I don’t think it’s worth a hijack, but I think we’d agree that engaging in a sexual relationship without meaningful consent is rape.
Two people making the best of a bad situation with mutual consent is possible. Equally, it’s possible that being forced into the relationship means that one or both never consents.
I just don’t think it’s possible to call this without knowing how they came to a sexual relationship: if they both agreed, it’s not rape. If one did not freely consent, it’s rape. I don’t think we can know with the information we have.
It’s a serious enough allegation that I think it’s best not to presume guilt without evidence, and the presence of children isn’t evidence of why they had sex. But it’s definitely a strong possibility, so not something I want to dismiss out of hand (I was on my phone earlier, so my response wasn’t as nuanced as it should have been).
If you go to YouTube there are many videos about the previous defections. The one on Biographics is one of the best. Although the title only mentions James Dresnok it goes into all four.
James Dresnok:The US soldier who defected to North Korea.
The marriages are well detailed. Dresnok appears to have developed a solid relationship with his wife.
I’m just going to point out that so far as I know the men in these forced marriages do not consent and are not given choice, either. Which in no way diminishes the horror of being kidnapped and forced into a marriage for the women. When someone pulls out a gun and says “you two are going to be married and have sex and in all ways behave as a loving couple or you’ll be executed” neither of the two people in that couple can be said to be consenting. It’s the guy(s) with the gun(s) who are committing the abuse.
I read Jenkin’s book many years ago. I don’t recall the details of his descriptions of their various marriages. I do know that his reports about Dresnock were of a violent man who lacked any conscience. When ordered to beat his fellow Americans he seemed to be enjoying himself.
As for the women, marrying these men was a way to survive in a hellish situation. That is not the same as consent. By every available measure, Jenkins and his wife truly loved one another. After she escaped home to Japan he joined her there and they lived out their lives together.
But they were all no better than well-fed slaves in a breeding program. The government wanted Western-looking spies, and it was their job to produce them.
Good to know. That MOS is “tip of spear”, but it’s also not full of useful info for NK intel. Imagine instead King had a job more like this other shining example of responsible youthful and low-ranking behavior:
It would be useful to know where he was stationed, and how long he was in Korea. Where was he arrested? I assume Itaewon or something like that. What I was getting at earlier, someone of his age may only be dimly aware of what the deal is with North/South Korea.
It would almost seem to be one or the other - either no clue whatsoever, or, kind of a YOLO thing and “let’s cause some trouble ha ha ha!”. Which in fact, witnesses at the JSA reported as he sprinted across the border itself.
Both the DPRK and the UNC forces at the Joint Security Area are unarmed.
I think the Army doesn’t actually conduct such tours. The most popular, apparently, is the tour run by the USO.
I see no reason whatsoever to accept NK’s version of that incident.
It’s definitely a crime for South Korean citizens. Unsurprisingly, it’s also an offense under military law for US service members, so he will face that issue if returned.
He will never see even the outside of the camps. There is no way the NKs will expose their people to a source of outside information.
IMHO, he found what, in his mind, was the biggest way to embarrass the Army for “What the Army did to him”.
Of course he’s a citizen until either he formally renounces citizenship at a US consulate as the law requires or his citizenship is revoked legally. There is no such facility in North Korea.
Obviously there is no policy requiring “leave nobody behind”. First, it’s unworkable. Second, one runs a very real chance of sacrificing more people than one brings back.
Deserter dumbass.
The military escorts could not go through the airport security and immigration procedures. King was not being deported by the SK government. Once SK was finished with him, they returned him to USFK control as required by treaty.
Does this refer to not having firearms. Admittedly my story is dated, but in the incident I mentioned in the 70’s the NK soldiers killed the two Americans with the axes of the laborers who were tasked to cut down trees at the DMZ.
The JSA is not not the DMZ. The JSA is only the “Truce Village” where negotiations happen and the two sides come face to face. You know, the place where Trump took a stroll with his bestie. The DMZ is the entire border. There are certainly weapons along the DMZ along with a shit load of mines.
But the axe murder incident did happen in the JSA. And part of how it was able to happen was that at the time, the demarcation line between North and South wasn’t applied within the JSA, making the JSA a sort of bubble where both sides could occupy positions and intermix (at least in theory) anywhere within it. They only extended the demarcation line into the JSA itself, giving us our modern view of sentries facing off, after the incident.
The videos I’ve seen of DMZ tours always have what appears to be a soldier in uniform giving the tour which is apparently done from a script (DPRK is always exclusively referred to as “Communist North Korea” for instance), so I assume the Army is at least in some way involved with the USO tours beyond just giving them permission to be there. I’ve also noted that they seem to be very particular about what and when you can photograph - you can take pictures into North Korea from the JSA, but NOT of the JSA looking south, for instance, and I don’t believe they allow photography in the tunnels.
I agree that this is how it happened. Because the US escorts were not traveling with King he was essentially released to his own temporary recognizance at the beginning of pre-departure immigration / security, with the military trusting he’d arrive on his own at the destination as expected. And he’d be re-escorted from there to Fort Whatever.
We transport unescorted people who are picked up by police or immigration agents at the destination rather frequently. This is both domestically and internationally in either direction. We also transport no-kidding prisoners who are restrained and never more than arm’s reach from an armed LEO of some flavor.
The military could have chosen to treat King as a flight-, safety-, or security risk and detailed two escorts to physically accompany him to his final destination in the USA. They did not.
I’m going to suggest that in the vast, vast majority of cases unescorted service members show up as expected to face their music. So the Army’s decision wasn’t prima facie a silly one. But it was a decision. One that worked out badly for them.
Other than PV2 King’s family, not a lot of people are too worked up over trying to get him back. He’s just one more burr under the collective saddle of US/NK relations. And not a very big burr. Just the newest. So far; the week is yet young.
Even though there have been occasional defectors, I seriously question whether anybody outside of NK knows enough about the state of the country to get a genuine “true picture” of life there. Sure, we know some of the “big stuff” – famines, etc. But that isn’t necessarily the whole story.
I’d say very few Americans know or think they know absolutely zero about NK. Whether from recent explicit official training or from the osmosis of growing up in the USA over the last 20-ish years, they know the broad outlines:
It’s a shitty place that is actively hostile to America and to all Americans. Laws, rules, and protections don’t apply there to their own citizens, much less to you.
Danger Will Robinson, Danger!
That’s all any trooper or legitimate tourist needs to know about NK to make a sensible decision if they’re of sound mind.