No Gun Ri tragedy

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No Gun Ri (Korean: 노근리 pron. Noh gool li) is a village in South Korea where an unknown number refugees were shot to death by soldiers of the U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment in July 26-29, 1950. This incident gained widespread attention as a result of a Pulitzer Prize-winning Associated Press article published in 1999.^[1] The village is located in Hwanggan-myeon, Yeongdong County, Chungcheongbuk-do, central South Korea.

In the chaotic early days of the Korean War, panic-striken groups of refugees fleeing the North Korean advance often attempted to cross American lines despite warning shots. U.S. soldiers, who suspected that such groups were infiltrated by Communist gunmen, may have killed hundreds of refugees in July 1950, according to a New York Times report at the time.^[2] The most widely quoted casualty estimate for the No Gun Ri incident is 400 dead, a figure which first appeared in a North Korean newspaper three weeks after the incident.^[2] The 1999 Associated Press article claimed that refugees at No Gun Ri were strafed from the air and shot at close range by machine gunner Edward Daily.^[1] Army records suggest that Daily was never a machine gunner and was not present at No Gun Ri.^[3] In 2001, the U.S. military responded to the AP account with a report that included a detailed aerial photograph taken on Aug. 6, 1950.^[4] The photo shows no indication of bodies or of a mass grave.^[2] Robert Bateman, author of No Gun Ri: A Military History of the Korean War Incident (2002), estimated that eight to 35 South Korean refugees were killed at No Gun Ri.

[edit] Controversy over policy

The following books contain competing versions of the incident:

• The Bridge at No Gun Ri: A Hidden Nightmare from the Korean War - ISBN 0-8050-7183-0
• No Gun Ri: A Military History of the Korean War Incident - ISBN 0-8117-1763-1

The Associated Press version, which won a Pulitzer Prize,^[5] contained the damning assertion that U.S. military policy permitted firing on unarmed, peaceful civilians who posed no threat to U.S. forces.

Another version, which won the Colby Prize for History in April 2002, was written by a professor of history calls this a twisting of the truth, on the grounds that the US military policy was both indistinct and, in any event, unknown to soldiers on the ground at the time of the events at No Gun Ri.

[edit] Controversy over events

The five key points on which the versions differ are:

1. Did US troops open fire on Koreans who were stationary, i.e., not moving toward US lines and not posing any apparent threat?
2. Were armed South Korean insurgents among the Korean civilians who were killed?
3. Did the US military unit on the ground recieved any orders to shoot civilians?
4. Were civilians bombed and strafed by jets at No Gun Ri?
5. Were the journalists fooled by sources who had agendas?

[edit] Background

On the day before the incident, hundreds of Korean civilians were evacuated in the vicinity, southward from Imgae-ri and Joogok-ri, fleeing a North Korean advance. Some state that they were herded from their houses by elements of an American army unit. (An assertion which has been generally substantiated by all sides.) They were stopped by a roadblock near Nogeun-ri near the railroad track which eventually led to a bridge, where American forces were. To compel the refugees to halt their advance from the line, U.S. soldiers fired mortar rounds. The circumstances of the killings, and the precise number of dead, are disputed. Estimates of deaths ranged widely, from 8 to 400.

[edit] Associated Press stories investigating the deaths

The damaged Wonsabu Bridge in the vicinity of Nogeun-ri is shown here from a picture taken on August 6, 1950; NIMA officials reported that no pictures suggest evidence of mass graves.

The incident was investigated nearly 50 years later in a well-publicized 1999 Associated Press report, later expanded into the book, The Bridge at No Gun Ri: A Hidden Nightmare from the Korean War. The original reporting, before its content was disputed, won the Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting in 2000.^[1] A report was released in January 2001 by the United States Department of Defense and the Republic of Korea (South Korea) about the incident.

[edit] Pulitzer Prize-winning story

A July 25, 1950 Air Force memorandum states: "The army has requested we strafe all civilian refugee parties that are noted approaching our positions....To date we have complied with the army request in this respect." An Army inquiry would later find no source order for such a suggestion, though the same implication has been discovered in a memo to the State Dept.

The story was initially reported by the Associated Press in 1999.^[1] In an investigation by AP reporters Charles J. Hanley, Sang-Hun Choe, and Martha Mendoza and AP researcher Randy Herschaft, the AP discovered numerous previously classified documents which were now in the open archives, and interviewed many witnesses, including Korean survivors and members of the U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment.

