Kwak Jong-geun's wavering gesture on the day. A single call record divided the truth of impeachment. Hanmibio Graphics

Even now, "Yoon Again" echoes from streets across the nation, shouted by young people and citizens.

As Kwak Jong-geun's testimony crumbles, those voices are re-emerging, heralding a significant turning point in the political landscape. 

With the testimony of former Special Warfare Commander Kwak Jong-geun, a key witness in the impeachment, faltering in criminal trials, and a televised interview by former Constitutional Court Justice Moon Hyung-bae, who championed the unanimous decision emphasizing that testimony as "the most truthful," being re-examined, the legitimacy of the impeachment decision is facing fundamental re-verification. 

This is not a mere dispute over truth. It reveals a structural failure of the Constitutional Court system, where a presidential dismissal, the nation's highest decision, was hastily processed based on unverified single testimony and the justices' schedules and strategies. 

On the night of August 27, 2025, former Justice Moon Hyung-bae, appearing on MBC's "Questions with Sohn Suk-hee" Season 3, stated, "The vote on April 1 was 8-0, and I personally thought it should be unanimous." He added, "We aimed to increase the acceptability of the decision through unanimity."

This raises a crucial question: What was the basis for Moon Hyung-bae's 'clarity' and 'conviction of unanimity'?

He provided his own answer in the same interview.

"The most truthful testimony was that of former Special Warfare Commander Kwak Jong-geun."

He assessed that while the testimonies of other generals were difficult to trust, Kwak Jong-geun's was "the most certain and memorable."

In other words, the decisive evidence supporting the Constitutional Court's unanimous 8-0 decision was the word of one person, Kwak Jong-geun.

However, this testimony is now fundamentally shaken in criminal trials.

During the prosecution's investigation, Kwak Jong-geun testified, "I received a call from President Yoon around 00:20 ordering me to 'bring him down' and immediately ordered the 1st Airborne Brigade." The Constitutional Court also used this testimony as a core premise for its impeachment judgment.

However, when the call records were revealed, this testimony proved impossible.

The actual call between President Yoon and Kwak Jong-geun was not at 00:20 but at 00:31, and it was a single, short call lasting only 40 seconds.

In other words, Kwak Jong-geun's '00:20 order call' never existed in the first place.

Furthermore, subordinate officers of the Special Warfare Command testified in court that they had already received instructions from Kwak Jong-geun to "break down the door" before 00:20.

Therefore, even if Kwak Jong-geun's claim of speaking with the president at 00:20 were true, the entire structure of time, orders, and actions would collapse due to contradiction.

Circumstances of chain of command violations also emerged. The Minister of National Defense clearly ordered "no live ammunition," but the officers testified that Kwak Jong-geun had instead instructed them to "prepare live ammunition."

Despite the inconsistencies in testimony, records, and actions, the Constitutional Court accepted Kwak Jong-geun's word as absolute fact. The reason is simple: Moon Hyung-bae believed him to be "the most truthful."

However, a judgment does not become truth. Only procedure and verification form truth.

In the same interview, Moon Hyung-bae revealed an even more astonishing fact.

"I thought we couldn't delay the vote any longer. If it went past April 4th, I would have only a week left until my retirement, and I judged that the impeachment trial would drift."

In other words, the historic decision to dismiss the president was rushed not due to 'evidence verification' but because of 'a justice's personal retirement schedule.' 

The "necessity of unanimity" he mentioned was merely a strategic judgment to secure 'decision acceptability,' not a legal verification.

If so, the question becomes even clearer.

Why did the Constitutional Court not wait for the criminal trial?

Why did it not follow the basic procedure of 'fact determination → legal judgment → decision,' but instead followed a reverse structure of 'testimony adoption → judgment completion → referral to criminal trial'?

The result is the situation we are witnessing now: the paradoxical occurrence of the factual premise of impeachment collapsing in a criminal trial.

While the Constitutional Court Act does not provide for 'retrial,' paths that create the same effect as a retrial do exist.

First, if core facts are overturned in a criminal trial, the premise of the Constitutional Court's decision disappears.

Second, if a significant procedural flaw is revealed, the Constitutional Court can self-declare "confirmation of the non-existence of the decision's premise."

Third, a constitutional appeal based on infringement of fundamental rights is theoretically possible, and similar cases exist in the German Federal Constitutional Court.

In other words, although the word 'retrial' is absent, the inherent path to invalidating the decision is already open.

Ultimately, the issue is simple.

The fate of a president elected by the people was decided by a single unverified testimony and the strategic judgments of justices who lacked conviction and merely followed the prevailing wind.

There is no more dangerous destruction of democracy than this. If the process collapses, the outcome collapses too.

The Constitutional Court abandoned the process, and the nation is now paying the price.

As Kwak Jong-geun's falsehood is revealed, Moon Hyung-bae's confession will lead to a massive public demand to re-examine the entire impeachment.

Impeachment is not a closed case. It is a question that has begun anew.

That question is singular:

"Who was the real traitor?"

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