OhMyNews reports that a US MP on patrol at Osan Air Base severely beat two old men on Feb 14.
According to the USFK Employees Union, two Korean base employees — drivers with the 51LRS — are now receiving treatment in a hospital after they were kicked by US airmen… while they were in handcuffs. A Korean base employee at Osan told OhMyNews today that at around 10:50am on Feb 14, the two drivers, aged 62 and 56, were about to be escorted through a secure zone at the base (”Black Cat,” which a quick Google search leads me to believe is a hanger) when an MP — citing “suspicious behavior” — made them kneel on the ground and put them in handcuffs. He then said the MP kicked them on the back and pressed their faces on the ground, drawing blood. He then put his boot down on the men’s throats, he said.
The employee — and now the source is sounding a bit suspicious — said, “Besides these, there are countless instances of human rights abuses… Why must we be abused by the soldiers of another country as we’re working hard in our country.”
A union member said the two men were carrying runway entry permits issued by the MPs, and they showed those cards to the MP on guard duty. Afterwards, they took all the proper measures, he said, putting their names and units in the log. They called the airmen who called in a broken-down vehicle at Black Cat, who came out to escort them, but before they could enter the secure zone, the MP on duty suddenly claimed that the entry permits were fake and drew his weapon. The two men were put in cuffs. It was -7~9 degrees Celsius that day, but the handcuffed men had to put their faces on the frozen ground, not knowing why, while one was bleeding from the face because he was pushed from behind while being put on the ground. They were forced to remain in that position for more than two hours, he said.
Another union member said Black Cat was a strict security area, and that you need to be escorted by an airman to enter. He said the two men — long-time employees at the base — would have definitely known the procedures. He said if the men had entered without escort, the appropriate thing to do would be to charge the two with administrative punishment after a lawful investigation. In fact, he said, it would be the MPs who would be responsible since they failed to carry out their duty to guard the zone. He added that it was impermissible to kick the men after they’d been placed in handcuffs, and that the “nature of the abuse is thickly covered with racism against Koreans.”
An official with the union told OhMyNews that they’ve sent an official letter to USFK asking for an explanation of what happened, and that the local chapter heads would meet for an emergency meeting. The union added, however, that they understood that the men weren’t, in fact, beaten.
Big Bad USFK — which said the incident was an unplanned incident that occurred during operations and couldn’t be helped — was reportedly not taking responsibility for the incident, said OhMyNews. When OhMyNews called them today, USFK was quiet, saying only that it could not confirm anything at the present time.
Marmot’s Note: Expect more of this from OhMyNews with Roh leaving office.
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20 Comments
The other side of the story should shed some light…
If in a restricted area and you act like and ass you get treated like an ass.
Once on the flightline we got a new batch of SP’s from a closed down SAC base (Loring AFB) and they tackled me off my bicycle put their carbines on me and held me down in the concrete with their knee because I had half of my line badge stuck in my shirt. Granted I was a C-130 crew chief in the USAFR on summer hire as a GS-9. Cuffed me, stuffed me and gave me a good asschewing until my Pro-super, Chief, 1’st shirt, Squadron and wing commander came to get me and told them to lay the hell off on his flight line. Business as usual for those kids. They’re like real cops, they got picked on as kids.
Not saying the koreans didn’t…. ahem, embellished a little.
I’m with Richardson, the other side of the story should be quite interesting, not that Oh My News really cares.
My buddies threatened to club and hogtie a US colonel once because he was being an ass. He had refused to cooperate after my friends captured him wandering around without escort during Canada-US joint exercises. He didn’t want to recognize that members of the CF had any authority on a USAF base.
If you want to parallel official DoD usage, the phrase “Military Police” (MP’s) in the context of this type of discussion always means US Army Military Police. They will wear “MP” armbands (always? often? depends on their specific assignment).
The US Air Force has its own police (”Security Police”l — not sure if they wear “SP” armbands or not). You won’t find “MP’s” pulling flight line security(or even routine traffic or perimter guard duty) on a US Air Force base — nor will you find USAF SP’s doing duty on a US Army base.
Of course they are all part of USFK, which means for US-bashing in Korean media they can all be considered “military police” in the most generic sense.
I think USAF Security police have traditionally been trained to be extremely aggressive in carrying out flight line security duties, esp when guarding “ready” aircraft (which at one time in Korea would have been armed with nuclear weapons). All it takes is one bullet in the right location and the acft is disabled and unavail for an immediate “scramble” reaction to an imminent attack.