A memo (dated July 25) of the U.S. Fifth Air Force regarding "Policy on Strafing Civilian Targets", written by USAF Colonel Turner C. Rogers recalls that, "[t]he army has requested that we strafe all civilian refugee parties that are noted approaching our positions," and that, "to date, we have complied with the army request in this respect." The memo says that bands of civilians have either been infiltrated by or are under the control of North Korean soldiers, but recommends that official policy be discriminate in targeting civilians only when "they are definitely known to contain North Korean soldiers or commit hostile acts." Although a similar naval document was found, an official inquiry later did not find a source request from the army.

The book describes the soldiers as, "green recruits of the U.S. occupation army in Japan thrown unprepared into the frontlines of war, teenagers who viewed unarmed farmers as enemies, led by officers who had never commanded men in battle." The soldiers were wary of civilians as being potential (North) Korean People's Army (NKPA) fighters; there were reports of captured enemy fighters as well as of Russian and Japanese weapons.^{[citation needed]}

No documents were found which suggested that an order was given to the regiment at Nogeun-ri to shoot at civilians. For this the AP relied on the testimony of witnesses. AP reporter Martha Mendoza states:

"Some of the veterans recall hearing orders, and we quoted them as hearing those orders to fire on civilians. We also in our reporting described some veterans who did not hear orders. Where those orders came from, we've tried to track down as best we could, and we're looking forward to the Pentagon getting to the bottom of it."

The AP editor of the story, J. Robert Port said he was demoted after championing the story for more than a year with AP higher-ups. The AP special assignment division, which Port headed, was dissolved. Port resigned in June 1999. In September 1999, seventeen months after the story was first found, the AP published the story. It is the AP's only Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting.^[6]

[edit] Media controversy

An article in U.S. News & World Report, by military reporter Joseph L. Galloway, questioned the credibility of a key witness in the AP report.^[3] Using the same Army records as those utilized by the AP, Galloway demonstrated fraudulent claims by Edward Daily. Edward Daily had said he saw both the killings at Nogeun-ri and an order to carry them out. The US News story found, based on army reports, that he was not a machine gunner, and he was not part of any unit at Nogeun-ri, nor anywhere near the village during the period in question. The AP initially stuck by Daily, who had reaffirmed his statements to numerous media outlets, including an appearance on a Dateline NBC interview with NBC anchor Tom Brokaw:

Tom Brokaw: You heard that order?

Edward Daily: Yes, sir.

Brokaw: "Kill them all?"

Edward Daily: Yes, sir.

However, after the expose by other journalism outlets, the AP reinterviewed Daily who, when confronted with army records which conflicted with his statements, admitted that he could not have been at the scene of the incident, and instead had heard of it second hand. Daily was a mechanic during the war and did not join the 2nd Battalion of the 7th Cavalry until 1951. In January 2002 he pled guilty to defrauding the government for collecting over $400,000 in benefits for combat-related trauma from combat he never saw, over nearly fifteen years. The AP's major American witness then served a 21 month sentence in Federal prison for his fraudulent accounts. ^[7]

Other servicemen who had not been interviewed for the original story were brought forth by the AP to corroborate the AP account. Lawrence Levine and James Crume, who worked at the headquarters of the 7th Cavalry Regiment, both said they believed that orders to shoot civilian refugees came from headquarters, though neither said he'd seen or heard such orders. In interviews, some of the American soldiers at Nogeun-ri said they had been ordered to fire on the refugees because their commanders believed that North Korean troops, wearing white so as to look like peasants, had infiltrated the refugee column and were shooting at the Americans. Others quoted by the AP referred repeatedly to receiving fire from among the refugees. ^[3]

New York Times Reporter Felicity Barringer reported that Herman Patterson, a rifleman in the 2nd Battalion, said: "Unfortunately, the incident took place. Numbers are not known exactly." She also reviewed the conflicting news accounts of the events that transpired at Nogeun-ri, concluding that at that point (spring, 2000) "in the end, the crucial centerpiece of The A.P. report, the American soldiers killed at least 100 Korean civilians — possibly under direct orders — has been chipped but hardly shattered by the latest revelations."^[8]

[edit] Challenges by West Point historian

Robert Bateman, a former member of the 7th Cavalry Regiment and an academic historian at West Point, wrote No Gun Ri: A Military History of the Korean War Incident, which is critical of the AP report and calls into question both evidence presented to the reporters as well as their interpretation of the material.

