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ENLARGE
By David C. Henley
LVN Publisher Emeritus
On Wednesday of next week, we will be commemorating the 40th anniversary of the seizure of the USS Pueblo by North Korean naval units in international waters west of Japan off the coast of North Korea.
The Jan. 23, 1968, capture of the Pueblo, the killing of one of its crew by the North Koreans, the imprisonment and torture of the other 82 crewmembers and their release the day before Christmas 11 months later made international headlines.
For those who may not know much about the Pueblo incident, here is a brief synopsis of events.
The Pueblo, a 24-year old, 177-foot former Army cargo vessel that had been acquired by the U.S. Navy and converted into an intelligence gathering ship, was conducting surveillance of Soviet and North Korean naval activities in the Tsushima Straits before her seizure.
On Jan. 23, North Korean navy ships and torpedo boats attacked the Pueblo. The Pueblo's crew was unable to man the ship's two machine guns because ammunition was stored below decks and the machine guns were wrapped in heavy, cold-weather tarps. Crewman Duane Hodges, 21, was killed during the attack.
Pueblo skipper Cmdr. Lloyd M. Bucher subsequently surrendered his ship to the North Koreans. The crew was blindfolded and beaten and transferred to a series of North Korean prisons where they remained until freed by their captors on Dec. 24, 1968.
The crew suffered horrific tortures and humiliations during their imprisonment and were forced under threats of death to admit their ship was in North Korean waters before its capture. Following their release from captivity, a naval court of inquiry recommended that Bucher and one of his five officers be court-martialed for not returning enemy fire and failing to completely destroy sensitive ship's papers and code devices before the Pueblo's capture. The court-martial was overturned by Navy Secretary John H. Chafee who said, "They have suffered enough." Bucher and his crew finally received Prisoner of War medals in 1990, 22 years later.
I was partially involved in the Pueblo incident when the crew was released by the North Koreans and returned to the United States. An Army Reserve captain at the time and a member of the 306th Psychological Operations Reserve unit at Ft. MacArthur in San Pedro, Calif., I was serving as the battalion's intelligence officer.
Before dawn on Dec. 24, 1968, I was awakened by a call from our battalion's commanding officer, Lt. Col. Thomas Cornell, who ordered me to leave our Los Angeles home "on the double" and drive to San Diego to attend the arrival there of the crew who were flying in from South Korea and attend their briefings at the Navy's San Diego Balboa Naval Hospital.
Leaving my wife and two children, ages 3 and 1, I raced to San Diego and arrived in time to see the crew arrive at the hospital in two buses following their flight on two C-14 "Starlifters" from South Korea to Miramar Naval Air Station. When the initial debriefings and a press conference by Bucher were completed, the crew were reunited with their families and underwent hospital stays to improve their mental and physical health.
A few days ago, I spoke with two of the Pueblo's enlisted crew members, Earl Phares and Stu Russell, who were, respectively, 19 and 24 when the ship was seized. Both men told me they continue to suffer nightmares from their capture and imprisonment, and both are receiving Navy disability checks for lifetime injuries they suffered from beatings and torture inflicted on them by sadistic North Korean prison guards.
Phares, now 59, who stayed in the Navy and retired in 1995 as a senior chief in the Navy Reserve, said he suffers from post traumatic stress disorder and described to me the endless beatings he received on his back and legs while bound hand and foot with chains. The worst physical abuse he and the other crew members received was during "hell week, the week before we were released."
Russell, now 64 and past president of the USS Pueblo Association, described to me the "terrible dreams and flashbacks" he suffers daily. He also told of the "innate cruelty" of his captors "who screamed at us that we were the devil as they kicked and beat us."
Russell left the Navy after his San Diego hospital stay and now lives in Northern California, having retired in 1997 as a county jail warden there.
As for Cmdr. Lloyd Bucher, I ran into him in the late 1990s while dining at a San Diego seafood restaurant with friends. Bucher was at a nearby table, and I walked over and introduced myself. He did not recognize me, and said he had remained in the Navy, retiring as a commander in 1973.
In 1970, Bucher wrote "Bucher, My Story," a book that detailed his life in the Navy, the Pueblo's capture, his imprisonment and torture, and his court-martial. Bucher spent his last years in the San Diego suburb of Poway where he painted and grew vegetables. He died at age 76 in January 2004 and is buried at San Diego's Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery.
What has happened to the USS Pueblo?
For years, the Pueblo was docked at a pier at Wonsan, the closest port near the ship's capture on Jan. 23, 1968. Eight years ago, it was moved to a special pier at Pyongyang, North Korea's capital, where today it serves a a floating museum. It draws an estimated 1,000 people a day who tour the ship, viewing anti-American videos and listening to lectures about the evils of capitalism and the "devil" United States.
The U.S. Navy has never decommissioned the USS Pueblo, and it continues to be the only U.S. warship in enemy hands.
