All and Everything

"'Fire on everything! Fire on everything! Kill 'em all!' I shot too, I shot at the people. I didn't know if they was soldiers or what. Kids, there were kids out there. It didn't matter what it was: eight, eighty, blind, crippled or crazy. They shot them. Joe Jackman (Kill 'em All 21:03-21:29)

This is an excerpt from one of the testimonies that really stuck out to me. As select lines from this excerpt are repeated more than once in this short film, there is clearly some significance that can be placed on them. Above all else, what these lines prove to me is the evident indiscretion that was exercised in handling these refugees. According to Jackman, the exact words of his lieutenant were "Fire on everything" and "Kill them all." With the language choice of everything and all, one can conclude that this lieutenant was not concerned with weeding out refugees from potential North Korean soldiers but instead chose the easier though tactless route of firing on all and everything. And as for the testimonies of the higher-ups in our readings this week (who defended their commands by stating that a group of refugees without women and children meant North Korean soldiers in disguise), they are plainly contradict by Jackman's testament that there were in fact "kids out there." But just in case there was need for clarification as to who fell into the category of all and everything, Jackman elaborates on all and everything to include individuals that were between eight or eighty or who were "blind, crippled or crazy." North Korea, South Korea, communist, refugee, "It didn't matter what it was."

 "You can't forget, no matter how much you try, no matter how much medication you take. It's there, it just eats you alive... We were in hell and we only made it half way back."
Buddy Wenzel (Kill 'em All 45:42-46:02)

I feel incredibly insensitive saying this but this is my favorite excerpt from this documentary. I find this statement so powerful, raw, and honest. It strikes me at my core and brings out the sheer empathy that I feel for not only Wenzel but for all of the other veterans of this war. This, for me, challenges the idea that The Korean War is "The Forgotten War" because there are clearly veterans out there like Wenzel that simply cannot forget. "No matter how much [they] try, no matter how much medication [they] take." Undoubtedly Wenzel is speaking from experience, surely he has tried to forget and has even taken medication to forget but he remains haunted. How many more must be eaten alive by the guilt that they feel and, like Wenzel, have only made it "half way back" from the hell they were in? This is something that I plan to discuss in my final paper.
- Patricia Ledezna

Testing Grounds Of A Would Be Emprie

 The above image I found after reading Bruce Cumings article Occurrence at Nogun-Ri Bridge: An Inquiry into the History and Memory of a Civil War. I found it to be troubling, in that it is true. America has the very bad habit (putting it lightly) of brutally oppressing and killing those they seek to "liberate." I ask why? Largely, it stems I feel from the position of power, and racism which has for a long time been imbedded in America's psyche.

Following WWII, America now had a firm foothold in SEA (South East Asia) in the form of a occupied Japan. This was now prime time for the U.S. to expand its interests in SEA. This would be under the guise of expanding Freedom and Democracy. Korea provided the perfect testing ground for America's interest, in the form of combating communism. The Korean War began in 1950 (or 1945 depending on what you believe) and ended in 1953. Ultimately, Korea would result in a failure, or part success, as South Korea was created under the form of a democracy, but was in truth a dictatorship backed and created by America.

Two years later, in 1955, The Vietnam War broke out, under much the same ideals and principles that happened in The Korean War. America "intervened" to combat the spread of communism, and bring freedom and democracy to South Vietnam. See a trend? "Misjudgements also grew out of the ubiquitous racism of white Americans and of American society in 1950" (Cumings 198).

 In light of two countries which America has thrust its hands into, that have been divided, physically, and ideologically, I must ask, is this an example of capitalism, or imperialism? Is this the actions of a nation that is seeking to bring freedom to others, or use others to expand its own interests. Because the amount of dodging the topic which America has done, the hiding of evidence of war crimes, would suggest the former. Fredric Jameson writes "The Vice of Anglo-Saxon empiricism lies...in its stubborn will to isolate the object in question from everything else...Such thinking is characterized by a turning away of the eye, a preference for segments and isolated objects, as a means to avoid observation of those larger wholes and totalities which if they had to be seen would force the mind in the long run into uncomfortable social and political conclusions" (Cumings 201).