As mentioned above, Daily falsely corroborated the AP story and provided colorful descriptions of the incident, although he was not mentioned in the AP report until the 56th paragraph. The AP argued Daily was not central to the case and merely was one witness of sixty interviewed. Bateman asserts that not only did the AP reporters refuse to recognize the flaws in his testimony, at Bateman's prodding before its release, but that Daily was more important than the AP suggested. Bateman believes that Daily, as a prominent member of the 7th Cavalry regimental association, had strong influence over other witnesses and that by virtue of his statements he "contaminated" the views and recollections of other veterans. Additionally, it appears that Daily was central to guiding the AP to the sources that they used. Leaning upon academic research into memory modification, such as the works of psychiatrist Elizabeth Loftus, Bateman related the plasticity of memory and susceptibility of some "memories" to outside suggestions from influential figures such as Daily, who had written two books on the history of the unit. Another AP witness inadvertently demonstrated Bateman's point in a front-page New York Times article. Veteran Eugene Hesselman denied the charge that Daily was not at Nogeun-ri when confronted; "I know that Daily was there. I know that. I know that." Bateman is critical of Hesselman and Pfc. Delos Flint, for their recollections, and suggests they were not present at Nogeun-ri after he found records that they had been medivaced out of the area on July 24th, one day before the events in questions. Most damning, Bateman demonstrated that in all of the published material to date, the AP had not actually quoted anyone who was actually at Nogeun-ri, who heard an order. The closest being those who "believed" that there "must have" been an order. The AP regularly asserted that they had many interviews to this effect, but never published any of them, and refused to release their transcripts to any archive or allow for their examination.

The most contested estimates concerns the body count. A report of the Yeongdong County Office in South Korea, based upon self-reporting by present-day inhabitants, stated the total number of civilian casualties (injured, missing, or killed) to be 248. Some Korean victims have stated numbers in the hundreds. It's not entirely clear what happened to all the bodies in any case. Bateman believes it to be between eight and 35 killed, with two to three times that number wounded, due to mortar rounds and then a short (30-90 seconds) of gunfire from the troops which occurred when the troops panicked and believed they were under fire themselves. Declassified reconnaissance photos revealed no sprawling corpses nor indicated potential graves. Hanley has suggested that they were not in the open because they were stacked by local villagers beneath soil under parts of the bridge. Bateman contends that the soil required for burying hundreds of corpses even at a shallow level would have meant an excavation of soil so large (the remains alone for 300 small humans would be, roughly, 20 tons) that it would be visible in the photos. The AP contends that Korean witnesses testified to stacking bodies, however, but Bateman believes the number of victims are conflated with other incidents in the vicinity during the war, and in the same timeframe. Citing the psychiatric studies, he points out that none of the Koreans may believe they are lying, and he believes many if not most were fired upon by U.S. troops (he cites at least nine incidents that he found, and suspects dozens of other times where U.S. troops fired upon civilians in that period), just not all at the same time, and in the same place, at Nogeun-ri.

As mentioned above, to compel the refugees to halt their advance from the line, U.S. soldiers fired mortar rounds. West Point historian Robert Bateman describes this as "the dumbest possible action that could have been taken." Some Korean witnesses describe being strafed and bombed as they walked along the railway. Pictures taken on August 6 reveal possible recent strafing damage; Hanley, et al., contend the U.S. forces called in strikes. Bateman contends this was impossible because of the incompatibility between army and air force radios (AM vs. FM) and the fact that the same unit could not stop a USAF strafing of their own position the very next day due to the lack of such radios; he argues the witnesses may have confused the mortars for bombs, and that the strafing shown in the photographs could have been from that period, or could have been from a later period days or weeks after the events.