I think that this exemplifies the reason Korea should just kick the USFK out! After all, they are a rich nation, and can take care of themselves, so long as any armed conflict last 10 days or less…..
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/ww.....ryCode=205
Black Cat is the nickname of the 5th Recon Squadron at Osan Air Base. The squadron flies the U2 spy plane. Anything that deals with the U2 involves top secret missions and high security.
Then tell me about the other story guys…..
if there is the worth to know about that.
The old men probably thought they’d have some fun after their Soju lunch and got what they deserved I’m sure. And to hear them cry racism, HA! Point thy finger in thy other direction.
OhMyBias wouldn’t be exaggerating this one now, would they? It was just two hapless ajjeossis put down by the Man.
Seriously, you don’t like sky cops and their procedures, then don’t work on a USAF base. Besides, I hear the Sperwer/Carr gamja chaebol is hiring and these guys would fit their target demographic.
#10. There could be some truth to that. I know the DPW base workers in Daegu start the day by filling their empty water bottles with soju at the Katusa snack bar and continue on with more sojus over lunch. You can sometimes see them staggering around CP Walker or CP Henry in the late afternoons totally hammered.
Well, we won’t know the other side until the USFK makes a real statement about it. We certainly can’t trust OhMyNews for a truthful report. They really have no journalistic integrity.
I’m not saying the old guys are lying because I wasn’t there.
However, I’m reminded of other one-sided stories like the infamous Seoul subway fight of ‘96(?):
The news made hysteria reports of USFK personnel rampantly sexually assaulting Korean women on the the Seoul subway. One Korean man steps in to defend the honor of the women and the gang of soldiers beat him.
Now, on to the other side of the story:
There were US soldiers on the subway and one of them was with his Korean wife. The guy put his arm around his wife or his hand on her a$$ or something to that effect. Some ajosshi on the subway took offense to it, called her a “whore” and spit on her. The soldier, not liking his wife being treated that way, popped the guy and it turned into a mini-brawl.
Well, the way the news spun it, it made it look like the evil USFK was out beating honorable Korean men. When the other side of the story finally came out it was too late. Public opinion was already decided on the first reports.
Now, I’m not saying that this is the same type of situation, but it certainly has a possibility of being so.
Sounds like typical “poor victim me” Korean bullshit. Koreans are soooo perfect and never do anything wrong!
Dudes, the presidential elections are over…
#9 here is a story for you……. Big, long, noisy caravan of military equipment is rolling down the road. Two teenage girls are troubled by the entire racket. So, they cover their ears with their hands, close their eyes tightly and walk into the middle of the caravan. They die.
The story that is told to this day by the Korean media is that the USFK ran them down intentionally. Get the picture?
To be fair, much the same outroar, from Ohmynews at least, would have resulted if the Korean police had exercised such force on the same 노인. (Since when is 56 considered 노인?) Come to think of it, if it had been some young Korean cops or soldiers, the ajussis would have scolded, sworn at, and shoved them before being escorted off the premises and sent home.
Korea no doubt has a thing or two to learn from the US on effective law enforcement, but the distrust of government stemming from Korea’s experience with authoritative regimes does have its upside, namely higher sensitivity towards civil rights.
In any event, it is certainly conceivable that the Korean workers are in fact being regularly mistreated, but until and unless I read it from a reputable source, reporting by Ohmyjot (or jotsunilbo, for that matter; what can I say, I’m a moderate), neither proves nor disproves the story as far as I’m concerned.
Ohmynews = National Inquirer
I guess their were to soju’d up after lunch to read the sign that read “Restricted Area”
“Use of Deadly force Authorized” in English and if I remember that area it’s in Hangul also. Also if you’re not escorted.. your meat to the SP’s. Lesson: you WAIT for your escort period.
The Stars and Stripes finally got around to printing the story. As expected the standard USAF response was that the Security Police did everything by the book. But the Osan authorities still did not clear up the portion from the OhMy News story that the passes were declared to be fake by the Security Police — leading to the incident in the first place.
This is the crux of the matter…not the injuries. Were the documents forged???? That the two men were held for two hours in a face-down position certainly implies that the passes were indeed forged or somehow tampered with.
The union glosses over the matter by saying the men did everything right. However, it is possible to follow the correct entry procedures using forged documents.
I hope someone clears up the question — but most likely it will be lost in the chaff.
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