A farm boy from Illinois, Massie had enlisted in the Navy at 18, hoping to see the world while serving aboard a nuclear submarine. Instead, he was assigned to the Pueblo. Like other crew members, he was beaten remorselessly in North Korea. Guards wearing heavy combat boots kicked him over and over in the back, groin, knees, arms, elbows, and ankles. “My ankles were raw—they were actually bleeding,” he says. “They just kept it up, and kept it up, and kept it up.”
One day, after Massie was caught whispering with a shipmate, the Bear jammed the muzzle of an assault rifle into his mouth. “He took the clip out, and all this time he was yelling at me in Korean. He showed me the bullets and he slammed the clip back in and put his hand on the trigger and showed that the safety was off. And he just kept yakking at me. Finally, my knees were shaking so bad he pulled the rifle . . . out of my mouth and whacked me upside the head with it. Knocked me to the floor.”
Back in his hometown after his enlistment ended, Massie worked variously as a road paver, mechanic, and truck driver. He got married four years after coming home but suffered from nightmares and sexual dysfunction. His wife divorced him after only six months.
“I had a short temper. I wasn’t the same guy I was before I left. I was kind of moody. I’d have these dreams at night that would startle me in the middle of the night. I’d wake up screamin’ or sweatin’ or whatever. It was a hard situation for somebody to live with.”
In his dreams he was being punched and kicked and bashed all over again, and the sensations were so real, the pain so intense, he thought it was actually happening. Sometimes he envisioned himself breaking out of prison, knifing or shooting a guard to death in the process, and running for days through the hostile countryside, disoriented and terrified. Eventually the North Koreans caught up to him, riddling his body with gunshots and then dragging him through the streets as civilians shrieked at and kicked him.
By the mid-1990s, he was sweating through such dreams four or five nights a week. Exhaustion set in. His weight ballooned from overeating. When he thought of Duane Hodges’s bloody death and the injuries to his shipmates during the attack and in prison, he’d “just burst out and cry.” In 1997, he started his own heating and air-conditioning business, but persistent aches and pains made it increasingly difficult to work. “My back was killing me, my legs and ankles from when I was kicked and beaten overseas. At times, I couldn’t hardly walk.”
Massie never sought help because he didn’t want to be “a burden” on taxpayers. Finally, during a crew reunion, Bucher all but ordered him to seek treatment from the Veterans Administration. Massie received a disability rating of 100 percent due to post-traumatic stress disorder. Now, at 65, he takes several medications a day for anxiety and depression, and sees a VA psychiatrist at least once a month. He receives about $3,000 a month in government disability benefits. He never remarried and lives alone in the one-story house he grew up in.
“I’m just to the point now where I don’t get out of my house. I pretty much am a hermit here. I don’t like getting outside the house, really. I don’t like that much to get involved with people. With friends, and all the things that I used to really enjoy, I don’t anymore.”
Massie doesn’t try to sugarcoat his motive for suing North Korea: revenge, pure and simple. He wanted to punish the communists by prying as much money as possible out of them for what they did to him and his shipmates. But the court action also was his way of honoring Bucher, with whom he became close.
“I didn’t want to reach the Pearly Gates and have Pete up there waitin’ on me and ask me what the hell I was doin’ because I hadn’t done anything on the Pueblo’s cause,” he says. “I knew I had to do something to carry on, or try to carry on, part of his legacy, of our legacy.”
Massie approached a local lawyer, Daniel T. Gilbert, to draft his lawsuit. Gilbert had successfully sued Iran over the hijacking of TWA Flight 847 in 1985. His clients were six U.S. Navy construction divers who’d been passengers on the plane, which was en route from Athens to Rome when Hezbollah terrorists commandeered it. The hijackers killed another Navy diver, Robert Stethem, dumping his body on the runway when the plane landed in Beirut.
Gilbert won a $309 million judgment against Iran, demonstrating in federal court that it was a state sponsor of Hezbollah. He and his clients later collected $9 million out of Iranian assets frozen by the U.S. government. But Gilbert was reluctant to take on the Pueblo case. Squeezing money out of North Korea, he knew, would be much more difficult. He told Massie the case would be long and frustrating, and stood little chance of success. But Massie persisted and Gilbert ultimately agreed to help.
When the suit went to trial, no one appeared to defend North Korea. The sailors gave emotional testimony about what the Bear and other guards did to them, and how it had marred their lives. In December 2008, U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr. ruled in their favor, ordering North Korea to pay nearly $66 million: $16.75 million each to Massie, Tuck, and McClarren for their time in prison and subsequent pain and suffering; $14.3 million to Pete Bucher’s estate; and $1.25 million to Rose Bucher.
Kennedy noted that the sailors underwent “extensive and shocking” abuse in prison and “suffered physical and mental harm that has endured.” Massie and his coplaintiffs were particularly pleased by the judge’s statement that Bucher surrendered the Pueblo only after “recognizing there was no chance of escape.”