LVN Publisher Emeritus
On Wednesday of next week, we will be commemorating the 40th anniversary of the seizure of the USS Pueblo by North Korean naval units in international waters west of Japan off the coast of North Korea.
The Jan. 23, 1968, capture of the Pueblo, the killing of one of its crew by the North Koreans, the imprisonment and torture of the other 82 crewmembers and their release the day before Christmas 11 months later made international headlines.
For those who may not know much about the Pueblo incident, here is a brief synopsis of events.
The Pueblo, a 24-year old, 177-foot former Army cargo vessel that had been acquired by the U.S. Navy and converted into an intelligence gathering ship, was conducting surveillance of Soviet and North Korean naval activities in the Tsushima Straits before her seizure.
On Jan. 23, North Korean navy ships and torpedo boats attacked the Pueblo. The Pueblo's crew was unable to man the ship's two machine guns because ammunition was stored below decks and the machine guns were wrapped in heavy, cold-weather tarps. Crewman Duane Hodges, 21, was killed during the attack.
Pueblo skipper Cmdr. Lloyd M. Bucher subsequently surrendered his ship to the North Koreans. The crew was blindfolded and beaten and transferred to a series of North Korean prisons where they remained until freed by their captors on Dec. 24, 1968.
The crew suffered horrific tortures and humiliations during their imprisonment and were forced under threats of death to admit their ship was in North Korean waters before its capture. Following their release from captivity, a naval court of inquiry recommended that Bucher and one of his five officers be court-martialed for not returning enemy fire and failing to completely destroy sensitive ship's papers and code devices before the Pueblo's capture. The court-martial was overturned by Navy Secretary John H. Chafee who said, "They have suffered enough." Bucher and his crew finally received Prisoner of War medals in 1990, 22 years later.
I was partially involved in the Pueblo incident when the crew was released by the North Koreans and returned to the United States. An Army Reserve captain at the time and a member of the 306th Psychological Operations Reserve unit at Ft. MacArthur in San Pedro, Calif., I was serving as the battalion's intelligence officer.
Before dawn on Dec. 24, 1968, I was awakened by a call from our battalion's commanding officer, Lt. Col. Thomas Cornell, who ordered me to leave our Los Angeles home "on the double" and drive to San Diego to attend the arrival there of the crew who were flying in from South Korea and attend their briefings at the Navy's San Diego Balboa Naval Hospital.
Leaving my wife and two children, ages 3 and 1, I raced to San Diego and arrived in time to see the crew arrive at the hospital in two buses following their flight on two C-14 "Starlifters" from South Korea to Miramar Naval Air Station. When the initial debriefings and a press conference by Bucher were completed, the crew were reunited with their families and underwent hospital stays to improve their mental and physical health.
A few days ago, I spoke with two of the Pueblo's enlisted crew members, Earl Phares and Stu Russell, who were, respectively, 19 and 24 when the ship was seized. Both men told me they continue to suffer nightmares from their capture and imprisonment, and both are receiving Navy disability checks for lifetime injuries they suffered from beatings and torture inflicted on them by sadistic North Korean prison guards.
Phares, now 59, who stayed in the Navy and retired in 1995 as a senior chief in the Navy Reserve, said he suffers from post traumatic stress disorder and described to me the endless beatings he received on his back and legs while bound hand and foot with chains. The worst physical abuse he and the other crew members received was during "hell week, the week before we were released."
Russell, now 64 and past president of the USS Pueblo Association, described to me the "terrible dreams and flashbacks" he suffers daily. He also told of the "innate cruelty" of his captors "who screamed at us that we were the devil as they kicked and beat us."
Russell left the Navy after his San Diego hospital stay and now lives in Northern California, having retired in 1997 as a county jail warden there.
As for Cmdr. Lloyd Bucher, I ran into him in the late 1990s while dining at a San Diego seafood restaurant with friends. Bucher was at a nearby table, and I walked over and introduced myself. He did not recognize me, and said he had remained in the Navy, retiring as a commander in 1973.
In 1970, Bucher wrote "Bucher, My Story," a book that detailed his life in the Navy, the Pueblo's capture, his imprisonment and torture, and his court-martial. Bucher spent his last years in the San Diego suburb of Poway where he painted and grew vegetables. He died at age 76 in January 2004 and is buried at San Diego's Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery.
What has happened to the USS Pueblo?
For years, the Pueblo was docked at a pier at Wonsan, the closest port near the ship's capture on Jan. 23, 1968. Eight years ago, it was moved to a special pier at Pyongyang, North Korea's capital, where today it serves a a floating museum. It draws an estimated 1,000 people a day who tour the ship, viewing anti-American videos and listening to lectures about the evils of capitalism and the "devil" United States.
The U.S. Navy has never decommissioned the USS Pueblo, and it continues to be the only U.S. warship in enemy hands.
