Lesley Jackson talks at length with the author of ‘A Killing Art’, Alex Gillis, and discovers all about the shenanigans behind the sometimes elusive martial art of Taekwondo, an Olympic sport that is practised by millions around the globe.
“I fear that the martial art is dying – in both the ITF and WTF.” It isn’t often that I start an interview off with a quotation but in this case, I thought it was well worth it after speaking to Alex Gillis, author of the book ‘A Killing Art’, as reviewed in Martial Edge recently. Alex is everything we like here at Martial Edge, a straight talking martial artist with sharp pen to boot. The leaders of this turbulent martial art must have groaned when they realised that a dedicated student of Taekwondo such as Alex Gillis, is also a tough investigative journalist who isn’t afraid to get to the truth of the matter, no matter what he digs up. So, compared to some of the subjects he has tackled in his career, the corruption in Taekwondo isn’t going to frighten Alex off.
You probably won’t be surprised to hear that I almost quit Taekwondo after I discovered its past - Alex Gillis
Alex tells Martial Edge about his early career and how the idea of A Killing Art came about. “ My journalism career began in India with a profile I wrote about a Tibetan monk who had fled from a slave-labour prison in China. That was about 15 years ago and led to a series of articles about human rights in China. I decided very quickly that I wanted to be an investigative journalist, the only journalism that mattered in those days, when corporate manipulation of the popular press was snapping into high gear.
In 2001, my journalism and my hobby, Taekwondo, merged when I began A Killing Art. Twenty-five years of rebellious martial arts training and investigative journalism led to a hard-hitting book about a martial art that I love.”
Beginning ‘A Killing Art’
As well as being an established writer, Alex is also an experienced martial artist who has studied Taekwondo under a number of illustrious instructors in Canada including; Grandmaster Park Jung-Taek, Phap Lu, Grandmaster Park Jong-Soo and WTF Master Yoon Yong-Beo. However, in Alex’s 25 year experience of Taekwondo, the instructor that has had the biggest impact on him is Mr Lenny Di Vecchia. Alex explains further:
“It began with Mr. Di Vecchia in Grandmaster Park Jong-Soo’s gym in Toronto. For months, I’d watched Mr. Di Vecchia out of the corner of my eye. He was very talented, but kept a low profile and he spoke to few black belts. I didn’t blame him, because Park’s huge dojang was a surreal, wondrous place: empty one day and full of champions and blowhards the next. For some reason, Mr. Di Vecchia decided to teach advanced techniques to me and Floyd, another black belt, who I soon befriended. To make a long story short, Mr. Di Vecchia told us that General Choi Hong Hi had helped to found Taekwondo, in fact, many considered Choi to be the founder, and Choi lived right here in Toronto.
And so began a talk about a cold war between men, about WTF shenanigans and ITF plots, about surrogate sons and betrayals… Mr. Di Vecchia told me very little, actually, but enough to make me wonder if he was testing me with bizarre stories. Sometimes, good teachers do that.
Being a journalist, I had to find the truth; as a martial artist, I had to find my art’s history. It just so happened that massive changes had begun in the World Taekwondo Federation around that time, and that Choi, Park and other pioneers in the International Taekwondo Federation were negotiating a reunion. Suddenly, many men made themselves available for interviews. I was in the right city at the right time.
As I researched and interviewed, I saw a way through the politics and corruption, I saw a way to write a truthful history, in spite of the gangsterism and thuggery.
Another thing that motivated me was curiosity about corruption, in terms of the martial arts techniques and in terms of money. As with so many martial artists, I wanted to know how profit corrupts an art with elevated morals. The level of corruption has been astounding; instructors and administrators still advance students without proper grading and standards; they set up kickbacks for equipment and uniform purchases; and they outright steal. These occur at all levels, from individual gyms to global organizations. It seems as if making a living, making a fair wage for good work, quickly erodes into corrupting the techniques themselves. What’s remarkable is that leaders overcome the corruption, fight the temptation and, sometimes, fight those who are doing the corrupting.”