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7oehz0016q77dbj/AnUnattachedUnit.m4v

So I download An Unattached Unit in Mchenry Library with this link to make sure it is possible. The link only shows a 15 minute preview but the entire film can be watched by pressing download and waiting twenty or so minutes. There is a lot to compare and contrast between this movie and Piagol. Sorry for prior confusion. Hope it works!

Kill 'em All

Watching the documentary, Kill ‘em All, evokes a mix of emotions, but it’s also a reminder that war is about intelligence and the management of information, both during and after the war. The film claims that there are a recorded 61 instances of American attacks against civilians during the Korean War, but only one of those has been recognized by the U.S. government. Even then, acknowledgement of the No Gun Ri massacre didn’t come until 2001, more than 50 years after it happened, and in the form of a report that conveniently sidesteps all responsibility by claiming it was not deliberate, but a tragic, unintended symptom of war violence.

The suspicious circumstances surrounding the creation of the report was frustrating to hear about, like the fact that the communication log for the 7^th cavalry was missing, making it impossible to officially confirm whether or not there were orders to kill civilians. At best, this is unacceptable negligence; at worst, it’s foul play, an attempt by the Pentagon to mask premeditated violence against civilians and, thus, a war crime (though I think it’s pretty clear that the convenient disappearance of a vital document means the Pentagon was trying to hide the facts and protect the U.S. from being exposed).

These issues raise questions about the control of information and the reinforcement of specific versions of war and history. The lack of accountability on the government’s behalf is telling because it means that they are protecting their own war narrative and preventing any deviance from it, this at the cost of those who were targeted in the attack. The truth (and trauma) of war atrocities is left to its survivors and witnesses, whose voices do not have the same authority and access to a wider reception. So the government's lack of accountability for its mistakes, war crimes, and outright cruel acts of violence is part of its management of information as a technology of war. Preventing the U.S. from looking like the aggressors, rather than the protectors of Korean civilians, is a useful strategy even years after the Korean War. I think the documentary, then, highlights how big of a role information and its disbursement (or containment) plays in war and power, and the injustice of this information being lost to the past and left to survivors to deal with.

The Nightmare of Nogun Ri

Kill Em All was very startling; it is hard to understand what happened completely in Nogun Ri. Too many lives were changed and lost just from this single instant, let alone if you combine every moment of the Korean War. Kill Em All showed how afraid the refugees were, but even more than that how afraid and nervous the soldiers were who were there to "protect" civilians. The 7th Cavalry let their fears get the better of them, so it caused a killing frenzy that lead to an inexplicable amount of pain and suffering, and death to befall the refugees. The film says that we may never know the true death toll of Nogun Ri, but the fact that 3/4 of the refugees killed were children, women, and men over 40 creates an even more tragic telling of Nogun Ri. It is hard to think about all the innocent children who lost their lives at Nogun Ri because they never had a chance to grow up and fulfill their dreams.

The shooting frenzy of Nogun Ri is haunting because a single blast, that landed in the middle of the group of refugees, set-off the shooting frenzy of the 7th Cavalry. I know that the soldiers were put into a tough situation, but now they will forever be haunted by this atrocity they were a part of. These soldiers will forever hold the guilt of what happened to the innocent refugees. As one soldier says, “you can’t forget” and this knowledge of crimes against humanity “eats you alive.” But I have a hard time understanding what exactly made the soldiers react so violently to a group of refugees to continue shooting and shooting, especially once the refugees scattered. The refugees were already running for their lives, but because of this they became shooting targets for the soldiers.

