.f:ueblo officer to speak at 6 _1t. ~7, I., ._,~· , . • Youth Citizenship Seminar . . Commander Stephen Harris, ·speak to the group in four formerofficerincbargeoftheill- sessions, from. 8:15- !J:15 a.m., fated U.S.S . Pueblo, will 9:30-10:30,10:40-11:10and1~.:20 highlight the Thursday schedule -· 12:30. · ' :of the Youth Citizenship Seminar Afternoon sessions will include being hosted by Harding a special recreational trip to College's American Studies Camp Tahkodab near Pleasant Program. Plains for half the group, while Commander Harris and his the otber tieipatea in film crew were aboard the Pueblo sessions, discussions and when the ship was declared to be recreational actiVities. OaeM the captured by the North Korean films is eDtiUed "Aleksandr government. Harris spent 11 Solm.ntsya: Voice of freedom " months·~ "in•· a North Korean a preeentation about the famo~ prisoner~Qf"\rar camp and was dissident R\l&sian author responsible for organizing and 'I'be 1976 Youth Citizenship encouragirig religious activities Seniibar hu been in process on the part of Am~rican sin Mon y. More than 300 prisoners. yoq fNm fiv~staSes are Now an intelligence officer, attending tffe citizenshipCommander Harris currently education fonun. Dr. Billy Ray serves as Deputy Director of the Cox, dir qf the American Naval Courier Service in Stucfit,s ~aJQ, is supervising Washington, D.C.- He is slated to the tfuly Sessions. '"\1 ('~ .-, ~ '~ ,. ~ .. 1 lit __ ........J ....._: r, .. ~· Naval Commander Steven "Only the communicators got the - " II H'- 1:1:1 pnsuncrs · llVCi:i m personally from Admiral C ~xchung f I' a patch of ocean f h Harris of Washington. D.. message.WeonthePueblonever :Maxv.e\1 Smart (star o t e yesterday said one of the "classic knew." Harris said. \'here North Korea was, making television series "Cet Smart" l." communications disasters of He said he and others on the 3oulh Korea an island," Harris Harris illustrated how another history" precipitated the USS ship believed that their seizure :heorized as to North Korea's crewman slyly informed their Pueblo's 1968 capture by North outside the 12-mile stretch of mpression of American naval families that the brainwashed · Korea and the sentencing of l\'orth Korean waters was a "gut might. facade was false. The man began himself and 81 other servicemen reaction" to the tension between Commander Harris declined to the greeting portion of his letter to execution as spies. 1\'orth and South Korea "but the Jetailthe tales of torture inflicted with "Be sure to show this to Harris told 300 high school horrible irony of It a ll was that Llpon him and his shipmates by Garba Gefollows" which when students gathered at Harding the 1 orth Koreans brought.it off the Communists hut assured the divided differently reads teens th-at it was '·nothing exotic. College for the Youth Citizenship with orne measure of success for "garbage follows", he said. Seminar this week that although us to end up s itting in their 'They just pounded on us for hours Unfortunately, a second surge the Pueblo's crew "didn't tune in prison m end with their fi sts, machine of torture followed when the to North Korea's radio station". The Deputy Director of the ~un butts and two~by-fours ···For North Koreans read an American American Intelligence did and :\'aval Courier Service said he 1ights and days on end we were magazine which had printed one was alerted to the Korean fully expected to be "mowed .vithout s leep during e ter na l of the Koreans' propaganda Communists' plot to as~asinate down" at s unsd as his captors mle rroga lions ... It was a photos of the prisoners who were Soutq Korean President Singman had told them. 'Why tell a person ~~:.~.tmare situation, believe d isplaying an obsceoe hand Rhee_ in earJy 1968. · he's going to die when that's not _ . . gesture that they had assured "Intelligence's reacti on to the the fact? T(l scare us. They sure ~espite the bru_tah ty , Barns • their captors was the "Hawaiian Blue House ~aid tRhee lived ii_! a did that. What changed their sa'? the psychological torture of good-luck, sign". The magazine blue house ) was for us to move mind? The .Se' cmth Fleet of the their unresolved fa te was worse. photo's caption read, "Once from lha l a rea until_the situation u.s. Navy and the USS En- The North Korea ns ha d a gain the U.S. Navy makes fools clarified itself," the Pueblo's ~er prise, which had mo r e demanded that the U.S. "admit of the North Koreans". SC'cond-in-commana stated. T_he nrepowcr lha n aU that was ex- what it hadn't done (sent the During the beatings' tenure, a message was sent to the Jmnt pended during Wor ld war Two. P ueblo into North Korean group of the sailors continued to Chiefs of Staff but never reache_d steaming toward North 1<orea territorial waters), apologize for pray for release by Christmas . its intended recipients. he said. c.ha nged lhe ir mind." he what it didn't do and then, this is 1968, if it wer e God 's wil l. Ha r ris reasoned . tricky, promise not to do what we said. The ordeal had prompted hadn't done in the first place "even the saltiest of sailors to . 1" SPEAKS AT SEMINAR - Commander Steve11 Harris, former officer of the U.S.S. Pueblo when the American ship was captured and held by the North Korean government, addressed the Youth Citizenship Seminar attendants at yesterday's feature ·sessions on the Harding College campus. again," he stated. Harris ad- pray to a stranger, God. and put mitted the mission which he their trust in Him", he stated. headed was to gather intelligence On the eighth day of nev.: purge, but stated the Pueblo was in the prison head assembled the 82 international waters. and told theQ1 "we were sincerely The Oriental mindset against repentant for all our wrongdoin~s "loss of face" and the prisoners' and that the U.S. government belief that their country shouldn't would sign a document for our apologize for what it didn't do retease". Harris explained that resulted in an impasse which the the North Korean system of officers contemplated daily in JUStice metes out punishment their solitary confinement for according to the doer's penitence lacj{ of anything else to do, ac- rather than according. to the cording to Harris. • severity of the crime. The ship's officers had been "The next night we were on a told that as "men of respon- train south - which is the only sibiii ty we were entitled to direction to travel in North privacy" alias solitary con- Korea," he related. In Decemfinement, he explained. ber, 1968, 11 months after the Harris applauded the ship's seizure, the Pueblo's men American capacity to find humor walked one-by-{)ne in reverse in any situation- "which baffles military rank order over the the Orientals". He satirized the Bridge of No Return "from North. North Koreans' non- Korea to South Korea, from night industrialization with the to day, from slavery to reminiscence of 82 prisoners treedom," Harris said. lined up in the exercise yard kneeling to cut the grass with
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