USS Pueblo (AGER-2) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

USS Pueblo (AGER-2) is an American ELINT and SIGINT

SIGINT

Signals intelligence is intelligence-gathering by interception of signals, whether between people , whether involving electronic signals not directly used in communication , or combinations of the two...

Banner-class technical research ship

Technical research ship

Technical research ships were used by the United States Navy during the 1960s to gather intelligence by monitoring the electronic communications of nations in various parts of the world. At the time these ships were active, the mission of the ships was covert and discussion of the true mission was...

(Navy intelligence) which was boarded and captured by North Korea

North Korea

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea , , is a country in East Asia, occupying the northern half of the Korean Peninsula. Its capital and largest city is Pyongyang. The Korean Demilitarized Zone serves as the buffer zone between North Korea and South Korea...

n forces on January 23, 1968, in what is known as the Pueblo incident or alternatively as the Pueblo crisis or the Pueblo affair. Occurring less than a week after President

President of the United States

The President of the United States of America is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president leads the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces....

Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...

's State of the Union Address

State of the Union Address

The State of the Union is an annual address presented by the President of the United States to the United States Congress. The address not only reports on the condition of the nation but also allows the president to outline his legislative agenda and his national priorities.The practice arises...

and only weeks before the Tet Offensive, it was a major incident in the Cold War

Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

.

North Korea stated that it strayed into their territorial waters, but the United States maintains that the vessel was in international waters at the time of the incident.

Pueblo, still held by North Korea today, officially remains a commissioned vessel of the United States Navy

United States Navy

The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...

. It is currently moored along the Taedong River

Taedong River

The Taedong River is a large river in North Korea. It rises in the Rangrim Mountains of the country's north. It then flows southwest into Korea Bay at Namp'o. In between, it runs through the country's capital, Pyongyang. Along the river are landmarks such as the Juche Tower and Kim Il-sung...

in Pyongyang

Pyongyang

Pyongyang is the capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, commonly known as North Korea, and the largest city in the country. Pyongyang is located on the Taedong River and, according to preliminary results from the 2008 population census, has a population of 3,255,388. The city was...

, where it is used as a museum ship

Museum ship

A museum ship, or sometimes memorial ship, is a ship that has been preserved and converted into a museum open to the public, for educational or memorial purposes...

. It is the only ship of the U.S. Navy currently being held captive.

Initial operations

The ship was launched at the Kewaunee Shipbuilding and Engineering Company in Kewaunee, Wisconsin

Kewaunee, Wisconsin

Kewaunee is a city in Kewaunee County, Wisconsin, United States. The population was 2,806 at the 2000 census. Located on the northwestern shore of Lake Michigan, the city is the county seat of Kewaunee County....

, on April 16, 1944, as United States Army

United States Army

The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...

Freight and Passenger (FP) FP-344. Army redesignated the FP vessels as Freight and Supply changing the designation to FS-344. The ship, commissioned at New Orleans on April 7, 1945, served as a Coast Guard manned Army vessel used for training civilians for the Army. Her first commanding officer was LT J. R. Choate, USCGR, succeeded by LTJG Marvin B. Barker, USCGR on September 12, 1945.

She was transferred to the United States Navy

United States Navy

in 1966 and was renamed USS Pueblo. Initially, she served as a light cargo ship, AKL-44, but shortly after resuming service was converted to an intelligence gathering ship, or what is colloquially known as a spy ship

Spy ship

A spy ship or reconnaissance vessel is a dedicated ship intended to gather intelligence, usually by means of sophisticated electronic eavesdropping. In a wider sense, any ship intended to gather information could be considered a spy ship....

, and redesignated AGER-2 on May 13, 1967. AGER (Auxiliary General Environmental Research) denoted a joint Naval and National Security Agency

National Security Agency

The National Security Agency/Central Security Service is a cryptologic intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the collection and analysis of foreign communications and foreign signals intelligence, as well as protecting U.S...

(NSA) program.

USS Pueblo Incident

On January 5, 1968, Pueblo left Yokosuka

United States Fleet Activities Yokosuka

U.S. Fleet Activities Yokosuka, or Commander, Fleet Activities Yokosuka is a United States Navy base, in Yokosuka, Japan. Its mission is to maintain and operate base facilities for the logistic, recreational, administrative support and service of the U.S. Naval Forces Japan, U.S. 7th Fleet and...

