What Really Happened At NO Gun Ri?

An Army major says the Associated Press' Pulitzer-winning story of American soldiers massacring Korean civilians is grossly exaggerated and dishonest.

June 3, 2002 | A few months before Robert Bateman's book "No Gun Ri: A Military History of the Korean War Incident" came out, his editor at Stackpole Books, Col. Edward Skender, received an incendiary letter from Charles Hanley. Hanley was the senior Associated Press writer on the Pulitzer Prize-winning story detailing an apparent massacre of hundreds of South Korean civilians in the early weeks of the Korean War. Hanley maintained in that letter, and in later voice and e-mail conversations with me, that Bateman's book, which criticizes the AP's coverage of the incident, was -- among other over-the-top pronouncements -- "a fairy tale," "a rape of the truth" and an "atrocity."

Bateman, an active-duty Army major who taught history at West Point and is currently on a yearlong fellowship at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says that the original September 1999 AP article and the AP team's later book on the incident were exaggerated and sensationalistic, more concerned with engaging the reader's emotions and advocating for the Korean victims than telling an honest story. Although Hanley was far more vitriolic and intemperate about Bateman in his conversations with me, each man sincerely believes the other to be, for whatever reasons, deliberately purveying falsehoods.

There is only one thing that the two books agree on: Some number of South Korean civilian refugees were killed by confused, exhausted and jittery American troops of the 7th Cavalry near the village of No Gun Ri, South Korea, between July 26 and July 29, 1950. But Bateman says the number of civilians killed at and near the bridge was probably somewhere around 35, while Hanley and his team reported witness estimates of a death toll exceeding 350. The refugees were fleeing advancing North Korean troops along a railway track toward the bridge, where American troops were dug in.

Hanley heard about Bateman's book when someone forwarded part of an early draft to him after Bateman offered it to some members of the military community for their comments before publication. Some veterans were "disgusted," Hanley wrote in his letter to Skender, and they felt that Bateman's book was an "immature, sneering, unprofessional approach" to the incident. Other veterans disagree. Bateman's book boasts a foreword from retired Gen. Harold E. Moore, whose exploits with the 7th Cavalry in Vietnam were recently featured in the movie "We Were Soldiers."

Despite this disagreement among veterans of the 7th Cavalry about the value of Bateman's book, Hanley warned the Stackpole editor that publishing the book would besmirch Stackpole's reputation and perhaps even expose the publisher to legal action. But, Hanley told me later, contrary to the implications of a San Francisco Chronicle story about his letter, "I wasn't denying anyone's 'right' to publish; I was interested in a publisher's responsibility to the truth."

Batemen and Hanley disagree on three central aspects of the No Gun Ri story: the credibility of the witnesses for the AP version (particularly in the original article), the evidence that U.S. aircraft and troops were ordered to fire on the Korean civilians as the Koreans were fleeing along the railroad tracks toward the bridge, and the reliability of the AP witnesses' estimates that over 350 civilians were killed.

Bateman spends more than a few pages in "No Gun Ri" outlining his interactions with Hanley regarding the credibility of Edward Daily, one of the star witnesses in the original AP story. Daily, whose specific and emotional testimony the AP team later disavowed in their book "The Bridge at No Gun Ri: A Hidden Nightmare from the Korean War," was not anywhere near the infamous railroad trestle on the day of the incident, and certainly could not have been one of the two machine gunners at the bridge, as he originally claimed. In fact, Daily was an ordnance mechanic during his military service, didn't join the 2nd Battalion of the 7th Cavalry until 1951, and probably never saw a day of actual combat while he was in Korea. He recently pled guilty to defrauding the U.S. government of over $300,000 in veterans' disability benefits for combat-related post-traumatic stress disorder.

Bateman argues that Hanley and the other AP reporters gave preferential credibility and prominence in their original story to veterans who made the most "quoteworthy" statements and allegations, and that when doubts began to arise about Daily, they tenaciously refused to acknowledge them. The AP team received Daily's official record in December 1999, almost a month before the AP's story was submitted for the Pulitzer Prize in January 2000. In his book, Bateman offers two March 2000 e-mails he received from Hanley to show that even then Hanley maintained his belief in Daily's story on the basis of flimsy evidence provided by Daily himself. Two weeks later, the AP story won the Pulitzer.

Hanley feels that the questions raised by Daily's record did not -- and still don't -- significantly undermine the story. "Three months after we published [the original story]," he wrote to me, "we learned of the discrepancy in Daily's record: despite our inquiries it remained an unresolved discrepancy for us and the Pentagon investigators, like many other discrepancies in the personnel records and documents, until long after No Gun Ri was submitted for and awarded a Pulitzer."

In his March correspondence with Hanley, Bateman outlined several reasons for questioning Daily's story, such as the extremely unlikely placement of Daily's supposed machine gun, and the fact that he could find no evidence whatsoever of Daily's presence in any of the documents he was examining for his book. These were documents that the AP team could have examined themselves to corroborate Daily's story, but they apparently didn't -- even after they had received Daily's official record and doubts about his veracity had been raised -- until Bateman brought the discrepancies to their attention.

June 19, 2000
Alumna and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist honored at University House

Martha Mendoza, a 1988 graduate of UCSC (Kresge College) who received a Pulitzer Prize for investigative journalism this spring, was honored at a June 6 reception at University House. Mendoza was part of an Associated Press team that documented the killing of hundreds of civilians by U.S. troops during the early weeks of the Korean War. (See earlier story.)

Martha Mendoza has acquired numerous awards, including the Pulitzer (center award), for her work on the No Gun Ri story. (Shmuel Thaler)

Chancellor Greenwood presents the UCSC graduate with an award from the campus. (Shmuel Thaler)

Mendoza, who returned to campus to teach in UCSC's Writing Program this past quarter, chats with her mentor Conn Hallinan. (Jim Burns)

Guests at the reception study the awards, articles, and other artifacts relating to the Associated Press story. A table at the reception displayed the items. (Jim Burns) )

Chancellor Greenwood welcomes Mendoza. (Jim Burns)

Bump; and we are supporting such nationalizing socialism.

A couple days ago, I listened to a local Ph.D. lament the system, and in spite of the desire for that tax money to keep the Ph.D.'s enshrined in walls of ivy, he agreed that it is federal funding ought to be cut, in order to stop wrecking the "university system."

It's a "high class welfare system" for the non-self-supporting.

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