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TIME: Almanac of the 20th Century
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TIME, Almanac of the 20th Century.ISO
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1960
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60pueblo
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1994-02-27
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<text>
<title>
(1960s) Pueblo Capture
</title>
<history>
TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1960s Highlights
</history>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
Pueblo Capture
</hdr>
<body>
<p> [In early 1969, while the U.S. was preoccupied with fighting
the Communists in Vietnam, there came what appeared to be a
completely unprovoked attack from another Asian Communist power
on a U.S. ship, an old freighter converted into an electronic
reconnaissance vessel and called the Pueblo.]
</p>
<p>(February 2, 1968)
</p>
<p> It was noon, Korea time, when a Soviet-built North Korean
torpedo boat bore down on Pueblo. Commander Lloyd M. Bucher, 40,
was not overly disturbed. Harassment is one of the hazards of
electronic snooping.
</p>
<p> Using international signal flags, the PT boat asked Pueblo's
nationality. When she identified herself as American, the Korean
boat signaled: "Heave to or I will open fire." Pueblo replied:
"I am in international waters." She maintained her course at
two-thirds speed (8 knots), with the PT boat never very far
away. An hour later, three more North Korean vessels came
slashing in from the southwest. One was a 30-knot, Soviet-built
subchaser, the others 40-knot PT boats. "Follow in my wake,"
signaled one of the small vessels. "I have a pilot aboard." The
Korean boats took up positions on Pueblo's bow, beam and
quarter.
</p>
<p> It was only when one of the Korean PT boats rigged fenders--rubber tubes and rope mats to cushion impact--and began
backing toward Pueblo's bow that Bucher realized what was
happening; in the bow of the PT boat stood an armed boarding
party. "These guys are serious," the skipper radioed his home
port, U.S. Navy headquarters in Yokosuka, Japan. "They mean
business."
</p>
<p> As the Koreans swarmed abroad, U.S. Navymen feverishly set
fire to the files, dumped documents, shredded the codes, and did
their valiant best to wreck the electronic gear with axes,
sledge hammers and hand grenades. At 1:45 p.m., Pueblo radioed
Yokosuka that the North Koreans were aboard. Twenty-five minutes
later, she reported that she had been "requested" to steam into
Wonsan, a deep-draft port used by many Soviet submariners in
preference to Vladivostok, where the continental shelf forces
them to cruise uncomfortably close to the surface. At 2:32 p.m.,
barely 2 1/2 hours after the first Communist PT boat hove into
view, came Pueblo's last message. Engines were "all stop,"
Bucher reported; he was "going off the air."
</p>
<p> Were U.S. field commanders at fault for having failed to send
planes to frighten off Pueblo's captors? Should they have sunk
her rather than let the ship fall into probing Communist hands?
Astonishingly, there were no planes in a position to help.
</p>
<p> [After eleven months in captivity, the Pueblo crew was
released at the Korean DMZ.]
</p>
<p>(January 3, 1969)
</p>
<p> The prisoners' long-sought release came only hours after the
enactment of a scene that belongs in the weirder annals of
diplomacy. In the one-story hut in Panmunjom that has seen
hundreds of meetings since the 1953 truce that ended the Korean
War, U.S. Army Major General Gilbert H. Woodward sat down
opposite North Korean Major General Pak Chung Kuk. "The position
of the U.S.," said General Woodward, the top U.N. member of the
armistice commission, "has been that the ship was not engaged
in illegal activities, that there is no convincing evidence that
the ship at any time intruded into territorial waters claimed
by North Korea, and that we could not apologize for actions we
did not believe took place." He added: "My signature will not
and cannot alter the facts. I will sign the document to free
the crew and only to free the crew."
</p>
<p> With that, he put his name to a document prepared by the
North Koreans which said that 1) Pueblo "had illegally intruded
into the territorial waters of the Democratic People's Republic
of Korea on many occasions," 2) the U.S. "solemnly apologizes
for grave acts of espionage," and 3) Pueblo's crew members "have
confessed honestly to their crimes." The U.S. said one thing,
then signed quite another.
</p>
<p> Predictably, Communist propagandists ballyhooed the agreement
as "an ignominious defeat for the U.S. imperialist aggressors"
and ignored the disclaimer. Whatever use the Communist chose to
make of the solution, the U.S. had backed itself into an awkward
corner. A high-ranking U.S. representative had openly said his
signature was worthless. If the Navy tries to punish any of
Pueblo's crew for signing "confessions," an obvious defense is
that the U.S. Government itself has done exactly that.
</p>
<p> [As details emerged about the Pueblo crewmen's brutal
imprisonment, during which they had been systematically beaten
and tortured to make them sign confessions, the U.S. agonized
for months over the dilemma of the military code of conduct,
which requires brave men to endure vicious treatment rather than
sign false documents that are of dubious value anyway. The Navy
finally elected not to try, punish or reprimand any of the
crew.]</p>
</body>
</article>
</text>