Finding out the Facts
One thing you will notice when you read A Killing Art is the amount of detail that Alex uses to illustrate the story of Taekwondo. Some of the facts that he reveals and the level of corruption that he exposes will certainly raise your eyebrows, as well as the violent and turbulent history of Korea which to many people living in the Western world, may not be that well known. Alex tells Martial Edge about what went into researching his book:
“ The book was difficult to research because many facts were bizarre and took enormous effort to corroborate. It was a seven-year project. I began by reading most of the mainstream works about Taekwondo and conducting a couple of crucial interviews. Afterwards, I dove into obscure sources, including more than 4,000 pages of U.S. Congressional documents about Koreagate, the scandal that followed Watergate in the 1970s. Those documents, along with Korean-language ones, contained previously classified details about martial arts leaders and secret-service agents in Taekwondo in the 1960s and 1970s, which was when Taekwondo became as hot as Karate and Kungfu.
I interviewed some of the pioneers of the art after much of the research was done, interviews that were the most challenging in my career as a journalist. In one case, I had to interview a former martial arts assassin. In a second, I needed to corroborate that a martial arts instructor had been a Korean CIA agent in a highly publicized presidential kidnapping. In a third, I had to triple-check that a cult had been involved with Taekwondo. I found at least two sources, usually three, for every fact.
During the interviews, too many people asked not to be named or told me to avoid naming someone who might take offense. I'd sit back at night and think things like, ‘Okay, this martial artist who I'm not supposed to name was part of a mass espionage mission that resulted in innocent people tortured and killed, and I'm supposed to be careful not to hurt his feelings?’ The terror these men instilled in others was palpable even decades after the events.
The redeeming thing in the research is that I met many instructors and martial arts leaders who countered violence and corruption every step of the way. They were inspiring, and I dedicated my book to them.”
General Choi Hong-Hi
Of course, to anyone who has taken up Taekwondo in the last few years, the figure-head of ITF (those who practise WTF may not be aware of his existence at all) General Choi Hong-Hi is an elusive martial arts legend of whom not that much is known, compared to other founders of martial arts such as Funakoshi for Shotokan Karate, Jigoro for Judo or Ueshiba for Aikido, who are quite easy to read about. Fortunately, Alex managed to meet the man himself before he died in 2002 and for the first time in A Killing Art, we are given a frank biography of the man who appears so intangible to those practising Taekwondo today. Alex talks about what meeting General Choi was like:
“ I met Choi Hong-Hi in his later years, when he was more peevish and crankier than in earlier years, from what his friends and family told me. When I met him, he was in the middle of family problems and an extremely challenging negotiation with martial arts leaders. I did see his cutting humour though; he was brilliantly witty and his one liners were like his jabs, precise and fast. During one seminar, after a black belt guessed that a straight-fingertip strike to the groin was meant to rip off a man’s testicles, Choi chuckled and said, ‘No, but you see why Karate guys have no balls.’ He said something like that, but not as crass. You can see why he pissed people off; even his jokes were merciless.
He was also generous and thrifty, some would say he was a miser, in spite of the millions of dollars that he sometimes had access to. He helped those who needed help, and most of his money seemed to go to Taekwondo. He was obsessed with his martial art, with making the techniques better, or ‘purer,’ as he put it.
I wish he were still alive. I’d ask him many questions, like when and how, exactly, he included the Korean Central Intelligence Agency in his organization. He was a master at organizing people and at working within tyrannies. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, he expanded Taekwondo in South Korea under a dictator and seemed adept at both working with the KCIA and keeping it at arm’s length. Maybe one day a grandmaster or two will elaborate.”
