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TechnoratiSeoul Probes Civilian `Massacres' by US
SEOUL, South Korea - South Korean investigators, matching once-secret documents to eyewitness accounts, are concluding that the U.S. military indiscriminately killed large groups of refugees and other civilians early in the Korean War.
A half-century later, the Seoul government's Truth and Reconciliation Commission has more than 200 such alleged wartime cases on its docket, based on hundreds of citizens' petitions recounting bombing and strafing runs on South Korean refugee gatherings and unsuspecting villages in 1950-51.
Concluding its first investigations, the 2 1/2-year-old commission is urging the government to seek U.S. compensation for victims.
"Of course the U.S. government should pay compensation. It's the U.S. military's fault," said survivor Cho Kook-won, 78, who says he lost four family members among hundreds of refugees suffocated, burned and shot to death in a U.S. Air Force napalm attack on their cave shelter south of Seoul in 1951.
Commission researchers have unearthed evidence of indiscriminate killings in the declassified U.S. archive, including a report by U.S. inspectors-general that pilots couldn't distinguish their South Korean civilian allies from North Korean enemy soldiers.
South Korean legislators have asked a U.S. Senate committee to join them in investigating another long-classified document, one saying American ground commanders, fearing enemy infiltrators, had adopted a policy of shooting approaching refugees.
The Associated Press has found that wartime pilots and declassified documents at the U.S. National Archives both confirm that refugees were deliberately targeted by U.S. forces.
The U.S. government has been largely silent on the commission's work. The U.S. Embassy here says it has not yet been approached by the Seoul government about compensation. Spokesman Aaron Tarver also told the AP that the embassy is not monitoring commission findings.
The commission's president, historian Ahn Byung-ook, said the U.S. Army helped defend South Korea in the 1950-53 war, but also "victimized" South Korean civilians. "We feel detailed investigation should be done by the U.S. government itself," he said.
The citizen petitions have accumulated since 1999, when the AP, after tracing Army veterans who were there, confirmed the 1950 refugee killings at No Gun Ri, where survivors estimate 400 died at American hands, mostly women and children.
In newly democratized South Korea, after decades of enforced silence under right-wing dictatorships, that report opened floodgates of memory, as families spoke out about other wartime mass killings.
"The No Gun Ri incident became one of the milestones, to take on this kind of incident in the future," said Park Myung-lim of Seoul's Yonsei University, a Korean War historian and adviser to the truth commission.
The National Assembly established the 15-member panel in December 2005 to investigate not only long-hidden Korean War incidents, including the southern regime's summary executions of thousands of suspected leftists, but also human rights violations by the Seoul government during the authoritarian postwar period.
Findings are meant to "reconcile the past for the sake of national unity," says its legislative charter.
The panel cannot compel testimony, prosecute or award compensation. Since the commission may shut down as early as 2010, the six investigators devoted to alleged cases of "civilian massacre committed by U.S. soldiers" are unlikely to examine all 215 cases fully.
News reports at the time hinted at such killings after North Korea invaded the south in June 1950. But the extent wasn't known. Commission member Kim Dong-choon, in charge of investigating civilian mass killings, says there were large numbers of dead - between 50 and 400 - in many incidents.
As at No Gun Ri, some involved U.S. ground troops, such as the reported killing of 82 civilians huddled in a village shrine outside the southern city of Masan in August 1950. But most were air attacks.
In one of three initial findings, the commission held that a surprise U.S. air attack on east Wolmi island on Sept. 10, 1950, five days before the U.S. amphibious landing at nearby Incheon, was unjustified. Survivors estimate 100 or more South Korean civilians were killed.
In clear weather from low altitude, "U.S. forces napalmed numerous small buildings, (and) strafed children, women and old people in the open area," the commission said.
Investigator Kang Eun-ji said high priority is being given to reviewing attacks earlier in 1950 on refugees gathered in fields west of the Naktong River, in North Korean-occupied areas of the far south, while U.S. forces were dug in east of the river. One U.S. air attack on 2,000 refugees assembled Aug. 20, 1950, at Haman, near Masan, killed almost 200, survivors reported.
"There were many similar incidents - refugees gathered in certain places, and there were air strikes," she said.
