Kim Chang-ryong
| Kim Chang-ryong | |
 |
|
| Korean name | |
|---|---|
| Hangul | 김창룡 |
| Hanja | 金昌龍 |
| Revised Romanization | Gim Chang-ryong |
| McCune–Reischauer | Kim Ch'angnyong |
Kim Chang-Ryong (1920–January 30, 1956) was a high-ranking officer in the Republic of Korea Army, the head of the Korean Counter Intelligence Corps, and South Korean President Syngman Rhee's most trusted right-hand man. He was assassinated in 1956 by army colleagues.
He was born presumably in 1920 to a poor peasant family in Kumya County, South Hamgyong Province, during the Japanese rule and, like many other young Koreans, he joined the Imperial Japanese Army in Manchukuo. At first serving as an military police, he soon became a reputed detective whose job was to uncover moles in the Japanese intelligence service and to hunt communists.
In 1941, Kim cunningly assumed the appearance of a beggar to get close to Wang Gunlai (王近禮), an infamous Chinese spymaster. After gaining the latter's trust by having himself intentionally arrested several times in the process, he was able to gather intelligence allowing the Japanese military to neutralize a spy network of about 60 agents from the Soviet Union.
After the Surrender of Japan and independence of Korea in 1945, Kim came back to his hometown, Hamheung, finding it to be under Soviet occupation. Wanted by the Communists for being a former Japanese soldier, he had to keep a low profile. Around the end of 1945, he apparently visited friend and former assistant Kim Yun-Won (金允元) in Chorwon, who sold him out, and he was sentenced to death for "anti-Korean deeds," arresting anti-Japanese combatants. -s Kim was being transferred to the place of his execution, however, he managed to jump off the truck transporting him and escaped to a relative's house. Recovering from his wounds, he waited for the right time to flee to American-controlled South Korea but was once more betrayed and captured by the Communists, who sentenced him to death a second time. However, Kim again managed to break loose by knocking out, with a chair, the soldier guarding him, and he escaped south.
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