ART GIRARDIN BELIEVED THAT THE GOVERNMENT had conspired for political reasons to cover up his brother’s disappearance, along with that of the other 450 missing POWs. Nick, while he still wasn’t one hundred percent convinced, was more interested in motive. Nick knew the CIA had intervened on more than one occasion when he had subpoenaed records he thought had bearing on the case, but he did not know why the CIA maintained its interest in a matter that occurred thirty years ago. In more than one instance, like the Broadbent report, Harris claimed a state secrets privilege. Lindquist reviewed documents, in camera, denying Nick access to most of the documents. There were a string of coincidences that defied explanation, such as Sonny Reiner’s untimely death a mere three days after meeting with perhaps Army agents. Could they all be coincidences? Nick wondered. But for all the thousands of documents Nick reviewed for the case, and for all the witnesses he interviewed, none was more revealing than a meeting with Ambassador J. Rufus Jefferson, from the U.S. State Department earlier that week.
Seymour Freedman had invited Nick to a joint regional National Security Agency/American Bar Association meeting at the Carlisle Hotel in New York City. Much to his surprise, the meeting host introduced the ambassador by saying that he had been a negotiator at Panmunjom in 1953. After a talk on the subject of Chinese and American strategic interests, he made an abrupt exit, telling his audience he had to testify in Washington the following morning. Nick ran out and cornered him in the lobby, telling him in a nutshell what the Girardin case concerned. The ambassador was to the point.
“A large number of POWs were not returned. Why? Well, that’s complicated.” He told Nick that the particular answers he needed were not in the United States. Being the diplomat that he was, he hinted that there were venues where Nick would find others more open.
On the ride back to Connecticut that night, Nick told Freedman what Jefferson had told him. Freedman said that he was planning a trip to Seoul to exercise a long standing invitation to the Blue House. “Nick, the people you’re dealing with are powerful and rich. They use bogeymen that end in‘ation.’You know, we fight for nation, democratization and monetization. Be careful, Nick, these men are treacherous; they don’t give a rat’s ass. They have a lot to protect and hide.”
Freedman told Nick that he had met with the highest levels in the government during his visits to the embassy. “They were pleased with my efforts to link them up with the right people, especially after I fixed the licensing problem. They also feel indebted to you Nick. After all, you orchestrated all of this—at least, in the beginning."
The next day Freedman called Nick to tell him that they had been invited to the Korean Embassy in D.C. the following day to talk to Jong Lee, one of Yoo’s administrative assistants.
Freedman and Castalano boarded Amtrak to Washington the next day and met with Jong Lee who opened the conversation.
“Yes, the ambassador was correct, many men were not returned. As the Armistice approached, the North Koreans were increasingly agitated over the U.N.'s unwillingness to force the 40,000 North Korean POWs and defectors to return home. Korean soldiers on both sides had families on both sides of the DMZ. Given a choice, many of their soldiers desired to remain in the South. The NK accused the ROK of breaching the deal with the POW repatriation. When Big Switch came, the North Koreans retaliated and refused to release hundreds of U.S. soldiers. Our governments kept this secret since the Armistice.”
Nick slumped in his chair, stunned that Lee would so matter-of-factly reveal something Nick couldn’t get anybody to talk about for years.
“When we reached the Armistice in June ’53, casualties were almost three million dead, over one-hundred thousand American casualties, thirty-five thousand dead. We did all we could, but short of resuming hostilities, the subject was best left to the post-war negotiations, which failed.”
“You have no idea what happened to them?” Nick asked incredulously.
“Some of them, not all. We know that at least sixty men were executed at a place called Death Valley.”
“And you’re telling me that our government knew this?”
“I am afraid so. But I must caution you: this cannot be disclosed at this time, since it would present an embarrassment that even your Mr. Freedman could not fix.”
Nick offered what he knew. “South Koreans opposed the truce negotiated by the U.S. and its allies. I read that in June ’53, nearly twenty thousand North Korean POWs stormed the barbed-wire fences. Security had apparently disappeared. The soldiers quickly mingled with the locals who were quite willing to provide shelter. The allies, concerned that the North would call off the Armistice, issued their own spin on what happened. General Clark’s headquarters released a press report calling it ‘... a breakout and not a release by their guards.’”
Seymour slid his hand through his hair. “Yeah, but, what we didn’t know was that the North Koreans saved face by retaliating, by refusing to release a number of allied POWs. Outside the U.N. Security Council members and Korea, the rest of world never came to know this other piece of the story, did they, Mr. Lee?”
Lee didn’t answer Freedman’s largely rhetorical question. “Mr. Lee, do we have any idea where they ended up?” Nick asked.
“The North Koreans were incensed, believing that the president of South Korea had ordered anti-Communist prisoners to be freed, defying the U.N. structured armistice for reasons that, as they put it, were too obvious to explain. They steadfastly refused, even to this day, to acknowledge that they’d kept the hundreds of soldiers.”
“Were all the men they held back only from that development?” Nick asked.
“No, there were others not repatriated. Mainly from Camp 13. We have gathered other information that indicates that U.N. soldiers, likely Americans, had mined Kuneri, near Hung Nam and Ham and near Camp 13. Special operations oversaw the laying of these and other minefields.” He handed Nick a report. The government had blacked out most of the information. “I have a report we confiscated. It’s classified secret. I have the translated copy. You can read it, but unfortunately it must stay here.”
Lee handed the report to Nick, who read the part that included names he recognized.
The interrogator indicates that Lieutenant Trent Hamilton, RO 10435789 was Special Forces April 20, 1952, when his squad of seventeen men was dropped into the Yalu River Estuary islands. Once in contact with Man-O-War was to provide radio contact with Skatefish and then train partisans. The second phase was to include contacting prisoners in POW camps and establishing E&E routes. Assignment included survey troop movements, create maps of the various landmines/landmarks and supervise the laying of minefields. Jump succeeded, but radio contact failed two hours after insertion. Subject speaks Mandarin. Subject cooperative. Signed Colonel Cho Tat Wah, CCF, PRC, October 1952. (Translated 1955.)
The aide half-speculated. “I have studied the entire record. My opinion? Hamilton could have been caught with the maps, or that Hamilton detailed the location of the minefields. My conjecture. What is not conjecture: further intelligence indicates that many POWs used in mine clearing operations were killed, and those that weren’t ended up in Death Valley.”
“So is this where the allied POWs that weren’t repatriated were last located?”
“Yes, we believe so. Anyone not accounted for ended up there. Where they went from there is anybody’s guess.”
“Do you know if Roger went there?” Nick asked.
“We do not. For some reason, those that survived the mine detail were only known to the enemy... as were the four or five hundred sacrificed for the escapes that occurred in Seoul in June.”
“So you’re telling us you don’t know what happened to the ones that ended up in Death Valley?”
“There were secret negotiations after the war between North Korea and the U.S. envoy in Switzerland, but they never resolved the matter.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning those men were left behind.”
“Meaning that’s what the government is trying to cover up.”