Heo Sam-su (許三守, born 18 September 1936) is a South Korean military officer and politician.
He was one of the closest associates of Chun Doo-hwan during the Choi Kyu-hah administration and the Fifth Republic.
Together with Heo Hwa-pyeong and Heo Mun-do, he was known as the "Three Heos" (3許). His ancestral seat is Kimhae.
Life
Military career
After graduating from Busan High School and the Korea Military Academy, he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army in 1961. In 1965 he was transferred to the Army counterintelligence unit, and over the following fifteen years he was responsible for counterintelligence, intelligence, and anti-communist investigation duties. He then graduated from the Army War College.
He subsequently enrolled at the Yonsei University Graduate School of Business and received a Master of Business Administration degree.
During his military career, he joined Hanahoe together with some of his classmates from the 17th class of the Korea Military Academy, including Heo Hwa-pyeong and Ahn Hyun-tae, and he was a leader of the 17th-class members within Hanahoe.
While serving as an Army colonel, he was appointed Personnel Chief of the Defense Security Command in 1979. That same year, when the October 26 incident occurred, he took part in arresting and apprehending the faction of Kim Jae-gyu from 27 October. In December, as Personnel Chief of the Defense Security Command, he received orders from Chun Doo-hwan and, together with troops of the 9th Infantry Division sent by Roh Tae-woo, personally arrested then Army Chief of Staff Chung Sung-hwa, performing a key role in the December 12 military coup.
After the 26 October incident
He concurrently served as general affairs director of the Joint Investigation Headquarters while serving as Personnel Chief of the Defense Security Command.1
Also, after 12 December, while serving as Personnel Chief of the Defense Security Command, he concurrently served as special assistant to the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.2 At this time, he was in charge of the purge of the Central Intelligence Agency.
Drawing on his experience of having set off a personnel purge within the Defense Security Command the previous year, he purged the intelligence agency. Several hundred agents and dozens of division-director-level officials were forced out.3
In May 1980 he was also involved in the expansion of emergency martial law nationwide on 17 May.
Fifth Republic era
From 27 May 1980, he served as secretary of the Social Purification Subcommittee of the National Legislative Council for National Security, among other posts, and led the Samcheong Education Camp program and related measures.
At this time, he simultaneously held three posts: Personnel Chief of the Defense Security Command, special assistant to the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and member of the Social Purification Subcommittee of the National Security Emergency Standing Committee.
However, according to him, "even while holding these concurrent posts, I was so busy with my work as Personnel Chief of the Defense Security Command that I could hardly do anything else."2
On 9 September of that year, he was appointed Senior Secretary for Public Safety at the Presidential Secretariat.
On 5 November, about three months after his promotion to Army brigadier general, he retired from the military.2
On 20 December 1982, he resigned from his post as secretary together with Heo Hwa-pyeong and others.
In the early days of the Fifth Republic, he was known together with Heo Mun-do and Heo Hwa-pyeong as the "Three Heos" (Three 許), forming a core group of close associates of Chun Doo-hwan. However, in 1982 he lost Chun Doo-hwan's trust and withdrew. He moved to the United States, where he served as a research fellow at the East-West Cultural Studies Institute, and later moved to Japan, where he worked as a professor at Nihon University and Kyoto University.
He later went to the United States, and after six years returned to Korea in 1988. In the same year, he ran as a candidate of the Democratic Justice Party in the 13th National Assembly election but was defeated.
From 1982 to 1987, he was also appointed as a researcher at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in the United States.
Political career
He became a national policy evaluation committee member of the Democratic Justice Party.
In January 1990, he took part in the three-party merger of Kim Jong-pil, Roh Tae-woo, and Kim Young-sam, and became a senior figure of the faction from the Democratic Justice Party within the Democratic Liberal Party. At the same time, he was invited as a visiting professor at Stanford University in the United States.
In 1990, he organized the Busan City and Busan Dong-gu district branches of the Democratic Liberal Party as the organizer of the Busan City district branch and the Democratic Liberal Party's Busan Dong-gu district branch.
In 1991, he was appointed chairman of the board of the Korea Cultural Research Institute.
In 1992, he ran as a Democratic Liberal Party candidate in the 14th National Assembly election and was elected in Busan Dong-gu, defeating Roh Moo-hyun, who was then spokesperson of the Democratic Party led by party leader Kim Dae-jung.
In the 14th National Assembly, he served as a member of the National Assembly Budget Committee and the Special Committee for the Daejeon Expo, and he was also appointed as a special committee member of the Presidential Commission on Industry and Resources.
In 1992, he was appointed president of the Korea Scout Association.
In 1995, in the Kim Young-sam administration, he protested against the purge of military personnel, left his party, and served as an independent National Assembly member.
In January 1996, he was indicted and detained on charges of participating in a conspiracy to commit insurrection and participating in a plan for rebellion. In April of the same year, he ran in the 15th National Assembly election from prison but was defeated.
In 1997, the Supreme Court confirmed a six-year prison sentence against him.
Later life
In 1997, during a transition of power, Chun Doo-hwan, Roh Tae-woo, and others were released for the sake of social reconciliation, and Heo Sam-su and others were released along with them.
In 1998, he became chairman of the International Disabled Persons Council.
Education
Career
- Personnel Chief, Defense Security Command (1979)
- Secretary, Social Purification Subcommittee of the National Security Emergency Standing Committee (1980)
- Retired as Army brigadier general (1980)
- Senior Secretary for Public Safety, Presidential Secretariat (1980–1982)
- Visiting professor at the East-West Center, University of Hawaii, Kyoto University, Nihon University, and Stanford University (1983–1987)
- National policy evaluation committee member, Democratic Justice Party (1987)
- Chairman, Korea Cultural Research Institute (1991)
- 14th National Assembly member (Busan Dong-gu; Democratic Liberal Party, New Korea Party, independent) (1992–1994)
- President, Korea Scout Association (1992)
- Detained on charges including serious involvement in insurrection (1996)
- Ran as an independent in the 15th general election in Busan Jung-gu and Dong-gu (1996)
- (Current) Chairman, International Disabled Persons Council (1998–present)
- Special committee member, Liberty Democratic Party (December 2005 – March 2006)
Publications
- Chinese Communist Party in the 2000s
- My Truth
Actors who portrayed Heo Sam-su
Notes