: "The old man is beaten."

By midweek stubborn old Syngman Rhee gave up, asked U.S. Ambassador Ellis Briggs for his terms to restart the flow of U.S. oil and dollars. Said Briggs in effect: "Do what you promised to do four months ago in Washington." Rhee meekly agreed to:

¶ Give up his insistence that the U.S. buy its Korean currency at the "official" rate of 180 hwan to $1 (v. a free-market rate of more than 500 to $1), accepted a 310-to-$1 rate for the present, promised a "realistic" rate for the future.

¶ Abandon his demand for 15 more active ROK divisions (and with them, his dream of "driving north" to unify Korea on his own), and settle for the U.S. plan he had accepted in Washington—ten reserve divisions, 75 jet planes.

¶ Spend at least 25% of his U.S.-aid money in Japan. This will help the Japanese economy, and end a three-year boycott of Japanese goods which Japan-Hater Rhee has never announced officially but has made nearly 100% effective.

¶ Abandon his stalling on ratification of the U.S.-Korean mutual defense pact, which he has held up for ten months because it provides that either party can terminate it on one year's notice.

These sticking points disposed of, the two nations signed the agreement providing Korea with $250 million in economic aid and $450 million in military aid in 1954-55—the largest single U.S.-aid program anywhere in the world.

Syngman Rhee was a hard man to help.