September 17, 1996
During the Korean War, I was Head of the Special Projects Branch/Intelligence Division/Far East Command. General Douglas MacArthur was in command. I stayed and served in the same position under General Ridgwar and General Clark. My duties included the production of Intelligence on political (counter-insurgency), and subversive activities by the enemy in both North and South Korea. Within this framework I was responsible for intelligence and communist activities (North Korea, Chinese and Soviet) within our prisoner of war camps in South Korea and the enemy camps in North Korea. In 1953, I was a staff member of the truce delegation at Panmunjom and participated in the discussion for the exchange of sick and wounded prisoners. I was on the ground and met and talked with our returning sick and wounded.
During the course of my duties, I discovered that the entire operation on the treatment and handling of our prisoners of war was supervised, masterminded and controlled by the Soviet Union, as was the entire operation of the war and hostilities in Korea. I wrote a study on how this control extended into our POW camps holding North Koreans and Chinese in South Korea, nominally in our control. I titled the study, "WAR IN THE POW CAMPS." Soviet policy, conveyed to their allies, was that a soldier taken prisoner is still at war and a combatant. They trained soldiers to be taken as prisoner and then agitate in the camps to keep the POWs in our custory under their control.
The brainwashing and atrocities against American prisoners were conscious acts of Soviet policy. Not only was it used on our prisoners, but on their own people and others under their control. The basis for their action was the Pavlovian theory of conditioned reflexes.
I had information on medical experiments (Nazi style) on our prisoners. The most devilish and cunning was the techniques of mind altering (Pavlov). It was just as deadly as brain surgery and many U.S. POWs died under such treatment. This was told to me by our own returning POWs. Many POWs willed themselves to death.
My findings revealed that the Soviets taught their allies, the Chinese Communists and North Koreans, a detailed scientific process aimed at molding prisoners of war into forms in which they could be exploited. Returned prisoners who underwent the experience reported the experts assigned to mold them were highly trained, efficient and well educated. They were specialists in applying a deadly psychological treatment which often ended in physical torment. The Soviet approach was a deliberate act of their overall policy which actively rejects, subverts and destroys decent standards of conduct and the whole structure of human values.
Upon my return to the United States, I was assigned to the Operations Coordinating Board (OCB) of the White House, National Security Council, and handled virtually all projects to U.S. prisoners of war. Here I found out that U.S. policy forbade that we win in Korea. The policy amounted to an actual paralysis and diversion of activity to force the return of our prisoners in enemy hands, including those in the Soviet Union.
Years later, I discussed this situation with Attorney General Robert Kennedy in his office and he agreed with me. This "NO WIN" policy is contained in policy directives NSC-68, NSC-68/2 and NSC-135/3. The basis for this policy was in directives ORE-750, NIE 2, 2/1, 2/2, 10 and 11. We called this the "FIG LEAF POLICY."
Note: Recently, the CIA in news releases admitted their NIE (National Intelligence Estimates) were wrong or not accurate.
In the past I have tried to tell Congress the fact that in 1953, 500 sick and wounded American prisoners were within ten miles of the prisoner exchange point at Panmunjom but were never exchanged. (Subsequent information indicated that they all died afterwards.)
Although I prepared a statement that was made at the Panmunjom delegation table, I was not asked even one question regarding this event.
During my tour of duty as the chief of the Special Projects Section of the Intelligence Division of the Far East Command, I received numerous reports that American POWs has been sent to the Soviet Union. These reports were from many sources: Chinese and North Korean POWs, agent reports, Nationalist Chinese reports, our guerrillas, NSA intercepts, defectors and from our own returning POWs.
My intelligence centered around three train loads of 450 POWs each. Two of these trainloads were confirmed over and over, the third was not as certain. Therefore, the final figure was, "confirmed 900, and 1,200 possibly. " These were the figures that I discovered with President Eisenhower while I was a member of his NSC.
The bulk of the sightings were at Manchu-Ii, on the border of Manchuria and the USSR. Here the rail gauge changed and the U.S. POWs had to be transferred across a platform to a waiting train going into the Soviet Union.
These POWs were to be exploited for intelligence purposes and subsequently eliminated. The methods of exploitation were not only practiced on our POWs, but all others falling into COMMUNIST hands.
To the skeptics and debunkers, I have only this to say: By some flashback in time, I wish you could be present with me at the prisoner exchanges in Korea in 1953 and look into the faces of those sick and wounded prisoners --- Americans and allied soldiers --- as they came across in the exchange. If you had witnessed their sacrifices and what they had suffered by COMMUNIST hands, you would not be a critic or skeptic today.
I will close with this final remembrance. At Panmunjom, as a wounded Turkish soldier was exchanged, he peeled off the Chinese padded clothing and flung them at the nearest COMMUNIST guard. I asked the Turkish Captain standing with me, "What did he say?" He answered, "Till we meet again."
{BACKGROUND: Col.(ret.) Corso participated directly in the decision by the late President Dwight D. Eisenhower to leave live American prisoners of war in the hands of the North Koreans, Chinese and Soviets at the end of the Korean War. His testimony will focus on the circumstances surrounding that decision.
CORSO RELATED MATERIALS:
No.1A - White House Operations Coordination Board (OCB) memo, "Meeting of POW Working Group," regarding "FIG LEAF". 9 Nov. 1953
No.1B - Eisenhower Papers, "Telephone Conversation with Army Secretary Stephens," re: Missing POWs. 22 Dec. 1953
No.1C - Dept. of State, "Efforts to Secure the Return of American Personnel Who Might Still be in Communist Custody." 22 Jan. 1954
No.1D - "Complaint of Detention and imprisonment of United Nations Military Personnel in Violation of Korean Armistice Agreement," Henry Cabot Lodge, to UN Secretary General. 20 Dec. 1954 *S
No.1E - White House OCB Memo, "Interview with Rastvorov Concerning US POWs in the USSR." 31 Jan. 1955}