[edit] Findings of the U.S. Army Inspector General

The results of the official Army inquiry were released in January 2001.^[4] Among its findings:

• U.S. forces were inadequately trained to deal with mass refugees, which were causing problems on the battlefield.
• Official policy emphasized the role of South Korean authorities in dealing with refugees.
• Policies enacted regarding refugees were that they were prohibited from crossing battle lines (positions where there is contact or expectation of contact with the enemy) as well as having a night curfew.
• The 2nd Battalion of the 7th Cavalry Regiment withdrew from a position east of Yongdong to Nogeun-ri, believing they were under attack; the withdraw was highly disorganized.
• The 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment showed up in the afternoon of the 26th to the east of the 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, relieving the 2nd Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment.
• During July 27 to 29, the forces believed they were under enemy attack.
• Official policy discouraged large evacuations so as not to clog roads and supply lines; it is unknown why so many were evacuated.
• U.S. forces were not responsible for the large evacuations in the vicinity; they may have evacuated Imgae-ri but if so they were not 7th Cavalry Regiment soldiers.
• There were no airstrikes in the afternoon of July 26 in the vicinity of Nogeun-ri. The only airstrikes during this period were a friendly fire incident on July 27 which caused the cavalry commander to request a Tactical Air Control Party (TACP) and a strike on NKPA forces on July 28 near the 1st Battalion.
• Only TACPs had the ability to communicate with aircraft; there were none in the vicinity during the time period of July 26 to 29.
• No USAF veterans interviewed participated in the strafing of civilians in the vicinity of Nogeun-ri in late July.
• The Navy found no evidence of its aircraft in the vicinity except on July 28, when it "attacked a railroad tunnel occupied by enemy troops and other targets forward of the 7th Cavalry in the direction of Yongdong with bombs and machine guns."
• Images dated August 6 and September 19 show no signs of bombing but, "some patterns near the tracks approximately 350 yards from the double railroad overpass show "an imagery signature of probable strafing"", the same location identified by witnesses as being where they were strafed.
• No evidence of an air strike on July 26 but number of eyewitnesses shows it can not be precluded.
• Separate strikes on July 27 and 28 (on friendly and enemy targets, respectively) could have caused civilian casualties.
• A strike could have occurred in this period which killed civilians but it did not target them.
• Veterans heard various types of fire near unidentified individuals in civilian clothing outside of the tunnels and bridges in the vicinity; some reported seeing or receiving hostile fire from civilians; other civilians had shots fired near them to prevent them from moving.
• "Although the U.S. Review Team cannot determine what happened near Nogeun-ri with certainty, it is clear, based upon all available evidence, that an unknown number of Korean civilians were killed or injured by the effects of small-arms fire, artillery and mortar fire, and strafing that preceded or coincided with the NKPA's advance and the withdrawal of U.S. forces in the vicinity of Nogeun-ri during the last week of July 1950. These Korean deaths and injuries occurred at different locations in the vicinity of Nogeun-ri and were not concentrated exclusively at the double railroad overpass."
• Estimates of the time length of fire range from a few minutes to four days.
• U.S. commanders did not issue orders to fire on civilians in Nogeun-ri during July 25-29.
• Pilots were not ordered to kill civilians in the vicinity of Nogeun-ri.
• Interviewed veterans said deadly force was not authorized against civilians who posed no threat, and they were not given orders to shoot and kill civilians.
• Some veterans believed they had the ability to use deadly force if civilians did not halt from passing their position.
• Some veterans believed there was an order to fire on civilians because the weapons used may have hit civilians; they did not hear any such order and do not know who would have given it or when; other veterans maintain there was no such order.
• There was a reference to firing upon civilians who refused to stop in an army log of the 8th Cavalry Regiment; this regiment was not in the vicinity during the time period and there is nothing suggesting this message was transmitted to other regiments.
• The number of casualties is unascertainable by witnesses; the 248 figure is unverified.

The summary concludes:

Neither the documentary evidence nor the U.S. veterans’ statements reviewed by the U.S. Review Team support a hypothesis of deliberate killing of Korean civilians. What befell civilians in the vicinity of Nogeun-ri in late July 1950 was a tragic and deeply regrettable accompaniment to a war forced upon unprepared U.S. and ROK forces.

[edit] Aftermath

In 1999 The New York Times reported that in 1997, 30 South Korean survivors and relatives of victims filed a lawsuit that "described a three-day period of killing, saying that American planes had strafed hundreds of refugees who were fleeing from North Korean troops, leaving about 100 people dead. The survivors fled under the bridge, where they said they were pinned by American troops who shot and killed almost all the refugees." Their suit was rejected on a technicality.^[9]

President Bill Clinton expressed U.S. regret over Korean civilian deaths,^[10] the U.S. and South Korea issued a joint "statement of mutual understanding" in January 2001, which stated that there were no orders to fire on civilians. It concluded the following:

[edit] Ongoing research

On February 23, 2004, the History News Network hosted an online debate between Robert Bateman and the AP reporters who wrote the initial story.