The declassified record shows the Americans' fear that enemy troops were disguising themselves as civilians led to indiscriminate attacks on "people in white," the color worn by most Koreans, commission and AP research found.
In the first case the commission confirmed, last November, its investigators found that an airborne Air Force observer had noted in the "Enemy" box of an after-mission report, "Many people in white in area."
The area was the village of Sanseong-dong, in an upland valley 100 miles southeast of Seoul, attacked on Jan. 19, 1951, by three waves of Navy and Air Force planes. Declassified documents show the U.S. X Corps had issued an order to destroy South Korean villages within 5 miles of a mountain position held by North Korean troops.
"Everybody came out of their houses to see these low-flying planes, and everyone was hit," farmer Ahn Shik-mo, 77, told AP reporters visiting the apple-growing village. "It appeared they were aiming at people."
At least 51 were killed, the commission found, including Ahn's mother. Sixty-nine of 115 houses were destroyed in what the panel called "indiscriminate" bombing. "The U.S. Air Force regarded all people in white as possible enemy," it concluded.
"There never were any North Koreans in the village," said villager Ahn Hee-duk, a 12-year-old boy at the time.
The U.S. military itself said there were no enemy casualties, an acknowledgment made Feb. 13, 1951, in a joint Army-Air Force report on the Sanseong-dong bombing, an unusual review undertaken because Korean authorities questioned the attack.
Classified for a half-century, that report included a candid admission: "Civilians in villages cannot normally be identified as either North Koreans, South Koreans, or guerrillas," wrote the inspectors-general, two colonels.
The Eighth Army commander, Lt. Gen. Matthew Ridgway, held, nonetheless, that Sanseong-dong's destruction was "amply justified," the AP found in a declassified document. Today's Korean commission held otherwise, recommending that the government negotiate for U.S. compensation.
A U.S. airborne observer in that attack, traced by the AP, said it's "very possible" the Sanseong-dong mission could be judged indiscriminate. George P. Wolf, 88, of Arlington, Texas, also said he remembered orders to strafe refugees.
"I'm very, very sorry about hitting civilians," said the retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, who flew with the 6147th Tactical Control Squadron.
The day after the Sanseong-dong attack, the cave shelter at Yeongchun, 120 miles southeast of Seoul, came under repeated napalm and strafing attacks from 11 U.S. warplanes.
Hundreds of South Korean civilians, fearing their villages would be bombed, had jammed inside the 85-yard-long cave, with farm animals and household goods outside.
Around 10 a.m., Cho Byung-woo, then 9, was deep in the narrow, low-ceilinged tunnel when he heard screams up front, and saw choking fumes billowing inside. Air Force F-51 Mustangs dropped napalm firebombs at the cave's entrance, a declassified mission report shows.
"I ran forward and all I could hear were people coughing and screaming, and some were probably already dead," Cho recalled, revisiting the cave with AP reporters. His father flung the boy out the entrance, his hair singed. Outside, Cho saw more planes strafe people fleeing into surrounding fields.
He and other survivors said surveillance planes had flown over for days beforehand. "There was no excuse," Cho said. "How could they not tell - the cows, the pieces of furniture?"
Survivors said the villagers had tried days earlier to flee south, but were turned back at gunpoint at a U.S. Army roadblock, an account supported by a declassified 7th Infantry Division journal.
Villagers believe 360 people were killed at the cave. In its May 20 finding, the commission estimated the dead numbered "well over 200." It found the U.S. had carried out an unnecessary, indiscriminate attack and had failed - with the roadblock - to meet its responsibility to safeguard refugees.
The commission also pointed out that Ridgway - in a Jan. 3, 1951, order uncovered by AP archival research - had given units authority to fire at civilians to stop their movement.
Five months earlier, the U.S. ambassador to South Korea confidentially informed Washington that the U.S. Army, fearing infiltrators, had adopted a policy of shooting South Korean refugees who approached its lines despite warnings. Ambassador John J. Muccio's letter was dated July 26, 1950, the day U.S. troops began shooting refugees at No Gun Ri.
American historian Sahr Conway-Lanz reported his discovery of the declassified Muccio letter in his 2006 book "Collateral Damage." But the Army had learned of the letter earlier, during its 1999-2001 No Gun Ri investigation, and had not disclosed its existence.
