Probably he felt completely cornered politically, so his decision is out of frustration.
According to news reports at that time, almost all the bills he tried to push through the Korea’s National Assembly were rejected. This is because South Korea has had something like a divided government, where the president is from the ruling party but the majority in the Assembly was actually controlled by the opposition.
In that kind of situation, it’s common for important bills to get blocked due to strong opposition.
It sounds like his frustration with the Assembly had been building up, and maybe he started to think that declaring martial law was the only way to break the deadlock.
It seems like there was another reason that pushed him to make that decision.
I’m not completely sure whether this is accurate, but I’ve seen some news reports claiming that Yoon Suk Yeol had close connections with certain far-right YouTubers in South Korea.
Some reports suggest that he interacted with them frequently and may have been influenced by their views.
There were even claims from some members of the National Assembly that he gradually started listening mainly to those voices. Apparently, he often used radical political rhetoric in his speech to frame the situation as a national crisis, and even calling the opposition as “anti-state forces.”
People with far-right ideologies often use phrases like “national crisis” or “anti-government forces” to incite the public. This can also explain why the president took such an extreme step as declaring martial law.
His biggest miscalculation I guess was that the people didn’t back him.He probably expected to gain broad public support. But he couldn’t, instead, he faced strong backlash, including large-scale protests.
Honestly, I think martial law is supposed to be used only in extreme situations — like during a war, a civil conflict, or when the whole country is in chaos because of a major disaster.
It’s meant to be a last resort when normal systems just can’t function.
But in this case, It doesn’t really seem like a national emergency — it sounds more like political frustration. We could say he privatized the military.
That’s why I think impeachment makes sense.
Actually, when President Yoon was removed from office and arrested, there were quite a lot of concerns in Japan about the future of Japan–South Korea relations.
On the surface, relations between the two countries may seem relatively stable. But historically, there are still many sensitive issues because of Japan’s colonial rule over Korea during World War II. That historical background continues to influence public opinion and political rhetoric in both countries.
In South Korea, presidents are sometimes described as either pro-Japan or more critical of Japan. President Yoon was generally seen as pro-Japan, so from the perspective of bilateral relations, many people in Japan viewed him as a favorable leader.
However, his successor, the current president, has made a number of critical remarks about Japan in the past before he became president.
Because of that, some people in Japan see him as a more challenging counterpart. But so far, he seems to be building a relatively friendly relationship with Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.
