(Via Milinet)
Document Cites Korean War Killings Associated Press Writers
By Sang-Hun Choe
and MARTHA MENDOZA
Thursday, June 15, 2000; 6:36 p.m. EDT
A captured North Korean document claiming U.S. soldiers shot and
killed South
Korean refugees was turned over to the American high command
almost
immediately after the incident in the early days of the Korean
War.
The North Korean document, dated Aug. 2, 1950, and translated by
the U.S.
Army within a few weeks of its capture, used its description of
the events to
whip up sentiment against U.S. forces.
The document was obtained by The Associated Press and is being
studied by
Pentagon officials investigating allegations of the attack on
civilians at No
Gun Ri in late July, 1950, according to a source familiar with
the
investigation.
At least 41 copies were made of one of the translations at the
time, and,
according to its distribution list, were sent to all three
branches of the
military as well as the Army's assistant chief of staff for
intelligence in
Washington, D.C.
The captured document was a report to commanders urging that
North Korean
propaganda officers make sure that all communist soldiers in the
field knew
about the alleged American actions. The document was contained
in one of 20
bulletins of captured documents circulated to U.S. military
commanders in
July and August 1950.
The captured document identified the site of the killing as a
tunnel near
Yongdong, which is eight miles from No Gun Ri. North Korean
newspaper reports
from the time, containing similar details to those in the
captured document,
named No Gun Ri as the site of the killings.
AP was unable to learn whether the allegations in the captured
document were
ever investigated by U.S. authorities. At the time, the American
military was
in a chaotic retreat from communist forces; the document itself
contained
language that may have been dismissed as propaganda; and U.S.
investigators
had orders to focus on atrocities committed by North Koreans
against U.S.
troops.
Pentagon investigators launched an inquiry into the events at No
Gun Ri after
AP reported on the killings last year. The source close to the
U.S.
investigation said the document is significant because it is the
first
evidence that the U.S. high command received an account of a
mass killing in
the vicinity of No Gun Ri shortly after it allegedly happened.
Army spokesman Maj. Tom Collins said he would not discuss the
document, nor
any aspect of the investigation, until the inquiry is completed.
In Seoul, a source close to a separate investigation of No Gun
Ri, by the
South Korean government, said investigators there had also
obtained the North
Korean document.
AP's original report cited dozens of ex-GIs and South Korean
survivors as
saying a 1st Cavalry Division unit killed a large number of
civilian refugees
in and around a railroad trestle's underpasses at No Gun Ri, 100
miles
southeast of Seoul, the South Korean capital, between July 26
and July 28,
1950. Korean survivors estimated 300 civilians were killed while
ex-GIs
estimated 100, 200 or hundreds died. About 100 refugees died in
a strafing by
U.S. warplanes that preceded the shootings, survivors said.
AP obtained two translations of the North Korean document. One,
which went to
the U.S. Army's Far East Command as well as the Army in
Washington, says
2,000 Koreans were killed in the tunnel. The other translation,
which went to
the 1st Cavalry Division headquarters in Korea, says 100 were
killed.
The original document in Korean was not attached to the
translations found in
the U.S. National Archives, and it could not be determined if
the discrepancy
in numbers was based on a mistranslation.
The AP's research in the U.S. National Archives and elsewhere
has found no
specific mention of No Gun Ri in U.S. military reports, nor any
sign that an
investigation was conducted at the time. The captured North
Korean document
does not mention No Gun Ri by name, but the location -- near
Yongdong -- and
details of the killings match the No Gun Ri circumstances.
For example, the document refers to bodies in a "tunnel." South
Korean
survivors have shown investigators the tunnel where they say the
shooting
occurred.
In addition, the survivors have also described hiding under the
dead to
escape the bullets. The document echoes their account:
"There were approximately 10 persons who had lain under the dead
for four or
five days and were finally able to escape. Those 10 escapees,
with tears in
their eyes, asked us to get revenge for their treatment."
The document, titled "Cultivation of Hatred to Obtain Revenge,"
also speaks
of another killing, of an unknown number of civilians, in a
railroad tunnel
in the town of Yongdong. Those refugees were strafed by planes
during the day
and shelled by artillery at night, it said.
In all, the document alleges the enemy" had "executed" 11,148
civilians in a
dozen locations.
The captured communication was signed by two North Korean
officers and urged
"all units" to use the information for propaganda and to inform
their
soldiers that the Americans "are performing the barbaric act of
killing
civilians." This would "cause the soldiers to feel that it is
their duty to
fight and liberate their people, and by this means to stir up
hatred for the
enemy and completely destroy it."
The North Korean army report was seized by a 1st Cavalry
Division unit on
Aug. 15, 1950, 17 days after division troops pulled back from No
Gun Ri.
A U.S. translator's note on the back of one translation said the
documents
were a "reflection upon the poor morale throughout the NK (North
Korean)
Command and also the fact that they are experiencing difficulty
in
controlling their men."
The 1st Cavalry Division's information officer from those days,
retired Col.
Harold D. Steward of San Diego, said he does not remember that
particular
captured document, but he said such a document would have been
distributed to
senior officers.
"Something like that would have gone to the division general
staff and
probably major unit commanders, and would have been part of the
daily
intelligence briefing for Gen. Gay," he said. The general staff
of colonels
and majors oversaw the division's operations. Maj. Gen. Hobart
R. Gay, who
died in 1983, was the division commander.
Five copies of one translation were sent to the intelligence
section at the
8th Army, headquarters for the entire warfront, according to
notations on one
of the translations.
After hearing what the North Korean report said, a division
intelligence
officer from those days told the AP such a report should have
prompted an
investigation.
"It seems to me an inquiry would be made, probably by the
inspector general,
or they would have called on us," retired Col. Louis B.
Trevathan of Santa
Fe, N.M., said, referring to his counterintelligence unit within
the
division's "G-2" intelligence section.
Trevathan said he does not remember being asked to deal with
such a document.
He also said some division officers might have viewed the
information as
unimportant.
"At that time there was so much confusion and lack of
reinforcements and this
sort of thing that we were hanging on by our fingernails at
best," he said.
Inspector-general reports for August 1950 show that 1st Cavalry
Division
investigators were involved in other issues, such as the
allegations that
North Korean soldiers had killed about 36 American prisoners of
war in a
single incident.
Several North Korean journalists advancing with their army filed
reports
about American shootings of refugees at No Gun Ri.
In one, dated Aug. 19, 1950, reporter Chun Wook of the Cho Sun
In Min Bo
newspaper wrote that North Korean troops moving into the No Gun
Ri area "were
encountered with indescribably gruesome scenes under the railway
tunnels and
in nearby fields. ... About 400 bodies of old and young people
and children
covered the scene so that it was difficult to walk around
without stepping on
corpses."
Professor Sunjoo Pang, a South Korean historian who is
researching No Gun Ri
for a magazine and who is an expert on captured North Korean
documents, cites
four North Korean news reports and other documents that refer to
killings at
a tunnel near Yongdong, all similar in detail to the captured
document.
–––– ––––
Eds: AP Investigative Researcher Randy Herschaft contributed to
this report.
© Copyright 2000 The Associated Press
Back to the top
|
