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Forever Cloaked in Smoke of War

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After investigating for more than a year, the Army has been unable to substantiate some of the most serious allegations about a massacre of Korean civilians by U.S. soldiers 50 years ago. While it’s clear that U.S. troops near the village of No Gun Ri fired on a group of refugees fleeing North Korean invaders, it’s unclear whether they did so under orders or out of panic. It is also uncertain how many civilians were killed. Investigators think the claim by some survivors that 300 died may be inflated.

The Army’s findings will be released next month, along with Washington’s intentions. Privately, officials indicate no formal apology will be made and no compensation will be paid. Instead the United States is likely to offer to erect a monument in South Korea to all of that country’s civilian war victims and to fund scholarships in their memory.

The Associated Press broke the massacre story last year, later winning a Pulitzer Prize. But follow-up investigating by others found flaws in the AP’s account. Several former soldiers who claimed to have witnessed the killing were determined by Army records not to have been at the site. And allegations that orders to shoot at civilians came from military superiors could not be conclusively substantiated.

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U.S. troops had been on the ground in South Korea less than a month when the killings took place. At the time the situation was one of confusion and some panic as underarmed and understrength American and South Korean forces retreated under North Korean pressure. Communist soldiers were known to be working their way behind U.S. lines by hiding themselves among groups of fleeing refugees. There seems little doubt that fear of possible infiltrators prompted the shootings.

Every war has its share of such frightful incidents. Half a century after the fact there is no fully credible way to verify the claims and establish the truth of what happened. The United States can only acknowledge that an unintended tragedy occurred and make amends appropriate to what it can confirm happened. That is a reasonable if perhaps not entirely just and adequate response.

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