• Robert Bateman criticized the AP report.
• The Associated Press reporters replied.
• Bateman's reply to the AP reporters.
• Associated Press reporter Hanley's reply to Bateman.
• Bateman has the last word.

American historian Sahr Conway-Lanz published an article in the January 2005 issue of Diplomatic History entitled "Beyond No Gun Ri," in which he argues that the position taken by the Pentagon after its 1999-2001 investigation--that the U.S. military did not order the refugees shot--is "untenable." In April 2006 he gave his own account of events in Collateral Damage: Americans, Noncombatant Immunity, and Atrocity after World War II, in which he published a letter by the United States ambassador to South Korea, John J. Muccio, which informed the State Department that U.S. troops had been authorized to shoot at refugees, referring to policy set down on July 25, 1950.

The Associated Press reporters who, in 1999, were the first to reveal the scope of the killings at Nogeun-ri, wrote, in an article May 29, 2006 in The Washington Post that the letter, which had not previously been known, "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." ^[11]

[edit] Notes

[edit] Further reading

• Bateman, Robert (April 1, 2002). No Gun Ri: A Military History of the Korean War Incident. Stackpole Books. ISBN 0-8117-1763-1. 
• The Bridge at No Gun Ri: A Hidden Nightmare from the Korean War. Review. Retrieved on 2006-07-15.
• Hanley, Charles J.; Choe, Sang-Hun; Mendoza, Martha (September 1, 2001). The Bridge at No Gun Ri: A Hidden Nightmare from the Korean War. Henry Holt & Company. ISBN 0-8050-6658-6. 
• Hanley, Charles J.; Martha Mendoza (May 29 2006). "U.S. Policy Was to Shoot Korean Refugees". Washington Post. 
• Hanley, Charles J.; Martha Mendoza (May 29 2006). "New Document Reveals Order to Shoot Refugees". Editor and Publisher. 
• Galloway, Joseph L. (May 22, 2000). "Doubts About a Korean 'Massacre' American soldiers allegedly slaughtered hundreds of innocent refugees at a place called No Gun Ri. A new review of the facts challenges that claim". US News & World Report. 
• Goodman, Bonnie (September 9, 2004). "The Face-Off: Bob Bateman Vs. the Associated Press". History News Network. 
• Greer, Judith (June 3 2002). "What really happened at No Gun Ri?". Salon.com. 
• (January 11 2001) "Joint Report: GIs Killed Refugees". News-Gazette. 
• Ma, Jason (December 23, 1999). "No Gun Ri: Exploring reactions to the Korean War tragedy". AsianWeek. 
• Port, J. Robert The Story No One Wanted to Hear in Borjesson, Kristina (2002). Into the Buzzsaw: Leading Journalists Expose the Myth of a Free Press. Prometheus Books. ISBN 1-57392-972-7. 
• The Pulitzer Prize Winners Investigative Reporting Bridge at No Gun Ri. Pulitzer.org. Retrieved on 2006-07-15. Some of the Associated Press stories.
• Report of the No Gun Ri Review. U.S. Department of Army Inspector General, January 2001.. Retrieved on 2006-07-15.
• Sahr, Cinway-Lanz (2005). "Beyond No Gun Ri: Refugees and the United States Military in the Korean War, Diplomatic History". Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Limited 28 (1): 49-82.  2006 winner of Stuart L. Bernath Award of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations[2]
• Sahr, Conway-Lanz (2006). Collateral Damage: Americans, Noncombatant Immunity, and Atrocity after World War II. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-97828-9.  Expands on the article in Diplomatic History revealing the letter from the U.S. ambassador to Seoul, informing the U.S. State Department that American soldiers would shoot refugees approaching their lines.
• Smith, Terence (May 31 2000). "Incident at No Gun Ri". PBS Online Newshour. 
• Williams, Lee (February 1, 2002). "Kill 'em All': American Military Conduct in the Korean War". BBC. 

[edit] See also

• History of South Korea
• History of Korea
• List of Korea-related topics