, Japan in transit to Sasebo, Japan from where she left on January 11, 1968 headed northward through the Tsushima Strait

Tsushima Strait

is the eastern channel of the Korea Strait, which lies between Korea and Japan, connecting the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea.The Tsushima Strait is the broader eastern channel to the east and southeast of Tsushima Island, with the Japanese islands of Honshū to the east and northeast, and...

into the Sea of Japan

Sea of Japan

The Sea of Japan is a marginal sea of the western Pacific Ocean, between the Asian mainland, the Japanese archipelago and Sakhalin. It is bordered by Japan, North Korea, Russia and South Korea. Like the Mediterranean Sea, it has almost no tides due to its nearly complete enclosure from the Pacific...

. She left with specific orders to intercept and conduct surveillance of Soviet

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

naval activity in the Tsushima Strait and to gather signal and electronic intelligence from North Korea.

On January 20 at 5:30pm a North Korean modified SO-1 class Soviet

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

style sub chaser passed within 4000 yards (4 km) of the Pueblo, which was about 15.4 miles (24.8 km) southwest of Mayang-do at a position 39°47'N and 128°28.5'E.

In the afternoon of January 22, the two North Korean fishing trawlers (Lenta Class) Rice Paddy 1 and Rice Paddy 2 passed within 30 yards (27.4 m) of Pueblo. That day, a North Korean unit made an assassination attempt

Blue House Raid

The Blue House Raid was an unsuccessful attempt by North Korean commandos to assassinate the South Korean President Park Chung-hee at the Blue House on January 21, 1968.-Preparations:...

against the South Korean President Park Chung-hee

Park Chung-hee

Park Chung-hee was a Republic of Korea Army general and the leader of South Korea from 1961 to 1979. He seized power in a military coup and ruled until his assassination in 1979. He has been credited with the industrialization of the Republic of Korea through export-led growth...

, but the crew of Pueblo were not informed.

According to the American account, the following day, January 23, Pueblo was approached by a sub chaser and her nationality was challenged; Pueblo responded by raising the U.S. flag. The North Korean vessel then ordered her to stand down or be fired upon. Pueblo attempted to maneuver away, but was considerably slower than the sub chaser. Additionally, three torpedo boat

Torpedo boat

A torpedo boat is a relatively small and fast naval vessel designed to carry torpedoes into battle. The first designs rammed enemy ships with explosive spar torpedoes, and later designs launched self-propelled Whitehead torpedoes. They were created to counter battleships and other large, slow and...

s appeared on the horizon and then joined in the chase and subsequent attack. The attackers were soon joined by two MiG-21 fighters. A fourth torpedo boat and a second sub chaser appeared on the horizon a short time later. The ammunition on Pueblo was stored below decks, and her machine guns were wrapped in cold weather tarpaulins. The machine guns were unmanned, and no attempt was made to man them. An NSA report quotes the sailing order:

(...) Defensive armament (machine guns) should be stowed or covered in such manner so that it does not cause unusual interest by surveyed units. It should be used only in the event of a threat to survival (...)

and notes

In practice, it was discovered that, because of the temperamental adjustments of the firing mechanisms, the .50-caliber machine guns took at least ten minutes to activate. Only one crew member, with former army experience, had ever had any experience with such weapons, although members of the crew had received rudimentary instructions on the weapons immediately prior to the ship's deployment.

U.S. Navy authorities and the crew of the Pueblo insist that before the capture, Pueblo was miles outside North Korean territorial waters; the North Koreans claim the vessel was well within North Korean territory. The mission statement allowed her to approach within a nautical mile (1852 m) of that limit. North Korea, however, claims a 50 nautical miles (93 km) sea boundary even though international standards were 12 nautical miles (22 km) at the time.

The North Korean vessels attempted to board Pueblo, but she maneuvered to prevent this for over two hours and a sub chaser opened fire with a 57 mm cannon, killing one member of the crew. The smaller vessels fired machine guns into Pueblo, which then signaled compliance and began destroying sensitive material. The volume of material on board was so great that it was impossible to destroy all of it. In his book The Pueblo Surrender - A Covert Action by the NSA, author Robert A. Liston points out that weakly armed spy ships operating alone, and dangerously close to enemy territorial waters normally carry little if any sensitive material on board, to minimize the risk of anything important falling into enemy hands. The crew inside the security space on board the Pueblo had over an hour to destroy sensitive material before the ship was boarded. A NSA report quotes Lt Steve Harris, the officer in charge of Pueblos Naval Security Group Command

Naval Security Group

The Naval Security Group was an organization within the United States Navy, tasked with intelligence gathering and denial of intelligence to adversaries. A large part of this is Signals Intelligence gathering, Cryptology and Information Assurance...

detachment:

".. we had retained on board the obsolete publications and had all good intentions of getting rid of these things but had not done so at the time we had started the mission. I wanted to get the place organized eventually and we had excessive numbers of copies on board..."

and concludes

Only a small percentage of the total classified material aboard the ship was destroyed.