The Army now asserts it omitted the letter from its 2001 No Gun Ri report because it discussed "a proposed policy," not an approved one. But the document unambiguously described the policy as among "decisions made" - not a proposal - at a high-level U.S.-South Korean meeting, and AP research found declassified documents in which U.S. commanders in subsequent weeks repeatedly ordered troops to fire on refugees.
In a May 15 letter to Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the then-vice speaker of Seoul's National Assembly, Lee Yong-hee, called on Congress to investigate whether the Army intentionally suppressed the Muccio letter in its inquiry.
Since targeting noncombatants is a war crime, "this is a matter of deep concern to the Korean people," wrote Lee, whose district includes No Gun Ri.
Lee, who has since lost his leadership position as a result of elections, suggested a joint U.S.-Korean congressional probe. Frank Jannuzi, the Senate committee's senior East Asia specialist, said its staff would seek Pentagon and State Department briefings on the matter.
In 2001, the U.S. government rejected the No Gun Ri survivors' demand for an apology and compensation, and the Army's report claimed the No Gun Ri killings were "not deliberate."
But at a Seoul news conference on May 15 with survivors of No Gun Ri and other incidents, their U.S.-based lawyers pointed out that powerful contrary evidence has long been available.
"The killings of Korean civilians were extensive, intentional and indiscriminate," lawyers Michael Choi and Robert Swift said in a statement.
In its 2001 report, the Army said it had learned of other civilian killings by U.S. forces, but it indicated they would not be investigated.
Associated Press investigative researcher Randy Herschaft in New York contributed to this report.
© 2008 The Associated Press.
38 Comments so far
Show AllSlavery is hell, but the world has always been plagued by it and probably always will.
Oh well.
Seems as though they might ask the Chinese for some compensation for war crimes. That is where we get most of our money these days since Bush got rid of all we had when he got appointed.
War is hell, but the world has always been plagued by it and probably always will. The big difference now is that the ones who want it stay in their luxurious digs and send others to die for their greedy and power hungry conquests. In olden times, the leaders had the guts to get out and see some of the action and risk being killed themselves.
Superdumb:
Yes. All Koreans were victims of the Soviets/Chinese and Americans who were fighting each other on the Korean peninsula. The Americans were not fighting for the south Koreans, we were fighting against the communists. Likewise, the Soviets/Chinese were not fighting for the north Koreans.
World War II in the Pacific was a clash between empires- The Japanese wanted to carve out a Japanese Empire out of the British, French, and American Empires. The true victims were the Koreans, Chinese, Tagalog, and other peoples of Asia and the Pacific.
By the way, my fellow Americans, on the 7th of December 1941, the Japanese Imperial Navy attacked the American bases on the occupied Hawaiian Islands- a recent acquisition by the American Empire- as were the Philippine Islands.
I am a Korean immigrant. I completely agree with bligh3. There were hundreds of thousands, if not millions, innocent civilians killed by
leftists and right wings. That was one of the saddest times in Korean history. North and South Koreans literally massacred each other. Are they going to request reparations from North and South governments too?
war IS criminal. the only thing that keeps us from realizing that wars are always, inevitably, and quite explicitly acts of political rape and plunder is the myth of the heroic warrior. well, the humans going into basic training may have heroic ideals, but when they come out, they're the same murdering rapists who fight every war on every continent. yes, we let our sons and daughters be professionally made insane, and sent off to kill and die, because we believe in the myth of the warrior hero.
can we get it through our head? there are no massacres in wars; war IS massacre. there are no war atrocities; war IS atrocity. there are no mass rapes in war; war IS mass rape. nothing else. until we get that through our heads, the real criminals will continue to dupe us into volunteering our sons and daughters to be made insane and sent off to kill and die.
God help us!
WAR CRIMINALS.
This is what the Khanate of Washington does when it goes to war. Aboriginals, Mexicans, Filipinos, Germans, Japanese, Vietnamese, Afghans, and Iraqis have all learned this. Read James Bacque on Eisenhower's death camps. Read "The Scalping Party" by Mike Davis (http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/1066/mike_davis_on_war_crimes) on the depredations of Tiger Force in Vietnam--and the unspeakable American scalp-hunters of the mid 19th century whom they imitated. Inquire of the American Indian Movement--I'm sure they'll give you an earful.
and today and every day the US murder innocent people around the world. Be it with a gun or economic santions or pollution it is the only thing they know how to do.