To date, however, the former crewmen and Rose Bucher haven’t seen a cent. Gilbert is working with a Chicago law firm to uncover North Korean funds that could be attached. So far, they’ve found none.
“We have been continuously looking,” the attorney says. “I really can’t go into any other details than that. We’ve not been successful, unfortunately. But we’re constantly seeking to find the assets that would be available.” Gilbert adds that “it’s totally unpredictable” whether the plaintiffs will ever see any money.
Massie deeply misses Bucher, whom he credits with saving his life on the high seas and easing his pain at home. He was among about two dozen ex-sailors who attended the captain’s funeral after his death, following years of declining health, at 76. During a funeral mass at St. Michael’s Catholic Church in Poway, a priest told mourners the trials that marked Bucher’s life paralleled those of Jesus, “who was also betrayed, abandoned, discouraged, spat upon, preyed upon.” Actor Hal Holbrook, who portrayed Bucher in an acclaimed 1973 TV movie, sent a message describing him as “a beautiful man, a patriot who loved his wife and his country and the men who served and endured with him.” Holbrook added, “I salute him from my heart.”
Several hundred people attended the captain’s burial with full military honors at Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery in San Diego. The Navy that once tried to court-martial him provided a 21-gun salute. Two young sailors presented Rose Bucher with the American flag that had covered her husband’s casket, and his remains were slowly lowered into the ground.
The cemetery sits atop Point Loma, a windswept finger of land that curves protectively around San Diego Bay. It’s a lovely spot. To the east, you can see sailboats flitting across the bay, with the city’s sun-gilded skyline in the background. To the west is an even more spectacular view of Bucher’s first love, the vast, merciless Pacific Ocean.
Commander Lloyd M. (Pete) Bucher.
U.S. Navy
The USS Pueblo, bristling with antennae and electronic sensors. The large rectangular box forward of the bridge encloses the SOD hut.
U.S. Navy
The spy ship’s cramped galley produced meals for eighty-three officers and enlisted men each day.
U.S. Navy
Soviet surveillance trawlers often shadowed U.S. warships, studying their movements and tactics, during the 1960s. Here the Gidrofon paces the aircraft carrier USS Coral Sea.
U.S. Navy
Ensign F. Carl (Skip) Schumacher nearly ran the Pueblo aground his first t
ime on the bridge. Fellow crewmen later lauded him as “exceptionally strong” and “an inspiration” during their imprisonment in North Korea.
U.S. Navy
Twenty-two-year-old Peter Langenberg joined the Navy after dropping out of Princeton.
Courtesy of Peter Langenberg
Harvard-educated Lieutenant Stephen R. Harris was in charge of the secretive communications technicians who eavesdropped on North Korean radar and radio transmissions.
U.S. Navy
Quartermaster Charles Law, the expert navigator who would lose much of his eyesight due to malnourishment in prison.
U.S. Navy
Navy shore patrolmen in the bar district of Sasebo, Japan, where Bucher spent a long night drinking and playing cards before departing for North Korea.
Courtesy of Rick Juergens
Oceanographer Harry Iredale, whose presence was intended to reinforce the Pueblo’s cover story as a scientific research vessel.
Courtesy of Harry Iredale
Two days before the Pueblo seizure, North Korean commandos tried to storm the Blue House, South Korea’s presidential residence, and decapitate President Park Chung Hee.
Wikimedia.org
South Korean forces killed most of the Blue House raiders, but captured Second Lieutenant Kim Shin-jo. The attempt to murder their president left many South Koreans clamoring for revenge against the north.
Korea Daily
North Korean patrol boats attacked the Pueblo on January 23, 1968. In this frame from a North Korean propaganda film, a communist torpedo boat races past the American vessel.
JoongAng Ilbo
A North Korean SO-1 submarine chaser, similar to the one that blasted the Pueblo with cannon fire.
U.S. Navy
After their capture, Bucher and his men were paraded before an angry crowd of North Korean civilians. Some Pueblo veterans say this scene was a propaganda reenactment.
Korean Central News Agency
A CIA pilot flying the top secret A-12 aircraft spotted the captured Pueblo in Wonsan Bay. Here an A-12 refuels during a training exercise.
Central Intelligence Agency
A photo from the A-12 shows the Pueblo in Wonsan Bay. “Black Shield” was the code name for the January 26, 1968, reconnaissance flight that located the spy ship.
Central Intelligence Agency
A close-up of a North Korean torpedo boat guarding the Pueblo. A smaller service craft is nearby.
Central Intelligence Agency
President Lyndon Johnson hoped to avoid a second Korean War over the Pueblo. At a White House meeting in February 1968, he was flanked by Secretary of State Dean Rusk (left) and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara (right).
LBJ Library
Diplomatic troubleshooter Cyrus Vance (center) struggled to restrain South Korea’s Park Chung Hee (left) from attacking North Korea after communist infiltrators tried to assassinate him. At right is William Porter, U.S. ambassador to South Korea.