Radio contact between the Pueblo and the Naval Security Group

Naval Security Group

in Kamiseya

Naval Support Facility Kamiseya

is a detachment of U.S. Naval Air Facility Atsugi, Japan. The facility is located on the Kantō Plain, approximately three miles northeast of NAF Atsugi, and 7.55 miles WNW of Yokohama. The base consists of 587 acres with 110 acres within the fence line...

, Japan had been ongoing during the incident. As a result, Seventh Fleet command was fully aware of Pueblo's situation. Air cover was promised but never arrived. The Fifth Air Force had no aircraft on strip alert, and estimated a two to three hour delay in launching aircraft. The was located 510 miles south of the Pueblo, yet its four F-4B aircraft on alert were not equipped for an air-to-surface engangement. Enterprises captain estimated that 1.5 hours were required to get the converted aircraft into the air. By the time President

President of the United States

Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...

was awakened, Pueblo had been captured and any rescue attempt would have been futile.

Pueblo followed the North Korean vessels as ordered, but then stopped immediately outside North Korean waters. She was again fired upon, and a U.S. sailor, Fireman Duane Hodges, was killed. The ship was boarded by men from a torpedo boat and a sub chaser. Crew members had their hands tied, were blindfolded, beaten, and prodded with bayonets. Once Pueblo was in North Korean territorial waters, she was boarded again, this time by high ranking North Korean officials.

There was dissent among government officials in the U.S. regarding how to handle the situation. Rep. Mendel Rivers suggested the President issue an ultimatum for the return of Pueblo on penalty of nuclear attack, while Senator Gale McGee said the U.S. should wait for more information and not make "spasmodic response[s] to aggravating incidents." According to Horace Busby, Special Assistant to President Johnson, the President's "reaction to the hostage taking was to work very hard here to keep down any demands for retaliation or any other attacks upon North Koreans," worried that rhetoric might result in the hostages being killed.

Aftermath

Pueblo was taken into port at Wonsan

Wonsan

Wŏnsan is a port city and naval base in southeastern North Korea. It is the capital of Kangwŏn Province. The population of the city is estimated to have been 331,000 in 2000. Notable people from Wŏnsan include Kim Ki Nam, diplomat and Secretary of the Workers' Party.- History :The original name of...

and the crew was moved twice to POW camps, with some of the crew reporting upon release that they were starved and regularly tortured while in North Korean custody. This treatment was allegedly worsened when the North Koreans realized that crewmen were secretly giving them "the finger" in staged propaganda

Propaganda

Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....

photos.

Commander Lloyd M. Bucher

Lloyd M. Bucher

Commander Lloyd Mark "Pete" Bucher was an officer in the United States Navy, who is best remembered as the Captain of the USS Pueblo , which was captured on January 23, 1968 by North Korea....

, Commanding Officer of the Pueblo, was tortured and put through a mock firing squad

Mock execution

A mock execution is a stratagem in which a victim is deliberately but falsely made to feel that his execution or that of another person is imminent or is taking place. It may be staged for an audience or a subject who is made to believe that he is being led to his own execution...

in an effort to make him confess. Eventually the Koreans threatened to execute his men in front of him, and Bucher relented. None of the Koreans knew English well enough to write the confession, so they had Bucher write it himself. They verified the meaning of his words, but failed to catch the pun when he said "We paean the DPRK [North Korea]. We paean the Korean people. We paean their great leader Kim Il Sung".
(The word "paean

Paean

A paean is a song or lyric poem expressing triumph or thanksgiving. In classical antiquity, it is usually performed by a chorus, but some examples seem intended for an individual voice...

" sounds identical to the term pee on.)

Following an apology, a written admission by the U.S. that Pueblo had been spying, and an assurance that the U.S. would not spy in the future, the North Korean government decided to release the 82 remaining crew members, although the written apology was preceded by a verbal statement that it was done only to secure the release. On December 23, 1968 the crew was taken by buses to the DMZ border with South Korea and ordered to walk south one by one across the "Bridge of No Return

Bridge of No Return

Located in the Joint Security Area , the so-called "Bridge of No Return" crosses the Military Demarcation Line between North Korea and South Korea. It was used for prisoner exchanges at the end of the Korean War in 1953. The name originates from the claim that many war prisoners captured by the...

