Black wind

meters in length, the steel-hulled Benetti yacht was impressive even by Monte Carlo affluent standards. The custom-built Italian yacht’s lush interior featured an array of marble flooring, Persian carpets, and rare Chinese antiques, which filled the cabins and salons with warm elegance. A collection of fifteenth-century oil paintings by the Flemish master Hans Memling dotted the walls, adding to the eclectic feel. The glistening maroon-and-white exterior, which featured a wide band of wraparound dark-tinted windows, was given a more traditional appearance, with inlaid teak decking and brass fittings on the outside verandas. The entire effect was a tasteful mix of old-world charm combined with the speed and function of modern design and technology. Always turning heads as it roared by, the vessel was an admired fixture on the Han River in and about Seoul. To the local society crowd, an invitation aboard was a highly desired mark of prominence, providing the rare opportunity to sil with the boat’s enigmatic owner.
    Dae-jong Kang was a leading icon of South Korean industry and he seemed to have his hands in everything. Little was known of the mercurial leader’s early background, aside from his sudden appearance during the economic boom of the nineties as the head of a regional construction company. But upon his taking over the reins, the low-tech firm became a corporate Pac-Man, gobbling up companies in the shipping, electronics, semiconductor, and telecommunications industries in a series of leveraged buy outs and hostile takeovers. The businesses were all rolled under the umbrella of Kang Enterprises, a privately held empire entirely controlled and directed by Kang himself. Unafraid of the public spotlight, Kang mixed freely with politicians and business leaders alike, wielding additional influence on the board of directors of South Korea’s largest companies.
    The fifty-year-old bachelor held a veil of mystery over his private life, however. Much of his time was spent sequestered at his large estate on a secluded section of Kyodongdo Island, a lush mountainous outpost near the mouth of the Han River on the western Korean coast. There he dabbled with a stable of Austrian show horses or worked on his golf game, according to the few who had been invited inside the private enclave. More carefully hidden was a dark secret about the iconoclastic businessman that would have completely shocked his corporate cronies and political patrons. Unknown to even his closest associates, Kang had operated for over twenty-five years as a sleeper agent for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, or North Korea, as it was known by the rest of the world.
    Kang was born in the Hwanghae Province of North Korea shortly after the Korean War. At the age of three, his parents were killed in a railroad derailment, blamed on South Korean insurgents, and the infant boy was adopted by his maternal uncle. The uncle, a founding member of the Korean Workers’ Party in 1945, had fought with Kim Il Sung and his anti-Japanese guerrilla forces based in the Soviet Union during World War II. When Kim Il Sung later rose to power in North Korea, the uncle was richly rewarded with a series of provincial government appointments, brokering himself into ever more important spheres of influence until, ultimately, gaining a seat as an elite ruling member of the Central People’s Committee, the top executive decision-making organization in North Korea.
    During his uncle’s ascension, Kang received a thorough indoctrination in the Korean Workers’ Party dogma while obtaining the best state-sponsored education the fledgling country could offer. Recognized early as a fast learner who excelled at his studies, Kang was groomed as a foreign operative, with sponsorship from his uncle.
    Blessed with a keen financial mind, command like leadership skills, and a ruthless heart, Kang was smuggled into South Korea at the age of twenty-two and set up as a laborer at a small construction company. With brutal efficiency, he quickly worked his way up to foreman, then arranged a series of “accidental” work site deaths that killed the firm’s president and top managers. Forging a series of ownership transfer documents, Kang quickly took control of the business within two years of his arrival. With secret direction and capital infusion from Pyongyang, the young communist entrepreneur slowly expanded his network of commercial enterprises over the years, focusing on