With the caveat that the actual numbers are uncertain, the biggest single atrocity comitted by US Military was probably the higway of death at the end of the First Gulf War.
If you don't remember, or were too young then to have known, just google highway of death iraq
Grant August. First of all, China was an ally in WW II. If Communism was the great enemy, our history says we would have intervened to make sure China did not go communist. After WW II, Congress authorized military aid to the KMT. This aid was never provided. In the meantime, Stalin was arming the Communists. No way he was going to support an ally of the US post WW II, despite him having been a former ally. The plan was simple, the next 40 years were to be a Cold War between Communism and the Democarices. For it to be a real good one, Communism had to be spread. Communism was the only real winner of WW II. Truman helped make it so.
Up until the early 60's, China and the USSR cooperated. China got it's nuclear technology form the USSR. Then there was a break, since I believe that China was told that if it broke off it's ties with the USSR, then relations would be possible with the West. Nixon and then Carter made good on this promise. Then it was time to let China build up it's economy, Hong Kong was promised to be returned in the early 80's, and then the flood gates were opened to China, and the rest his history.
"Of course, Truman was the guy who lost China to the Communists in the first place, no way would he want to see it get recovered by non-communists."
It was, and never should be, a US president place to "lose" another country's internal battle. The Kuomintang did their best to "lose" their country anyway on their own terms.
"It was so obvious at the time that something was very, very wrong. Today of course, the history has been sanitized and McCarthy is considered a fruit cake. Those same Communists are still around, as fascists."
The Communists in China and Russia many times kept BACK revolution in other countries, especially as time went on and the Communists powers not only wanted to coexist with the West but also thought that poorer countries SHOULD go through capitalist development before their way in the future socialist revolution. The largest change, with the biggest and most wide spread repercussions for Russians themselves, was the killer Stalin's and Bukharin's change once in power from supporting international socialist revolution to "socialism in one country". Not only did he do things that had nothing to do with communism or socialism (dismantling workers rights, getting rid of the minimum wage, not allowing any worker self management, destroying any functioning democracy and killing all dissidents) he was a reactionary in everything but rhetoric, no different than Suharto or any other right wing, capitalist killer. You might notice that Stalin favored Chek over Mao and told Mao and the communists to back the Kuomintang, giving military and political support to Chek until the end (although he quickly acknowledged Mao after his victory), even as the Kuomintang slaughtered communists by the thousands. The USSR and China both did what was in THEIR best interests in all of the Vietnamese negotiations (from 1946 until the Paris agreements), something that even Kissinger (as well as I.F. Stone) acknowledged. The USSR for Christ sake talked Minh into allowing in French troops into Vietnam after he had fought them back, the French turned around and slaughtered the Vietnamese again. China pushed for Ho's forces to retreat from any neighboring states in order for the French to leave, which happened also happened. Stalin opposed the social revolution in Spain, supported the elite, capitalist elements that joined the Communist Party after the anarchists and the non-Communist leftists had gained control of large parts of Spain and were beginning their social revolution. Stalin fought hard to do things like re-institute private property in the areas that were collectivized (not from above like in Russia, by the people themselves with massive, widespread support). The communists (not Communists) many times were extremely brave and committed people who risked their lives and livelihood for noble causes, going into the poorest and most dangerous parts of the world to fight against the horrible ravages of capitalism. It doesn't mean that they were not at times naïve, or sometimes were in the course of events supported people that turned out to be horribly immoral and authoritarian, but they were usually held back or even sometimes outright opposed by the LEADERS of the so called international Communist movement. Forget that this monolithic movement has gone to war with each other in recent decades more than the West (cause there can't be a CAPITALIST international movement that pushed for the "one world government"). Tito broke with Stalin, the USSR and China even under Mao hated each other (one of the reasons Mao turned to the US) and almost went to war numerous times, Vietnam shortly after Pot took over invaded Cambodia only to be turned around and attacked by China. Forget all that, the international Communist movement was monolithic, with one goal, one mean and one mindset…
In the end, as always, it is about control, power and profits. In Iraq we have a few cute little slogans, "fighting terror" and "spreading democracy". Forget that our own intelligence agencies predicted terror would go up around the world if we attacked Iraq, which it has, or that we've done everything we could to PREVENT democracy in Iraq. That's why while we were busy "spreading democracy" we attempted to cancel Iraqi elections, we installed economic polices that Iraqis don't want (in ways that even enraged the Iraqi Chamber of Commerce) that have ruined the economy, have instituted the CPA's "orders" that this government says is binding to all future democratic governments, that we in opposition to international law have played around with Iraq's debt or that we have (even though ¾'s of Iraqis oppose it) tried numerous times to privatize Iraq's oil. We're spreading "freedom and democracy", just like as we were preventing elections in Vietnam because "our" candidate wouldn't win we were "protecting freedom". What the government gives us a bumper sticker, we repeat and don't question. If we think, we're obviously the enemy.