". Exactly eleven months after being taken prisoner, the Captain led the long line of crewmen, followed at the end by the Executive Officer, Lieutenant Ed Murphy, the last man across the bridge. The U.S. then verbally retracted the ransom admission, apology, and assurance. Meanwhile the North Koreans blanked out the paragraph above the signature which read: "and this hereby receipts for eighty two crewmen and one dead body".

Bucher and all the officers and crew subsequently appeared before a Navy Court of Inquiry. A court martial was recommended for the CO and the Officer in Charge of the Research Department, Lt Steve Harris. But the Secretary of the Navy, John H. Chafee

John Chafee

John Lester Hubbard Chafee was an American politician. He served as an officer in the United States Marine Corps, as the 66th Governor of Rhode Island, as the Secretary of the Navy, and as a United States Senator.-Early life and family:...

, rejected the recommendation, stating, "They have suffered enough." Commander Bucher was never found guilty of any indiscretions and continued his Navy career until retirement.

In 1970, Bucher published an autobiographical account of the USS Pueblo incident entitled Bucher: My Story. Bucher died in San Diego on January 28, 2004, partly as a result of complications from the injuries he suffered during his time as a prisoner of war

Prisoner of war

A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...

in North Korea.

Pueblo is still held by North Korea. In October 1999, it was towed from Wonsan on the east coast, around the Korean Peninsula, to the Nampo

Nampo

Namp'o is a city and seaport in South P'yŏngan Province, North Korea. It was a provincial-level Directly Governed City from 1980 to 2004, when it was designated a "Special City" and made a part of South P'yŏngan...

on the west coast. This required moving the vessel through international waters

International waters

The terms international waters or trans-boundary waters apply where any of the following types of bodies of water transcend international boundaries: oceans, large marine ecosystems, enclosed or semi-enclosed regional seas and estuaries, rivers, lakes, groundwater systems , and wetlands.Oceans,...

. With no Carrier Battle Group available nearby, no attempt to recapture the Pueblo was made. This move was done just before the visit of U.S. presidential envoy James Kelly

James Kelly

James Kelly or Jim Kelly is the name of: *James Kelly *James Kelly *James Kelly , 19th century Anglican bishop of Newfoundland and Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church, 1901–1904*James Kelly , UK MP for the Irish constituency of Limerick City 1844–1847*Jimmy Kelly James Kelly or Jim Kelly is...

to the capital Pyongyang

Pyongyang

. The Pueblo was again relocated to Pyongyang

Pyongyang

and moored on the Taedong River

Taedong River

on the exact same spot that the General Sherman incident

General Sherman Incident

The General Sherman Incident was the destruction of an armed merchant marine side-wheel steamer that visited Korea in 1866. It was an important catalyst to the end of Korean isolationism in the 19th century...

took place, next to the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum. It is currently the only American naval vessel held in captivity in the world. It has been used since as a museum ship.

Pueblo was named after Pueblo County, Colorado

Pueblo County, Colorado

Pueblo County is the tenth most populous of the 64 counties of the state of Colorado of the United States. The county was named for the historic city of Pueblo which took its name from the Spanish language word meaning "town" or "village". The United States Census Bureau estimates that the...

. It is the third US Navy ship to be named after the city of Pueblo

Pueblo, Colorado

Pueblo is a Home Rule Municipality that is the county seat and the most populous city of Pueblo County, Colorado, United States. The population was 106,595 in 2010 census, making it the 246th most populous city in the United States....

or Pueblo County. Today it remains the third-oldest commissioned ship in the US Navy, behind ("Old Ironsides"), and the . It is widely, but incorrectly, believed to be the first American ship to have been captured since the wars in Tripoli

First Barbary War

The First Barbary War , also known as the Barbary Coast War or the Tripolitan War, was the first of two wars fought between the United States and the North African Berber Muslim states known collectively as the Barbary States...

(On 8 December 1941, the river gunboat was captured by Japanese forces while moored in Shanghai.)

Tourist attraction

USS Pueblo is a primary tourist attraction in Pyongyang, North Korea, having attracted over 250,000 visitors since being moved to the Taedong River

Taedong River

. Pueblo is now anchored at the very spot where the General Sherman Incident

General Sherman Incident

is believed to have taken place in 1866.

