Valley veterans have mixed feelings on Korean War

Friday, June 23, 2000 | 11:17 a.m.

The Korean War

A brief history of the Korean War:

While the Korean War was a hellish waste of time and life to many American veterans it was of great importance to Korean-American soldiers such as Young Oak Kim.

As veterans prepare to observe the 50th anniversary of the start of that Asian conflict Sunday, retired Army Col. Kim, who served as a battalion commander in Korea, said the war gave him a chance to get in touch with his ancestral roots and play a role in keeping free the nation where his father was born.

Kim, a Las Vegas resident, was in charge of the 1st Battalion of the 31st Infantry Regiment, seeing action at the Punch Bowl and leading the first U.S. troops that crossed the 38th Parallel for the third and final time in the three-year conflict.

For all of his success, he feels a sense of loss over the eventual outcome of the war.

"We could have advanced another 25 or 30 miles and the North Koreans would have signed (an armistice) quickly," Kim said. "I was frustrated because stopping the advance put the lives of many men in jeopardy. We lost as many or more troops after the truce talks began as we did before the talks.

"We should have learned from Korea that you can't go into a war and try to win a tie because that only guarantees defeat. In many ways Korea was a defeat."

Other Las Vegas veterans not only agree with that assessment, but go one step further in their dissatisfaction over the outcome of a war that took them away from their families to a land that did not mean anything to them.

"The war was all politics and I think unnecessary," said Jim Parry, an Army veteran who today is secretary of Elks Lodge No. 1468. "It sure didn't look like we learned anything from Korea because we later had Vietnam."

Jim Childress, senior vice commandant of the Greater Nevada Detachment Marine Corps League and a Korean War Marine veteran, echoes that sentiment.

"We didn't learn a damn thing from Korea," he said. "I was proud to serve as a Marine and I was proud to serve with World War II occupational forces, but not in Korea. It was a sad situation. I saw children barefoot in the snow -- such terrible poverty."

Korean War veterans have long called the conflict "The Forgotten War" because it was sandwiched between America's greatest triumph in World War II and its only clear-cut military loss in Vietnam.

Many veterans still criticize President Harry Truman for recalling Gen. Douglas MacArthur because of MacArthur's aggressive tactics. They say it was done to appease the United Nations, which wanted to appease the Chinese and Russians.

"The war was not meant to be won -- if it were, they would have left MacArthur alone to do his job," Childress said.

While Parry and Childress say they will be among the many veterans who won't celebrate the golden anniversary of the war, hundreds of other veterans will be at the Reno Hilton today through Sunday for a ceremony that will feature nine of the nation's 21 living Korean War Medal of Honor recipients.

"The organizers under the leadership of Chairman Don Schwartz began working on this event a year ago," said ceremony spokesman Butch Lynn. "As a result of their hard work this will be one of the largest ceremonies in the world to honor Korean War veterans."

The ceremony called "Korea -- The Forgotten War Remembered" will be climaxed by a Sunday night dinner where former two-term Nevada Gov. Mike O'Callaghan, a Korean War veteran who today is chairman of the Sun, will be special guest speaker. Veterans also will receive the new Korean War Service Medal.

For Kim, the Korean War meant a chance for him to help make his dream for a united Korea come true. Kim's father, Shoon Kwan Kim, never lived to see his dream of a free Korea come to pass. He died in California in 1941 as Japanese forces occupied his beloved homeland.

At age 82, Young Oak accepts that he too will not see his dream fulfilled despite recent successful talks between the leaders of North and South Korea.

"I won't see a united Korea in my lifetime, but the recent breakthrough far exceeds what I expected to see," Kim said. "There is a long and difficult road ahead, but at least now we have a road. I hope to see a reduction of tension, a steady increase in trade and a continuing dialogue.

"It is possible that my stepson will realize my dream, just as I realized my father's dream."

A half century ago, post-World War II Korea became a hot spot as the North sided with the communists and the South adopted democracy. On June 25, 1950, the North tried to unite the nations by invading the South and spreading the sphere of communism.

"Because of the prejudices against minorities in the United States, many Asians at that time were leaning toward communism," Kim said. "I studied (Karl) Marx, but I also studied democracy. When I compared the two, I found that democracy in theory -- not as it was being practiced in the United States -- was ideal."

In World War II, the segregated U.S. military could find only one place for Kim -- the famed 100th Infantry Battalion and 442nd Regimental Combat Team -- Japanese-American forces that became the most decorated American units of the conflict.

Raised in a racial melting pot of the Bunker Hill section of Los Angeles, Kim accepted the challenge of working with a people long hated by Koreans for centuries of invasion and oppression. Kim became one of the most respected members of his company.

"Kim was a true leader -- he was running the show," said Japanese-American Ben Doi, a 442nd member from Fresno, Calif., who fought alongside Kim. "He had a mind for the military. If he was Caucasian, he would have had a star on his shoulder."

Kim earned the Distinguished Service Cross, Silver Star, the Purple Heart with three Oak Leaf clusters, the Presidential Unit Citation and the Combat Infantryman Badge. He was wounded twice in World War II and once in Korea.

Today the 155-mile-long Korean demilitarized zone is one of the world's most heavily fortified borders and a source of great tension.

About 35,000 U.S. troops remain on standby should the armistice be broken and the war resume. It is a possibility -- though some say remote -- as the two nations never signed a peace treaty. To the two Koreas, a state of war technically exists.

Occasionally, the Forgotten War is remembered in ways that its veterans and others don't want it to be. An example of that was the September 1999 Associated Press reports of the alleged 1950 massacre of refugees by American forces at No Gun Ri.

The incident now is being questioned because some of the recollections of American veterans have been called fabrications, as military records show that two of the "eyewitnesses" in the AP stories were not even at No Gun Ri. Some experts discredit the claim that a massacre even took place.

Regardless of the outcome of that story, the debate over the significance of the Korean War and its place in history are sure to continue at least through 2003 as 50th annual remembrances of battles are held and other key events are recognized.