SnowWolf August 4th, 2008 11:30 am
"didn't this come up maybe 10 years ago?…"
Mortimer Zuckerman is the owner and Editor-in-Chief of US News and World Report, and is the Chairman of The Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish American Organizations (which generally lobbies the Executive Branch, while AIPAC takes care of Congress). As of 2007, Mort Zuckerman was the 188th wealthiest American as per Forbes.
US News and World Report will *never* admit that the US Military does anything illegal - the US military protects Israel and billionaires, and the world economic system which makes both possible.
Most warcrimes are never reported. But once one is, the Military has the drill down cold:
'This guy wasn't really there (look, this document proves he shipped out that morning), that guy has mental illness now (so don't believe what he says), this guy is retracting his story (after being 'contacted' late one night), fog of war, no one is to blame, maybe one bad apple fired without orders, the 'enemy' was hiding behind civilians, etc...'
Always the same. Smoke and Mirrors, nothing to see here...
Most of the USNWR article was trying to discredit Ed Daily; they never ONCE quoted any Koreans who survived the massacre, they never talked to any Koreans at all. It's like the Police investigating themselves: "after 12 days of investigations, we have concluded Officer Riley was completely innocent of any wrongdoing in the incident killing three Girl Scouts selling cookies at his house".
If the Army does not support a story (with documents and officer quotes) then it did not happen.
Also:
"In 1973, a fire at the Army's Personnel Records Center in St. Louis destroyed the service records of thousands of Korean War veterans."
Yeah, it's always something.
MiMi - and all the rest who've written above---don't you realize the same thing is going on in Iraq today? Read Dahr Jamail's "The Green Zone" for one, and cry as you read some of it, as I did!!! Then imagine a stronger nation coming into the U. S. and doing the same thing to us - and I do believe that will happen some day! I have a grandson in training now to be sent over in January, to where I don't know, and I wanted to suggest he read the above book when he was home on leave, but his father said I absolutely was not to mention it to him! Said it would not be good for him at this stage! But every time I read of a big U.S. soldier firing on a child or woman, I think of the kind of person our soldiers must be when they return home and truly believe they all will suffer a long time with PTSD! God Damn War!!!
MiMiCcS, what the hell have you been smoking?
Our policy seems to be "kill them all and let God sort em' out." Why doesn't the government just say so and get on with it. In Korea it was "people in white" and in Iraq it seems to be weddings....hey, they're wearing white, that must be the problem. And here I sit thinking the bad guys wore black, no that was Vietnam, hell, now I'm really confused.
"Why is the word MASSACRES surrounded by quotation marks in the headline? Hazmat"
What Hazmat asked!!!!!!!!!!
The Korean War was actually a UN War, with the US as a participant. The war was actually planned in 1945 as a test for the soon to be established UN. When Korea was partitioned, the Soviets flooded North Korea with weapons to help them build up their army. The US of course did nothing for the South, except build up a lightly armed police state which spent it's time rounding up Communists, some massacres taking place even before the war.
When the North finally invaded, South Korea was unable to defend itself, setting the stage for the UN entry. It's curious, but the Soviet Union could have vetoed the UN move, but chose to abstain. The truth must be told, the Cold War was a hoax. Communists in the state department leaked information on operations to the Soviets who transferred it to the North Koreans. McCarthur was livid. I do not deny some atrocities might have been committed, but wars are tough, it's not always clear who is the enemy.
