U.S. Policy Was to Shoot Korean Refugees

U.S. Policy Was to Shoot Korean Refugees

By CHARLES J. HANLEY and MARTHA MENDOZA
The Associated Press
Monday, May 29, 2006; 2:44 PM



-- More than a half-century after hostilities ended in Korea, a document from the war's chaotic early days has come to light _ a letter from the U.S. ambassador to Seoul, informing the State Department that American soldiers would shoot refugees approaching their lines.

The letter _ dated the day of the Army's mass killing of South Korean refugees at No Gun Ri in 1950 _ is the strongest indication yet that such a policy existed for all U.S. forces in Korea, and the first evidence that that policy was known to upper ranks of the U.S. government.

"If refugees do appear from north of US lines they will receive warning shots, and if they then persist in advancing they will be shot," wrote Ambassador John J. Muccio, in his message to Assistant Secretary of State Dean Rusk.

More @ http://tinyurl.com/mscyn washingtonpost

OK here is how this all went down. In 1950 US forces and ROK forces were in full retreat from the Commie hordes from the N/Korea. The ever clever Commies had infiltrated armed troops dressed in civilian clothing into the civilian columns heading southward. The Commie plan was to infiltrate as many troop's as they could behind US lines with an eye to creating as much havoc as possible.

The civilians were warned not to approach US forces by leaflet and word of mouth. The Commies in their usual brutal fashion forced the civilians to maintain their pace southward. US forces used air strikes, artillery, and small arms fire to break up the civilian columns.

So who's the bad guy in all this? According to the usual suspects its the US of course! Is hell raised because the entire incident was caused by the callous behavior of the Commies? Well of course not! This is like having someone rob a bank and in their get away they shoot and kill a teller because the cops show up and open fire on the robbers. Then the cops get blamed for doing their job and not the robbers for setting the events in motion to start with.

Did we kill innocent Korean civilians during the Korean War? We most certainly did so and we had no choice. In the chaos of war the niceties of civilized behavior do not apply. Civilians during war are like buildings or trees, they are part of the landscape and nothing more. There is not time to sort the sheep from the goats and even if there was time it poses an unnecessary risk to our combat troops.

Those who believe that warfare has or should have rules have no idea what war is all about. There are two rules in war, win and win with the least cost to your side as possible. Sure that's callous and cold, but then war isn't for the bleeding hearts and the sob sisters. War is not for the faint of heart or those who are squeamish about killing to get the job done.