Park Chung Hee: The Five-Year Economic Development Plan

Park Chung Hee said that "We do not believe that the miracle. If you sweat as much as working days just I believe that there is a cost and compensation efforts (President Park).” Park Chung Hee, the president of Republic of Korea from 1963 to 1979, has been hailed to as the most influential person in the development history of the country (Hansol Park). Park Chung Hee had dictatorial power during his incumbency. On May 16th, 1961, Major General Park Chung Hee came into political power by militarily overthrowing the existing government. It was welcomed by the citizen who was disappointed with previous impotent governmental (Liu). Two years later, in 1963, he was elected President. In 1972, he promulgated the Yushin Constitution that makes possible …show more content…
Eventually, South Korea became one of the impoverished country in the world (Ahn). Then, How could Korea overcome the severe poverty and make the high level of the economoic growth rate? The Five-Year Economic Development Plan was the key of the economic growth. In fact, the Five- Year Economic Development Plan was not planned by President Park. Before Park Chung Hee seized power, an administration under Chang Myon devised the Five-Year Economic Development Plan first. However, his plans failed due to coup d'état of Park Chung Hee. Since then, Chung Hee Park government executed that plan, The First Five-Year Economic Development Plan (1962-66) included promoting normalization of industrial structure and exploiting energy industy such as electricity and coal. And, The Second Five-Year Economic Development Plan (1967-71) emphasized more modernized the industrial structure. At that time, industrialization started with construction of steel industry and mechanical industry. These two plans seeked light industry and labor intensive industry taking advantages of the lower labor costs. As a result, South Korea accomplished export enlargement …show more content…
The South Korea Assembly sent about 20000 troops to Vietnam in the war zone. President Lyndon B. Johnson wanted to build an international agreement behind his policies in Vietnam by retaining support from other countries (History.com). Winthrop Gilman Brown, the United States Ambassador to Korea, conveyed officially written notice to Korea. It included offering AID(Agency for International Development) loan and military aid, lending additional loan and advance of Korean enterprise to Vietnam etc. At this period, the rate of overseas export grow up rapidly. The overseas export of 1,200 million dollars in 1964 reached at 1 billion 6240 million dollars in 1972. If it had not been for Korean participation in Vietnam War, it is hard to achieve the standard of economic growth in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In some surveys, Park`s direct to fight in Vietnam War is considered as one of his great contributions (Baek). On the contrast, by this participation, many people have suffered long-term effects of exposure to defoliants. Also, there are some problems with Lai Daihan, who was born from Korean father and Vietnamese mother during Vietnam War. It is unknown there are how many Lai Daihan in Vietnam, but what is known is that those children did not have father and cannot start their lives greatly. They are not protected by anybody. The Participation to Vietnam War has double-sided