Often tourists are led through the ship by a guided tour. Participants will first enter the ship for a fifteen minute video shown from a small TV set mounted in the ceiling, explaining how the North Koreans captured the ship, with contemporaneous film footage. All areas of the ship are shown, including the secret communications room full of encryption machines and radio equipment, still in a partly disassembled state after they were inspected by North Korean technicians. One highlight of the guided tour is a photo opportunity where visitors may have their pictures taken while holding the rear mounted machine gun.

Offer to repatriate

During an October 2000 visit to Pyongyang by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright

Madeleine Albright

Madeleine Korbelová Albright is the first woman to become a United States Secretary of State. She was appointed by U.S. President Bill Clinton on December 5, 1996, and was unanimously confirmed by a U.S. Senate vote of 99–0...

, North Korean negotiators reportedly presented an offer to repatriate the USS Pueblo as part of a proposed process of normalizing diplomatic relations between the two nations. However, the Department of State is unable to confirm this claim.

During an August 2005 diplomatic session in North Korea, former U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Donald Gregg

Donald Gregg

-Personal history:Gregg worked for the CIA for 31 years, from 1951-1982. After graduating from high school he enlisted in the military and received training as a cryptanalyst. He then attended Williams College, in Williamstown, MA, until 1951. Upon his graduation, he was recruited by the CIA...

received verbal indications from high ranking North Korean officials that the state would be willing to repatriate the USS Pueblo to United States authorities, on the condition that a prominent U.S. government official, such as the Secretary of State, come to Pyongyang for high level talks. While the U.S. government has publicly stated on several occasions that the return of the still commissioned Navy vessel is a priority, the current overall situation of U.S. and North Korean relations makes such an official state visit seem unlikely. It seems likely that the U.S. government considers the USS Pueblo a low priority, compared to issues such as North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions, human rights record, and its relations with South Korea.

Lawsuit

Former Pueblo crewmembers William Thomas Massie, Dunnie Richard Tuck, Donald Raymond McClarren and Lloyd Bucher sued the North Korean government for the abuse they suffered at its hands during their captivity. North Korea did not respond to the suit. In December 2008, U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy, Jr.

Henry H. Kennedy, Jr.

Henry H. Kennedy, Jr. is a senior United States District Judge for the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.-Biography:...

in Washington DC awarded the plaintiffs $65 million in damages, calling their treatment by North Korea "extensive and shocking." The plaintiffs, as of October 2009, were attempting to collect the judgment from North Korean assets frozen by the US government.

Representation in popular culture

The Pueblo incident was dramatically depicted in the critically acclaimed 1973 ABC Theater televised production Pueblo. Hal Holbrook

Hal Holbrook

Harold Rowe "Hal" Holbrook, Jr. is an American actor. His television roles include Abraham Lincoln in the 1976 TV series Lincoln, Hays Stowe on The Bold Ones: The Senator and Capt. Lloyd Bucher on Pueblo. He is also known for his role in the 2007 film Into the Wild, for which he was nominated for...

starred as Captain Lloyd Bucher. The 2-hour drama was nominated for three Emmy Awards, and won two awards.

External links

YouTube video taken of and aboard the USS Pueblo in Korea
"The Pueblo Incident" briefing and analysis by the US Navy
Official website by former USS Pueblo crew members
Complaint and court judgment from crew members' lawsuit against North Korea
CNN.com obituary for Commander Lloyd M. Bucher
USS Pueblo on Google Maps satellite image -- a 1973 TV movie about the Pueblo incident
North Korean International Documentation Project
A North Korean video on the issue
A Navy and Marine Corps report of investigation of the “USS Pueblo seizure” conducted pursuant to chapter II of the Manual of the Judge Advocate General
Judge Advocate General of the Navy
The Judge Advocate General of the Navy is the highest ranking uniformed lawyer in the United States Department of the Navy. The Judge Advocate General is the principal advisor to the Secretary of the Navy and the Chief of Naval Operations on legal matters pertaining to the Navy...

(JAGMAN)http://www.jag.navy.mil/FOIA/FOIAJAGMANinvestigations.htm published as six PDF
Portable Document Format
Portable Document Format is an open standard for document exchange. This file format, created by Adobe Systems in 1993, is used for representing documents in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems....

files: 1 2 3 4 5 6

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Initial operations

USS Pueblo Incident

Aftermath

Tourist attraction

Offer to repatriate

Lawsuit

Representation in popular culture

See also

External links