Any reparations that need to be paid, please send the bill to the UN. They are responsible for that war, along with their treasonous accomplices within the US government and media.
It's interesting, but Taiwan at the time was a member of the UN and thought it was a good time to recover the mainland. The US stopped them by sending a fleet into the Taiwan Straits. If Communist China had been distracted by Taiwan, it is unlikely they would have intervened in North Korea. It is likely the same Communists in the State department who were leaking operational secrets had also reassured China they had nothing to worry about over Taiwan. Also, McCarthur wanted to bomb the Yalu bridges to prevent a massive entry by the Chinese and to restrict them from supplying the North Koreans but he was ordered not to by Washington.
Of course, Truman was the guy who lost China to the Communists in the first place, no way would he want to see it get recovered by non-communists. That's what had guys like McCarthy happing mad. It was so obvious at the time that something was very, very wrong. Today of course, the history has been sanitized and McCarthy is considered a fruit cake. Those same Communists are still around, as fascists. But national fascism is just a stepping stone for Global Communism. The goal is the same, One World Government.
So what has changed since the days of Manifest Destiny?
Nothing except that we do it faster - ask any native American - from either continent.
bligh3, no, no joke. We ostensibly fought the war to preserve "freedom" for the South. Why does the preservation of that "freedom" entail the intentional deaths of the civilians whose freedoms we are protecting? "We had to destroy the civilians in order to save them." Seems that I've heard something like that before. These intentional, and callous, acts cannot be changed, but history has often recorded the need to provide compensation for such deeds. South Korea and her government must answer for the deeds that they did. But we can answer for ours.
America loves free fire zones, scalps, ears and other trophies. In 1968 one of my good friends in the 173rd Airborne brought home photos of him posing with his brothers-in-arms...with long strings of dried VC ears hanging from their rucksacks. Common practice in Vietnam, is what he told me, but the man I knew before his service was never the same again.
We kill those that are 'other' to us by the hundreds of thousands...and end up mostly dead inside ourselves. Wait until the effects of IRAQ become evident.....just one more crop of men and women to live the only lives they can...under the bridges and in the soup lines.
Veteran '66-68
Monetary compensation won't bring back the dead or take away the pain they felt, but something needs to be done to close this. Compensation can be a small part, but some sort of official recognition of what happened and apology from the US is also necessary.
This is a joke right? The South Korean government wants reparations from the U.S.?
How about the 100,000 plus leftist and other civilians killed by the South Koreans? Or the 10s of thousands of civilians killed by the North?
Should have let Kim overrun the suckers.
I hope Canada didn't help with the indiscriminate murder.
Militantliberal,
Hilarious post, loved it. Sarah Ruth, c'mon now, tanks disguised as cows? It's so funny, I don't know how you missed it. Must not have had your coffee yet :)
Forgive my moment of Republicanism, but weren't the lives of over 50,000 American soldiers perhaps payment enough?
What distinguishes this account is that it actually reports what the survivors have to say.
Some with ideological blinders on will maintain that "The United States does not massacre" – the precursor to the Bush's " The U.S. does not torture."
This is a question of authority.
For some, unless the military officially declares that the U.S. military massacred, (tortured, committed atrocities, war crimes etc.), then all other accounts are suspect.
Those who hold military officials in awe dismiss not only the survivors' accounts but also those of the ground soldiers, other branches of government (i.e. congress, courts), the "liberal" media, the left wing press, and of course anything "un-American" – the foreign press, foreign governments, foreign witnesses, especially ones with darker skin.
At one end, they are dismissed as unreliable and inconclusive; at the other as propagandists – nothing said by the "enemy" can ever be true.
Progressives fall into this as well: the generals who criticize Bush are trumpeted far beyond the survivors of Fallujah.
For some, the military becomes a bastion of purity in a corrupt world.
The military represents impartial duty, sacrifice, honor, discipline, (and a good deal of testosterone), while the rest of us are loaded down by partisan bias.
Anything wrong in war is the result of accidents, confusion, or "a few bad apples" or perhaps just the way things were "back then" – certainly never policy or the predictable results of policy.
