South Korean troops in Vietnam

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Kamerad06
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South Korean troops in Vietnam

#1

Post by Kamerad06 » 09 Mar 2005, 09:10

I'd be grateful for any answers to the following questions:


(1) In what part of the Republic of Vietnam were South Korean (ROK) troops deployed?

(2) From what year to what year were they based in Vietnam?

(3) What was the peak number of ROK troops based in Vietnam?

(4) Were they only Army, or were ROK naval and/or air force units sent to Vietnam?

(5) Is there any record of South Korean troops being taken prisoner either by the Viet Cong or North Vietnamese?

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Peter H
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#2

Post by Peter H » 11 Mar 2005, 09:12

ROK forces served in South Vietnam from 1963 to 1973.Manouever battalions were introduced in 1965.This including a Marine Brigade.

My understanding is that due to their 1950s type equipment and structure they were given the role of mainly defending coastal enclaves,including Cam Ranh Bay,in the lower portion of II Corps.The Marine brigade was further north near Hoi An.

A good link:

http://www.polkcounty.org/vn/vnpix.html

http://www.polkcounty.org/vn/Kwon/korean_units.html

Also here:

http://mcel.pacificu.edu/as/students/koreavet/home.htm
The Republic of Korea (ROK) sent three divisions of troops to Vietnam, beginning in September of 1963, to help the Americans fight against North Vietnam. The "White Horse," "Blue Dragon," and the "Tiger" divisions totaled 312,853 men over a twelve year period, forming the second largest army fighting in Vietnam. Similar to many of the United States soldiers, the only other foreign army to outnumber the ROK soldiers in the war, the Korean soldiers were not considered heroes upon their return home after the Vietnam War.


This on ROK 'missing' as well:

http://www.dpg.devry.edu/~akim/sck/vietnam1.html
The ROK Ministry of Defense insists that there were
ROK soldiers 3 MIA (missing in action) during the entire
war. They asserted that the low rate of Koreans captured by the
enemy had to do with the nature of the guerilla war.
It also denied that there were soldiers who defected
and ended up in North Korea....


Kamerad06
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#3

Post by Kamerad06 » 12 Mar 2005, 08:29

Thank you very much. I appreciate it.

Docent P
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#4

Post by Docent P » 20 Mar 2005, 13:25


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Bubbles
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#5

Post by Bubbles » 28 Mar 2005, 05:20

The South Koreans started the ear-cutting craze. This was a throwback to the days when the japanese would cut the ears off their Korean enemies and return them to Japan in sacks (some of which are still around today at monuments - from what Ive read).

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#6

Post by mars » 28 Mar 2005, 17:58

Bubbles, the ear-cutting was an old tradition of Korean warrior which could traced back for at least more than one thousand year, I believe Korean inherit this habbit from our Chinese, neither ancient chinese nor Korean were head-collecting race, but in ancient chinese and Korean army, one of the way got reward or promotion was basded by how many enemy soldiers you killed in the battle, so how do you prove the number of enemy you killed ? Our chinese cut their head off, and present to the my superior aftter the battle, Korean did the same thing, but head was heavy an difficult to carry, and what would you do if you killed more than one enemy in the battle ? Imanging one warrier tied 5 or 6 heads under his belt, he may hardly move ! So ear-cutting became a alternative ways, which was more pratical.
Although, I am a little surprise that South Korean still do this kind of thing in the 60's of the 20 century.

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Panzerfaust XxX
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#7

Post by Panzerfaust XxX » 31 Mar 2005, 03:57

mars wrote:Bubbles, the ear-cutting was an old tradition of Korean warrior which could traced back for at least more than one thousand year, I believe Korean inherit this habbit from our Chinese, neither ancient chinese nor Korean were head-collecting race, but in ancient chinese and Korean army, one of the way got reward or promotion was basded by how many enemy soldiers you killed in the battle, so how do you prove the number of enemy you killed ? Our chinese cut their head off, and present to the my superior aftter the battle, Korean did the same thing, but head was heavy an difficult to carry, and what would you do if you killed more than one enemy in the battle ? Imanging one warrier tied 5 or 6 heads under his belt, he may hardly move ! So ear-cutting became a alternative ways, which was more pratical.
Although, I am a little surprise that South Korean still do this kind of thing in the 60's of the 20 century.
This was common in the olden days. The greatest warrior was offen the one leading the army.

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Acolyte
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#8

Post by Acolyte » 14 Oct 2005, 02:17

Were there North Korean troops stationed in North Vietnam?

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Kim Sung
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#9

Post by Kim Sung » 14 Oct 2005, 05:50

Acolyte wrote:Were there North Korean troops stationed in North Vietnam?
Yes, of course. Eleven North Korean pilots and three engineers were killed during the Vietnam War. NK also provided 10,000 weapons and 1 million military clothings to NV.

http://www.vietvet.co.kr/%7Evietvet/mission/miss04.htm

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lei_lord_demon
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#10

