S. Korea Plans DMZ Search For War Dead

[Mike Davino <mdavino@yahoo.com>]

Pacific Stars and Stripes
December 8, 2003 

S. Korea Plans DMZ Search For War Dead

By Jeremy Kirk, Stars and Stripes

http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=19140

YONGSAN GARRISON, South Korea ? Plans to search the
Demilitarized Zone for Korean War-era remains could
uncover Americans who perished on the border with
North Korea, officials said Friday. 
The South Korean army could start digging in the DMZ
as early as next year, but operations more likely will
begin a few years later, said Lt. Col. Song Bong-jun
of the National Ministry of Defense?s remains recovery
office.

It?s ?very possible? the teams could come across
remains of U.S. soldiers, Song said. But Song said
South Korea does not hold any data regarding Americans
who may have died in what is now the DMZ. If casualty
data was shared, it might aid in locating missing
soldiers.

The remains of 89 Americans are believed to be in the
2.5-mile-wide zone that stretches across Korea?s
middle, according to the Defense Department?s Prisoner
of War/Missing Personnel Office. The South Korean army
has slotted $2.6 million to fund remains recovery
projects in South Korea with plans to eventually do
operations in North Korea.

About 8,100 Americans are unaccounted for from the
1950-53 war, and about 5,500 of those are in North
Korea, the Pentagon has said.

The Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command in Hawaii,
formerly the Central Identification Laboratory-Hawaii,
has worked with South Korea before on recoveries, said
spokesman Lt. Col. Jerry O?Hara.

The command conducts operations in North Korea,
Vietnam, Laos and other countries to recover missing
GIs and identify their remains through DNA analysis.

>From 2000 to 2002, South Korean recovery teams
recovered five sets of remains and turned those over
to the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, Song said. No
American remains were found in 2003.

Since 1996, the Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command has
conducted 27 operations in North Korea. About 180
remains have been recovered and repatriated, and more
missions are scheduled for next year.

South Korea is rife with artifacts from the war.
Occasionally, construction workers dig up live
ordnance. Remains also turn up, such as a femur bone
found recently at Camp Casey, officials said.

In July 2001, a farmer found a boot sticking out of
the ground after heavy rains. Parts of a parachute and
dog tags were found that matched a servicemember on an
aircraft that went down there in the last months of
the war.

The remains ? believed to be those of a U.S. Marine ?
were given an honor guard salute before they were
shipped to Hawaii.

? Choe Song-won contributed to this report.


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