A scene that occurred before the shooting frenzy that also stunned me was when the soldier related how his commander told him to shoot at a group of refugees, and if he didn't comply the commander would shoot the soldier instead. I find this scary because a soldier has to follow orders, but this kind of order goes against humanity. In this case, it didn't end tragically because the soldier's friend only shot a "warning shot," and the refugees got the message that they needed to get off the road. But something like this shouldn't have happened in the first place, the refugees lives were already changed because they had to flee from their homes. The refugees were already suffering enough, so each uncompromising act of the army created even more suffering.  
~Melissa

Trauma and Survival in Nogun Ri

"The floor inside the tunnel was a mix of gravel and sand.  People clawed with their bare hands to make holes to hide in. Other people piled up the dead bodies like a barricade, and hid behind the bodies as a shield against the bullets… A baby boy's mother was killed during the strafing on the rail track.  The father managed to get the baby to the tunnel, but the boy was hungry and frightened.  He cried and cried.  And the American troops fired their guns into the tunnel whenever the boy cried.  The bullets fired in the direction of the crying.  People screamed that more would be shot if the baby kept crying.  The father didn't know what to do.  He might have thought the baby would die anyway, but he decided to silence it, in order to save the others.  He took the boy to the back of the tunnel and pushed him face-down into a pool of water.  I watched him doing that, and thought, 'What could be more tragic than this?'" (Kill 'em All 23:21-25:00)

In Kill 'em All, when the Nogun Ri survivor said that "the American troops fired their guns into the tunnel whenever the boy cried," I was really stunned over how cruel and senseless the actions of the American troops were, and what a grievous violation of the Geneva Convention the Nogun Ri massacre was.  Hearing the accounts of the survivors in this documentary contrasted with the accounts of the veterans was also very interesting, because it showed how much trauma the war produced for all parties, especially for Korean refugees.  This made me think about how people experienced and survived so many traumatic events in the Korean War.

The images of refugees fleeing the front reminded me of the images in Tae Guk Gi, of everyone leaving their houses in huge groups, carrying their possessions on their backs.  While Tae Guk Gi showed some of the hardships of evacuating, it didn't show how refugees were targeted in U.S. strafing, which made evacuating so dangerous.  When the Nogun Ri survivor asked, "'What could be more tragic than this?'" I thought about all the loss that particular family had endured because of the war.  The father of the baby lost his home, his wife, and his child.  If he survived, he would be haunted by all these traumatic losses– especially having to kill his own child to save others– for the rest of his life.  All these traumatic events make it so difficult for refugees, or anyone involved in the war, to survive, not only physically, but emotionally, and it also makes it hard for a country as a whole to recover.

I came across this article about a recent Rose Parade float created as a tribute to Korean War veterans.

The float is meant to replicate the Korean War monument in Washington, D.C. It was really surprising to me to see a float for "The Forgotten War," but it also made me think about the representations and perceptions of war, post-war narratives, and the concept of a party of forgetting. The front of the float reads "freedom is not free," a popular idiom we're familiar with in the U.S. Its use in relation to the Korean War is, no doubt, ironic and condescending considering the realities of the war and the United States' involvement. The fact that this expression has been used repetitively and is tagged onto something made about the Korean War, like any other war, seems to dismiss Korean War history and politics, and posits the U.S. within a paternalistic narrative wherein their mission was to liberate.

War narratives portraying the U.S. as arbiters of freedom aside though (because we're so accustomed to them by now), it also brings up issues of who is included in post-war representations and in what ways. Our discussion about the tendency of war films to focus on the heroic individual (which Huppauf writes about) rings true here, even when it comes to a seemingly insignificant float like this. Focus is on a few soldiers, who embody the bravery and heroism of the U.S. image of American combat. There is no outside context and no clear way of knowing where these soldiers are. All that matters is that they are masculinized symbols of American freedom and war. Unsurprisingly, the float (and the monument) only represents American soldiers and does not recognize Korean victims of the war, civilian or combatant. The article itself seems to similarly evoke this image of the individual soldier as the primary focus of war history and narrative, showcasing a few veterans without once mentioning the history of the Korean War. I find it interesting, then, that even a short news article incorporates the individualistic war representation mentioned by Huppauf.

All of this, of course, ties into the "party of forgetting" that we've discussed. I think this float embodies the U.S. privilege to forget, erase, and remake the past. It recasts the violence of war and even its participants in order to push a more patriotic, U.S.-centered narrative. History can be forgotten and, instead, replaced by a few symbols and a patriotic idiom.

Side note: I know we have been encouraged to find representations from North Korea and this is obviously not one, but I thought it brought up a lot of the concepts we've been talking about in class and seemed to fit well here.

(Sorry this is super late!)