Post by lei_lord_demon » 18 Oct 2005, 13:31

Panzerfaust XxX wrote:
mars wrote:Bubbles, the ear-cutting was an old tradition of Korean warrior which could traced back for at least more than one thousand year, I believe Korean inherit this habbit from our Chinese, neither ancient chinese nor Korean were head-collecting race, but in ancient chinese and Korean army, one of the way got reward or promotion was basded by how many enemy soldiers you killed in the battle, so how do you prove the number of enemy you killed ? Our chinese cut their head off, and present to the my superior aftter the battle, Korean did the same thing, but head was heavy an difficult to carry, and what would you do if you killed more than one enemy in the battle ? Imanging one warrier tied 5 or 6 heads under his belt, he may hardly move ! So ear-cutting became a alternative ways, which was more pratical.
Although, I am a little surprise that South Korean still do this kind of thing in the 60's of the 20 century.
This was common in the olden days. The greatest warrior was offen the one leading the army.
I heard a story too! After defeat a battalion of ROKA, NLF's soldiers (or VC) know about these enemies were cutted many ear of South-Vietnamese and NLF!
And they behead all of enemycorpse and put them into cage!
That's call the war!
When ROK soldies garrison in VN, they killed many VNmese, not only NVA,NLF, Vnmese hate them,even soldiers and officers of ARVN! I "heard" a group of ARVN shoted ROKA when them killed innocent Vietnamese!

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Kim Sung
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#11

Post by Kim Sung » 18 Oct 2005, 15:30

mars wrote:Bubbles, the ear-cutting was an old tradition of Korean warrior which could traced back for at least more than one thousand year, I believe Korean inherit this habbit from our Chinese, neither ancient chinese nor Korean were head-collecting race, but in ancient chinese and Korean army, one of the way got reward or promotion was basded by how many enemy soldiers you killed in the battle, so how do you prove the number of enemy you killed?
No, that's not a Korean tradition, but a Japanese one. Japanese committed ear-cutting atrocity to Koreans in Chosun-Japanese war from 1592 to 1598. I haven't heard there was any ear-cutting tradition in Korean military culture before the Vietnam War.

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Kim Sung
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#12

Post by Kim Sung » 18 Oct 2005, 16:16

lei_lord_demon wrote:I heard a story too! After defeat a battalion of ROKA, NLF's soldiers (or VC) know about these enemies were cutted many ear of South-Vietnamese and NLF!
And they behead all of enemycorpse and put them into cage!
That's call the war!
When ROK soldies garrison in VN, they killed many VNmese, not only NVA,NLF, Vnmese hate them,even soldiers and officers of ARVN! I "heard" a group of ARVN shoted ROKA when them killed innocent Vietnamese!
Yes, Korean troops were very notorious for their atrocities to Vietnamese civilians. Mylai massacre by American troops is nothing compared to Korean atrocities.

I remember I've read a Korean Vietnam War veteran's memoirs in which he told about atrocities committed by his unit.

One day, his unit captured some Vietcong guerillas that consisted of men and a woman. Koreans binded captured Vietcongs with chain. In front of male guerillas, Korean soldiers cut the woman's genital. Then, a male guerilla on the other side screamed! She was his lover! :( Of course, they were all killed in a cruel manner.

Koreans didn't take prisoners during the Vietnam War. Rapes and massacres were rampant in Korean-occupied areas. US troops were invaders to Vietnamese, but Korean troops were devils who accompanied invaders.

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Kim Sung
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#13

Post by Kim Sung » 04 Dec 2005, 15:26

http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/ ... 20018.html
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/ ... 60017.html
http://english.chosun.com/w21data/html/ ... 60033.html

Declassified Vietnam War Dossier Silences Suspicions


Korean president Park Chung-hee in the later 1960s proposed a regional defense body with Japan and Taiwan to combat the spread of communism, newly declassified documents reveal. The dossier related to the Vietnam War made public on Friday also shatters persistent myths by showing that Korean soldiers who fought in the war were paid the same as their Thai and Filipino counterparts, and that the money did go to the soldiers and was not used by the state to boost Korea’s economic development, as some have charged.

The Defense Ministry files consist of 17 volumes and 1,700 pages of documents related to the Vietnam War. They show Park seeking the establishment of a regional security body to deter the spread of communism from China and other communist countries. The date and author of the relevant document are not clear, but it is believed to have been drawn up in the late 1960s.

The government extracted an agreement from Washington after two years of negotiations starting in 1965 that the U.S. would be responsible for compensating the families of Korean soldiers and civilian staff who died in non-combat incidents during the war. Altogether 157 Korean technicians died in Vietnam, 31 of them killed in insurgent attacks between 1965 to 1969.

The newly released documents show that during the nine years until 1973 the Korean military served in Vietnam, overseas service compensation paid by the U.S. government to Korean troops there totaled more than US$235 million, with 82 percent of that money or around $195 million remitted to Korea.

The service compensation was regularly paid to the Korean troops in Vietnam as agreed between the U.S. and Korean governments, the documents show. That should silence suspicions that the U.S. in fact paid far less than agreed to, and that the troop deployment stipend was diverted into Korea’s economic development.

The dossier shows the amount of compensation per day for a brigadier general was US$7, for field officers between $5.50 and $6.50, for company officers $4-5, for sergeants $2-2.50 and for privates $1.35-1.80.

The allowance was roughly equal to that provided to Philippine and Thai troops, whose countries’ economic situation was far better than Korea’s at the time.

([email protected] )

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Acolyte
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#14

Post by Acolyte » 05 Dec 2005, 01:06

So Thailand and Philippines also deployed troops in Vietnam? I guess I need to update myself on that war.

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Chinese-Empire
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#15

Post by Chinese-Empire » 05 Dec 2005, 04:20

South korea sending troops to Vietnam

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