National Archives and Records Administration
Langenberg in prison. The North Koreans often added homey touches like potted plants to propaganda photos, hoping to persuade the world that their captives were being treated humanely.
Korean Central News Agency
North Korean doctors performed surgery on ship’s fireman Steve Woelk without giving him any anesthetics. The communists later re-created the operation for propaganda photographers.
Korean Central News Agency
Woelk smiles at a communist doctor after his Lazarus-like recovery.
Korean Central News Agency
The sailors deliberately extended their middle fingers to ruin propaganda pictures. After Time magazine explained the derisive gesture, the humiliated North Koreans brutally beat the crewmen.
Korean Central News Agency
More finger salutes from communication technicians Brad Crowe (center) and John Shilling (right).
Korean Central News Agency
Marine Sergeant Robert Hammond fiercely resisted his torturers. He later was awarded the Navy Cross for extraordinary heroism.
Korean Central News Agency
Lieutenant Edward R. Murphy points out fabricated intrusions by the Pueblo in communist waters during the “international” press conference in September 1968.
Korean Central News Agency
The sailors found many exhibits at the Sinchon “genocide museum” hard to believe. In this 2009 tourist photo, a guide points to a depiction of a U.S. soldier torturing a boy during the Korean War.
Courtesy of Raymond K. Cunningham Jr.
Under Secretary of State Nicholas Katzenbach oversaw the frustrating secret talks with North Korea to free the crewmen.
White House
Army Major General Gilbert Woodward (right) signed the “prerepudiated” U.S. apology that finally convinced the North Koreans to let the sailors go.
U.S. Navy
Walking twenty paces apart, sailors cross the Bridge of No Return to freedom on December 23, 1968.
Stars and Stripes
Taking off his Mao cap in a final act of defiance, an emaciated but smiling Bucher reaches the allied side of the Bridge of No Return.
U.S. Navy
Gene Lacy, Steve Harris, and Skip Schumacher (left to right) enjoy a meal at the United Nations advance camp shortly after their release.
U.S. Navy
After eleven months of sadistic imprisonment, Bucher reunites with his wife, Rose, on Christmas Eve 1968.
U.S. Navy
Marine Sergeant Bob Chicca hugs his wife, Ann Marie, as the news media records the crew’s homecoming at Miramar Naval Air Station near San Diego.
U.S. Navy
Bucher and Murphy receive Purple Hearts during a January 3, 1969, ceremony at the U.S. Naval Hospital in San Diego.
U.S. Navy
An outpouring of public sympathy buoyed Bucher and his men after their return. Here they read a ten-foot-long “welcome home” letter signed by New York schoolchildren.
U.S. Navy
Schumacher receives a plaque of appreciation from movie star John Wayne at a party in January 1969. Singer Pat Boone and “several Hollywood starlets” also entertained the sailors.
U.S. Navy
Vice Admiral Harold G. Bowen Jr. (standing) led the Navy’s official inquiry into the Pueblo debacle. Seated (left to right) are rear admirals Richard Pratt, Marshall White, Edward Grimm, and Allen Bergner.
U.S. Navy
Captain William Newsome, chief counsel to the investigating admirals, stunned the courtroom audience by warning that Bucher might be court-martialed for giving up his ship without a fight.
U.S. Navy
Bucher with his attorneys, E. Miles Harvey (left) and Navy Captain James E. Keys.
U.S. Navy
Shortly before the Pueblo and its code machines were captured, Navy radioman John A. Walker Jr. began selling key cards for programming the devices to the Soviets. This photo was taken early in Walker’s Navy career.
Federal Bureau of Investigation
After a bitter fight with the Pentagon, Bucher and his men were awarded the Prisoner of War Medal during a 1990 ceremony in San Diego.
© U-T San Diego/Zumapress.com
For years, the Pueblo has been a floating tourist attraction in Pyongyang. In this 2010 photo, North Koreans raise their fists at a rally marking the sixtieth anniversary of the Korean War’s outbreak.
Korean Central News Agency
ENDNOTES
ABBREVIATIONS
NANational Archives at College Park (Archives II), College Park, Maryland
LBJLyndon Baines Johnson Library & Museum, Austin, Texas
GFGerald R. Ford Library, Ann Arbor, Michigan
NHHCU.S. Naval Historical & Herita
ge Command, Washington Navy Yard, D.C.
VUVanderbilt University Television News Archive, Nashville, Tennessee
AMHIU.S. Army Military History Institute, Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania
HIHoover Institution, Stanford, California
NSANational Security Agency, oral history series, Fort Meade, Maryland
WWWoodrow Wilson Center, North Korea International Documentation Project, Washington, D.C.
RGRecord Group
NSFNational Security File
RPRecord of Proceedings of a Court of Inquiry, Convened by Order of Commander in Chief, United States Pacific Fleet, to Inquire into the Circumstances Relating to the Seizure of the USS Pueblo (AGER 2) by North Korean Naval Forces Which Occurred in the Sea of Japan on 23 January 1968
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