A “Paean” For Some Forgotten Heroes

We’re going to be commemorating a few 40th anniversaries this year, so we might as well begin with this one, and that would be the seizure of the U.S.S. Pueblo by North Korea on this date in 1968.

This Wikipedia article tells us that the issue of whether or not the ship was in international waters at the time it was seized or whether it had strayed across the border briefly into North Korea may never be resolved (not an uncommon practice if it had strayed, actually). Also, the Seventh Fleet apparently knew of the threat the Pueblo faced, but either no one sought authorization for attacking the North Korean vessels or was only able to obtain it after the Pueblo had already been captured.

The incidents of starving our troops as well as subjecting them to coercion, including beatings, grew harsher after the North Koreans realized our people were giving them “the finger” in propaganda photos, to the point where Cmdr. Lloyd Bucher (pictured) was put through a mock firing squad to make him confess to spying, and only agreed to write a confession after his own men were threatened (including the pun, “We paean the North Korean state…We paean their great leader Kim Il Sung,” which only led to harsher treatment when the North Koreans discovered the intended meaning).

However, as this San Diego Union-Tribune story tells us…

“It was a lot harder for the wives than for us,” said James Kell, 71. “We knew what was happening, and we could cope with it. But they didn't know. They could only imagine.”

Carol Murphy and her young son lived near Yokosuka when her husband – Lt. Ed Murphy, the ship's executive officer – was taken prisoner. The North Koreans released a photo that showed the Pueblo's five other officers, but not Ed.

Three days after the ship's capture, Ed's mother died in California. Carol Murphy, eight months pregnant with her second child, caught a flight home for her mother-in-law's services.

Imagine, eight months pregnant and flying across the Pacific in 1968 – a whole different story versus now.

And by the way, though I don’t mean to malign our services here, the next time you hear some right-wing blowhard frothing about how those damn dirty hippies were protesting the war and spitting on our soldiers, calling them “baby killers,” etc. (as if that was the only treatment our people received from civilians in that era), consider what the wives of the Pueblo crew had to endure at the hands of the Navy, which wanted to shut all of this out of sight…

The wife of the Pueblo's captain (Bucher) heard a report about the ship's seizure while watching a news show at San Diego's Bahia Hotel, where she was staying with her two teenage sons. Pete, a career submariner, would be assigned to San Diego after his Pueblo tour ended.

Within minutes, news reporters tracked down Rose Bucher at the hotel.

She reluctantly embraced the role as the Pueblo families' morale-booster and spokeswoman. She asked a senior Navy officer for the names and addresses of all the crewmen's families so she could keep them informed, a longtime tradition in the service. He told her no.

“He said, 'I think you might be a rabble-rouser,' ” said Bucher, who lives in the Poway home she shared with Pete until his death in 2004.

The Pueblo families bridled at this and other Navy cruelties they endured. After the Pueblo was seized, the Navy temporarily stopped some of the crew members' pay, leaving their wives without that source of financial support.

“I went to get his paycheck, and there wasn't any,” Pat Kell said. “I had to go to church to get some (money).”

…

(Kell) put a “Remember the Pueblo” bumper sticker on her car. Navy officials said the vehicle wouldn't be allowed on a base because of that emblem.

The Pueblo ordeal lasted for eleven months before the 82-man crew was finally freed (Fireman Apprentice Duane Hodges was killed in the initial attack on the ship), and the Wikipedia article tells us that we’ve since learned that the Soviet Union ordered North Korea to seize the ship because the Soviets were looking for a cryptographic machine they learned about from the American spy John Anthony Walker.

And to think that North Korea actually makes money off the seized ship as a tourist attraction, using the possible repatriation of the ship as diplomatic leverage (as much as Bushco disgusts me, I have to admit that that’s pretty damn low also).

As the Union-Tribune story notes, the surviving crew and family members have carried the memories of this act of terrorism with them all of their lives, and will quite probably until the day they pass from this earth. And I think they all deserve some respect and recognition for their great sacrifice.