Residual Feelings about Taekwondo
With all of the surprising and in places, shocking revelations about the history of Taekwondo and of its mother country, Korea, I found it difficult to equate that with the first tenet of Taekwondo, ‘Courtesy.’ I asked Alex how he felt about Taekwondo after he had written A Killing Art and how it had been received by some of the powers that be in the world of Taekwondo.
“You probably won’t be surprised to hear that I almost quit Taekwondo after I discovered its past. What kept me going was Mr. Di Vecchia, the group of men and women I train with, and the chequered past itself. The martial art is a sexy, athletic art, with spectacular kicks and fundamental techniques. The men who created it maximized their power physically, politically, emotionally and in many other ways. Sometimes they used the power for the wrong ends, hence the chequered past, but often they didn’t. Many rebels improved the art, the techniques and the way the organizations are run. I used to think that Taekwondo was only a rebel’s art, a young person’s art, but I see now, that older folks (like me!) can practise it while maintaining the athleticism, power and high morals.
The leaders of the WTF and ITF haven’t contacted me with their opinions, and I haven’t yet called them. Actually, I spoke to one grandmaster leader, who was annoyed that I hadn’t written enough about him. That conversation was extremely disappointing. He refused to support the book because, he said, it was too politically hot. I hope he’s in a minority. We’re known in our martial art for courage.
I’m impressed with the feedback from martial artists, especially from instructors, but not with the comments I’ve heard from grandmasters, who overall, seem uncomfortable with the book. I’ve spoken to only a handful of grandmasters and to more than a hundred instructors – and the book has been on shelves in North America for only four months - so I don’t have a full picture. Overall, the book is doing very well. Many people are glad that a clear history of Taekwondo is now available.”
A Killing Art
Lesley Jackson is gripped by this biography of the history of Taekwondo. We are given a no-holds-barred recount of the birth of this global martial art and the mind-numbing corruption, back stabbing and total giggery pokery that would give any soap opera writer material for years.
The Future for Taekwondo
And so we come full circle and where we started at the beginning, when I asked Alex what the thought the future holds for Taekwondo.
“ I fear that the martial art is dying, in both the ITF and WTF. My book explains how corruption and violent conflict started, and shows the massive amount of effort that’s required to get out of the mess. Before solving a deep problem, there has to be a reckoning, a truth and reconciliation phase. You can’t cure an illness without knowing what the illness is. My book helps to identify the illness, the conflicts and dilemmas in both the major styles of Taekwondo.
But it’s possible that we’re too late, that Taekwondo isn’t only dying, that it’s dead, dead in terms of the integrity of its techniques, in terms of keeping the profit motive in check, in terms of admitting to past failures, and in terms of popularity. It’s probable, for example, that WTF Taekwondo will be booted out of the Olympics soon. If you know about the shenanigans with money in the Olympics, all the scandals, then you can imagine how bad it must be in Taekwondo to be kicked out of the Olympic family.
For its part, the ITF continues to break apart; the three main splinter groups have themselves splintered further. Even the North Korean led organization contains fractures.
Still, perhaps enough instructors are quietly passing on the old techniques to keep our art alive. The continuity from generation to generation is what counts in martial arts, passing on the old, difficult techniques that take long years to perfect. I’m compiling a network of such instructors, people who have written to me, and I hope to post the list online one day.”
Thank you for taking the time to give Martial Edge such an insight into the creation of A Killing Art and for your candid ideas about the martial art that many readers continue to practise, without realizing the truth behind the moves that they carry out each time they enter their dojang.
To find out more about A Killing Art and to read Alex Gillis’ blog, visit his site Killing Art
Interviews 
Lesley Jackson talks at length with the author of ‘A Killing Art’, Alex Gillis, and discovers all about the shenanigans behind the sometimes elusive martial art of Taekwondo, an Olympic sport that is practised by millions around the globe. 
a mass espionage mission that resulted in innocent people tortured and killed, and I'm supposed to be careful not to hurt his feelings?’ The terror these men instilled in others was palpable even decades after the events. 
