[EDITORIALS]Widening mistrust

[EDITORIALS]Widening mistrust A little more than a month after the two Koreas agreed on a line of communication to prevent accidental military clashes in the highly sensitive West Sea between the North Korean coast and South Korean-held islands, the gulf between the two sides remains wide and deep. Also regrettable is that some seeds of distrust are being exposed between the military and the civilian administration. Facts about the North Korean violation of the Northern Limit Line on July 14 have been established. But when a special probe team submitted its report to President Roh, he ordered a reinvestigation to determine why key details in the incident were not conveyed to him, through either of the two reporting channels, and who exactly was responsible for the negligence. The investigators found the North Koreans lied first about the identity of the vessel that violated the maritime border when they responded to the South Korean patrol boat's warning message. They were also not truthful about the timing of their alleged return messages - that they were made before the southern patrol boat fired warning shots though they in fact were radioed after the shots. Both the Naval Operations Command and the military intelligence unit kept the information on the North Korean messages from being passed on to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and to the Blue House "because of the falsehood involved in the northern response," investigators were told. President Roh was not convinced and few others can accept the Navy's explanation. Whether false or truthful, every iota of the North Korean response should have been reported to the top authority via the command channel, considering the high sensitivity. Any concealment can unnecessarily arouse suspicion that some elements in the military are opposed to accommodations with the North or have too strong a conviction about the futility of peaceful deals with the communists. The politicians are intervening in the affair. Members of the ruling Uri Party called for stern punishment of officers responsible for the cover-up and even demanded an extensive purge of a generation of officers "who grew up under the past military rule." But opposition politicians defend the Navy, saying it did the right thing by ignoring the false northern messages. Both sides had better remain quiet if they are aware of how important it is for civilian-military cooperation and understanding in national security.