News-Info-Alerts

Re: Bring Fallen Soldiers Home

From: POW-MIA InterNetwork

Date: August 18, 2003

""You are not forgotten"U.S. teams search North for the remains of soldiers who fell half-century ago


"We are bringing fallen soldiers home," Johnnie Webb said. "That is the mission we are committed to." He is deputy commander of the U.S. Army¡'s Central Identification Laboratory in Honolulu, Hawaii. His military scientists operate under the slogan, "You are not forgotten."

The Korean War ended half a century ago. Of the more than 33,000 U.S. service members who died during the war, more than 8,100 remain unaccounted for. The U.S. government estimates that about 1,850 of them were lost in South Korea, while about 300 aviators went down over water and another 860 U.S. unknowns are interred at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific. The remaining 5,100 are believed to have perished in North Korea.

"Two research and recovery teams of the U.S. Army¡'s Central Identification Laboratory will be deployed to North Korea to conduct joint operations aimed at recovering the remains of American servicemen still missing from the Korean War," Mr. Webb said. "Two sets of operations were planned, and the first one will begin Saturday."

It will run until Sept. 23. Five days later the second operation will follow, continuing until Oct. 28. Each team will have 13 members.

The Honolulu laboratory maintains 18 search and recovery teams, Ginger Couden, a spokeswoman, explained. A typical team consists of members with specialized skills in anthropology, logistics, photography, explosive ordnance disposal, medicine, mortuary affairs, linguistics and radio communications. Teams usually remain in the field for up to 45 days. The specialists now being dispatched to North Korea will stay there for two months.

"The recovery operations are to take place in Unsan county, about 60 miles north of Pyeongyang," Ms. Couden said. "The teams will also work on the east side of the Chosin [Jangjin] Reservoir in the northeastern part of North Korea."

The sites of the operations were selected after analyzing where U.S. troops fought hardest against North Korean and Chinese forces. The fighting withdrawal of the U.S. Marines from the Chosin Reservoir from Nov. 27 to Dec. 9, 1950, is often considered the fiercest battle in U.S. war history, thus making the site in South Hamgyeong province a frequent destination for the U.S. searches.

According to U.S. military records, 25,000 Chinese soldiers and 3,000 Americans were killed during Chosin battle.

"Teams from Hawaii normally fly by commercial air to Beijing and then Air Koryo to Pyeongyang," said Larry Greer, director of public affairs at the Pentagon's Defense POW/Missing Personnel Office in Washington. "Then, they will be picked up by the vehicles the American side already has in that area."

The U.S. remains recovery and identification operations date back to 1973. They were directed then from Thailand to bring fallen soldiers home from Southeast Asia. After the fall of the South Vietnamese government, the team moved to Hawaii in May 1976, establishing the current Central Identification Laboratory.

Operations in North Korea began in 1996, Mr. Greer said, and the U.S. military maintains vehicles and some equipment there. Through last year 25 recovery operations in North Korea have yielded 150 sets of remains believed to be those of Americans.

In contrast, South Korea has a relatively short history of seeking to recover and identify the remains of missing soldiers. The National Defense Ministry reports that 178,000 South Korean soldiers are buried as Korean War unknowns in the National Cemetery. Another 103,000 South Koreans are unaccounted for from that war.

The Seoul government began its recovery project in April 2000, led by teams of military scientists and civilian experts. Through last month, the South Korean Army had recovered 933 remains on its own soil, a pace that suggests a 300-year project ahead. Through June, only 18 of them had been identified.

South Korean experts agree on the importance of continuing the search. "Our mission is to continue until we find the last body from the Korean War," Brigadier General Ahn Seo-gi, leader of the project, said. Experts also agreed that they would need systematic working procedures and better facilities after the model of the U.S. Central Identification Laboratory.

The Pentagon's Mr. Greer says that sites for investigation and excavation are developed first by researchers, and then this information is taken to the field, where forensics experts continue to narrow the information and excavate for remains. "In the field, our researchers may interview local villagers and others who may have knowledge of the area," he said.

Mr. Webb, who has been in North Korea with search teams in past years, said each team includes a linguist. On site in North Korea, soldiers of the Korean People's Army are detailed to work with them. "The KPA soldiers" jobs were driving, digging and providing security for us," Mr. Webb said. "They also help us to interview witnesses who saw Americans buried in surrounding areas."
The investigative work is not easy. "We don¡¯t get to talk to very many locals," Mr. Webb said. "Some provide information voluntarily, but not many."

In fact, the work is "extremely dull and boring," as both Mr. Webb and Mr. Greer noted. The work is mostly plain digging. "It is not exciting, until we find some remains," Mr. Webb said. "The most exciting moment for us is finding mass burials, several Americans in the same location." He said that in 2001, a U.S. team found 12 individuals buried together.

According to Mr. Greer, remains that are recovered are taken to Pyeongyang, where they are met by an honor guard, and flown to the Yokota Air Base, Japan. "We use U.S. Air Force C-130 cargo craft to transport the remains in secure containers," he said. "From Japan, they are moved to the identification laboratory at Hickam Air Base in Hawaii."

The work in North Korea presents challenging issues, Ms. Couden said. The U.S. teams are forbidden to use advanced technology in the North, including the Global Positioning System. "We work with old-fashioned maps," she said.
But team members agree, Ms. Couden said, "that the rewards of finding American remains and knowing they will eventually be sent home to their families is more than enough to compensate."

The operations in North Korea, Mr. Webb said, "reminded me of what we had done in Vietnam in the early days. We had very little cooperation at first, but things got better. I think we are making gradual progress in the North, too."

The progress comes in painstaking annual negotiations with North Korea, usually at yearend. This year's took place in Bangkok in July because the North responded slowly to the U.S. proposal. Washington agreed to pay $2.1 million for this year's recovery operations. The money is in return for the North's aircraft support and medical services.

If search and recovery are laborious and challenging, so is identifying the unknowns in the Honolulu laboratory. Of 150 sets of remains brought from North Korea, Ms. Couden said, "We have succeeded in identifying 13 of them."
"Some have been done in a few months, some take years," the Pentagon's Mr. Greer says. "It all depends on the amount and type of circumstantial and biological evidence that is available. Teeth are very helpful because of dental records. Other identifying items are metal dog tags or any kind of ID card."

He said the U.S. government now has medical files of all missing soldiers. "But we still need their families to give us blood samples for DNA testing."
Mr. Greer is proud of the recovery work in North Korea. "The families that I have had contacted are very, very appreciative that we have not forgotten the sacrifices made by their loved ones," he said. "Many are surprised that we are doing this work 50 years after the Korean War was over."

by Ser Myo-ja <myoja@joongang.co.kr>
©JoongAng Daily

2003.08.18"