"Pueblo" Incident That Surprised the World-2. Bombshell Announcement of the DPRK

  The Korean Central News Agency reported the truth behind the incident that occurred in the East Sea.

  The news stirred the whole world and the American empire was in uproar. The US imperialists screamed that it was "the first warship captured in the sea since the end of US civil war" and it was the "shame of the United States". The then US President Johnson declared his "will of retaliation".

  The United States had the impudence to claim that the "Pueblo" was a marine research ship and it was on the open sea. And it dispatched to the Korean peninsula its aggressive armed forces including aircraft carrier capable of fighting a war.

  When the world's attention was focussed on the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, a bombshell announcement of slashing at the US imperialists was made in Korea.

  Return retaliation for "retaliation" and all-out war for all-out war!

  The DPRK confronted the US aircraft carrier and atomic bomb with a posture of all-people resistance.

  Hundreds of thousand youth and students volunteered to join the Korean People's Army and the whole country was all afire with the enthusiasm of all people for donating tanks and planes.

  Confessions of captives and corroborative facts were opened to the public one by one and the DPRK government expressed its resolute stand not to show mercy to the captives if a bomb dropped on the Korean territory. Discouraged by it, the United States presented the card of compromise begging for sending back the crew in return for a "receipt" it would write. But there was no change in the attitude of the DPRK.

  The DPRK demanded the US government make an official apology.

  Hero of the DPRK Pak In Ho, the then executive officer for political affairs of submarine chaser No. 35 that captured the "Pueblo", says:

  "The captives of the 'Pueblo' were embarrassed at the impudent attitude of the US government to evade apology with irrational insistence. As they were moved by the humanitarian leniency of our Republic, they had enmity against their government trying to throw them away like a worn-out sandal. They wrote letters of confession, apology and petition one after another. A press conference was held with the participation of about 80 journalists from 34 countries and officials concerned, which witnessed a tragicomedy.

  The moment when the journalists were about to leave after the press conference, Lloyd Mark Bucher, the captain of the 'Pueblo', suddenly jumped on a chair. Without minding the honour of officer as an international gentleman, he vented his anger on the US government in front of the journalists.

  He said that if the US government, which should bear the moral responsibility for the action of the soldiers executing its orders, evades its liability for it, they would be referred to a trial in Korea and in that case, some of them would be sentenced to death and others long-term imprisonment.

  Really miserable were the captives of the 'Pueblo' who implored the world to help them."

  At last, the United States knelt down before the DPRK.

  At the Panmunjom meeting on December 23, 1968, Major General of the US Army Gilbert H. Woodward signed an instrument of apology on behalf of the US government and submitted it to the DPRK government. The dignified name--"the Democratic People's Republic of Korea"--was specified as many as 10 times in the two long sentences. Such submissive attitude of the United States struck the world with wonder.

  The captives were expelled through Panmunjom from the DPRK territory and the "Pueblo" incident that lasted for 11 months was concluded.

  The "Pueblo" incident was a world's grave event to be specially recorded in the 20th century.

  Tens of years has passed since then but the warship of the United States, the "only superpower" in the world, is still stuck in the River Pothong of Pyongyang, the capital of the DPRK, like a prisoner.

  The "Pueblo" incident 56 years ago tells us the truth that in the confrontation with the enemy concession precisely means surrender, submission and ruin and that the rising generations must never show any mercy to the aggressors.