Those who might otherwise challenge authority maintain a special place for this giant, self-serving, bureaucratic branch of government.
It seems likely that this is a way to maintain hope: "There are good, honorable people out there, in the military."
To accept other authorities would undermine this faith in the world.
This is one more example of the corrupt mind set that has manifested itself in a corrupt culture that the USA has exhibited for it's entire history.
The "corrupt culture" is evident by the fact that it has taken so long for this to be willingly discussed, in just this one story. The same things are going on now in Afghanistan, Iraq, Guantanamo, and every where the Americans go.
By 'Corrupt culture", I mean, this: If Gen. Smith, orders Col. Jones to order Capt. Whats his name----to order Sergeant GI Joe, to commit an act of violence against someone in a war zone, that all of them would condemn if the same were committed against their own families----and they perform the duty and obey the order-----then that is a CORRUPT CULTURE.
If the criminal in the White House did not have subordinate criminals ----all the way down the chain of command----this story, and the ones that are no doubt taking place even as I type this--------would never happen.
America built it's house on "shifting sand" and it is long over due for a collapse.
The USA has much to answer to history for---if they begin to clean their own house----soon---history will be kind: but "if" is the middle word in "life"; is it not?
Thanks for your time.
Sara Ruth:
Sorry, but militantliberal's comment was sarcasm--and funny to boot. Sarcasm of sarcasm doesn't amount to more sarcasm any more than two negatives make a greater negative.
I.F. Stone's book "The Hidden History of the Korean War" is one of the best sources on the Korean war I've ever read.
http://www.ifstone.org/hidden_history.php
As far as I know, you can only find it used, but you should find a copy if you can. A bit repetitive, but really he's just nailing home his point- which was that the war was not an act of self-defense against Northern aggression. By the end of the book you see that the official story simply could not be true.
Sarah Ruth:
Did you keep reading my earlier post? It seems you mistook my sarcasm for serious opinion.
We probably assumed they were leftists that survived the genecide by the right wing Koreans.
didn't this come up maybe 10 years ago?...
I mean if theres new evidence Hang the Bastards but this was investigated...heres a link
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/culture/articles/000522/archive_016967.htm
re: "Everyone knows the North Koreans nearly overwhelmed U.S. forces with Soviet T-34/85 tanks disguised as cows and pieces of furniture"
Who is everyone?? The T-34/85 Tank Weighed 32 ton, was 8.15 x 3.0 x 2.6 mt. A bit difficult to disguise as anything but a tank.
Where do you get your information? What a crock of crap!
Liberal is creative. Conservative is anal. Both are destroying forces when their only nature seems to be to divide the people.
Sara Ruth
why is the word MASSACRES surrounded by quotation marks in the headline?
gregdevious August 4th, 2008 11:04 am wrote: ". . . but then again, jesus probably didn't have stock in GE or Lockheed Martin."
The real problem is that GE or Lockheed Martin et al, put stock in jesus . . . and profits derived from it.
In the 60 years since WWII, the only thing that has changed with regard to the US policy of bombing innocent civilians is that we currently prefer to kill brown people instead of yellow people. They are all regarded as necessary, insignificant casualties of the all-important war against communism and/or any other ideas US policymakers offer up as a scapegoat to keep the ever-profitable war machine running.
Perhaps if the mainstream news media ever finds it profitable to cover stories like this, our nation of some 200 million 'christians' will eventually pull their heads out of the sand and start to try to effect the positive changes that patterning one's life after jesus' is supposed to bring about...but then again, jesus probably didn't have stock in GE or Lockheed Martin.
conservatives kill
"There was no excuse," Cho said. "How could they not tell - the cows, the pieces of furniture?"
Hah! Everyone knows the North Koreans nearly overwhelmed U.S. forces with Soviet T-34/85 tanks disguised as cows and pieces of furniture, especially nightstands with caterpillar tracks. Open the little drawer and an 85 mm cannon would spring out.
This piece is a classic example of the liberal movement that's ruining America. Support the Troops, protect the Homeland and obey the Leader!
"...the (US) embassy is not monitoring commission findings."
Seems like that would be a job the embassy is supposed to do...