War Trash (23 page)

Chaolin had a sharp tongue. The moment the major finished reading, Chaolin said, "Obviously our treatment falls short of the standard set by the convention. For example, we Chinese don't eat barley, which is fed to livestock back home. But you have made barley the staple of our diet, and most of the time there isn't enough barley for everyone. Each man can have only two bowls a day, and the calories are way below the minimum need of the body. What's worse, there's very little vegetable in our diet, and meat is absolutely a rarity. If your country has difficulties, please notify our country. I'm sure China will send over shiploads of rice, meat, and eggs to keep us from starving."

What he had said about barley wasn't true. No Chinese would feed animals barley, which we didn't like as much as rice but which tasted better than corn and sorghum, the principal foodstuffs in northern China. Having heard my translation, General Bell reddened and said, "I will take your unusual Chinese dietary habits into consideration and try to solve this problem. If you always feel hungry, I suggest that you stop the hunger strike now, which will just increase your fellow men's misery and waste food. As for the medical conditions, I will see what I can do."

Chaolin replied, "We appreciate that. If you agree to take steps to improve our living conditions, we'll be glad to end the hunger strike."

General Bell straightened up and promised, "I give you my word."

Chaolin and the other men looked at one another for a few seconds. Then he said, "We're willing to believe your sincerity, General Bell. Please accept our gratitude for coming to meet us personally."

"Does this mean you will call off the hunger strike?"

"Yes, we shall do it today."

"Very good, I'm glad we've met and talked."

"Thank you, General."

Bell nodded with a satisfied smile and then headed back. He got into his jeep, which pulled away, splashing muddy water from a puddle.

Not far from the gate, a middle-aged woman in a ruffly white dress was squatting on her haunches at a garbage dump, digging around with a mattock about two feet long. She was blind but came here every day to rummage around for edibles. On her neck was a healed gash. Beside her were a large gourd bowl and a small girl, four or five years old, whose hair had been cut straight across at the upper ends of her ears. The child held a bunch of grasshoppers, all strung through the mouths by a straw of dogtail grass. Now and then she ran away from her mother to catch a grasshopper. For a moment I was lost in a memory of my childhood, when my pals and I had often gone into the wilderness to catch insects and roasted them to eat. Cicadas and grasshoppers had been our favorites. My reverie was cut short by the woman's calling to her daughter, asking her what she herself was holding in her leathery hand. It was a piece of turnip peel, the child told her. The woman raised the thing and smelled it, then with a faint smile put it into the gourd bowl.

No matter how awful our situation was, there were always others who had it worse. The image of this blind woman would come back to haunt me for many years. Sometimes when I was losing heart, my mind would return to this war-mangled woman and to her eerie smile at a mere turnip peel. Then the desire for life and the will to continue would again stir in my chest.

"Hey, lets go," Chaolin said, bringing my mind back to the camp. Together we returned to the headquarters to give an account of the negotiation.

All the men who heard our report got excited, and some believed General Bell was a jackass. Yet to me he seemed to be an honorable man, perhaps somewhat naive; he couldn't possibly see through our ruse. I felt rather sad, because Bell 's promise to improve our living conditions would come to nothing if he was kidnapped.

On a sheet of ruled paper Ming wrote down a brief account of our meeting with the general, particularly his manner and the state of his vigilance. The information was delivered to the Korean comrades that same evening.

17. THE ABDUCTION OF GENERAL BELL

On the evening of May 7 Major Leach arrived in a jeep. He wanted two of our officers to go with him right away, to Compound 76, the one that held Korean prisoners.

"What for?" we asked.

He said General Bell was going to hold a meeting and had invited representatives from different compounds to attend. Chaolin gave me a meaningful grin that revealed his ulcerated gums. We guessed something unusual must be afoot. We hurried back to our headquarters and reported the new development to Commissar Pei. Pei sent Chaolin and me to go with Major Leach because we had met the Koreans and Bell before. We picked up our protest letter and memorandum on our captors' crimes, both written the previous night, and came out to join Leach. With Ming's permission, I brought along the English-Japanese dictionary as well. Before we set off, Commissar Pei 's orderly ran out, waving for us to stop. He rushed over and handed us each a service medal, which Chaolin and I put on as the jeep rolled away.

It was slightly windy, gray clouds chasing one another in the north as if following us. The dusk was smoky and flickered with puffs of midges, which brushed my face time and again. A flock of swifts twittered sharply and snapped at mosquitoes and gnats, soaring, diving, and spiraling like miniature aircraft in a dogfight. On the roadside rhododendrons and crimson azaleas bloomed in clusters, and rice paddies stretched in the fields studded with yellow forsythia, though half of the land was unused, overgrown with weeds. As soon as we passed a cattle pond, we saw large crowds of Korean prisoners gathering in various compounds. Most of them stood arm in arm swaying in rhythm and chanting battle songs. Seeing the jeep, a few men waved red flags, most of which were just pieces of shapeless cloth. They also shouted slogans. They seemed to know something extraordinary had just taken place.

Approaching Compound 76, the jeep slowed down a little. The road was lined with American tanks and half-tracks topped with machine guns. Military police and hundreds of marines stood around, all toting rifles. A radioman was shouting into a walkie-talkie that sat on the hood of a light truck, its antenna jittering. As we passed them, I felt almost as if we were their honored guests – all the prisoners and the Americans gazed at us intently. Near the gate to Compound 76 gathered more vehicles and marines, whose steel helmets were reflecting the shifting columns of searchlights beamed from the guard towers. Portable floodlights had been set along the barbed-wire fence, and somewhere a generator was whining. Beside the compound's gate hung a huge piece of white cloth – some sheets sewn together, six by thirty feet – which bore these English words: "WE CAPTURED BELL. AS LONG AS OUR DEMAND IS MET HIS SAFETY IS SECURED. IF THERE IS BRUTAL ACT SUCH AS SHOOTING AND BOMBING, HIS LIFE IS IN DANGER!" The exclamation mark was twice the size of a letter. I was impressed by the Koreans' thorough preparation; the sign must have taken a lot of work to make.

The jeep pulled up at the gate. Major Leach stayed behind while Chaolin and I walked into the compound. It was bright in there, lamps and torches everywhere. Over a hundred prisoners in their baggy uniforms stood in two lines to welcome us, clapping or waving a few tiny Chinese and Korean national flags made of paper. As we went farther in, people began shouting slogans in stiff Chinese: " Korea and China!" "Kim Il Sung and Mao Zedong!" "Welcome Chinese Comrades!"

We didn't know Korean, but we were so excited that we shouted: "Salute to our Korean comrades!" "Let us unite like brothers!" "Down with American imperialism!" From behind us came the swearing of the marines, reminding me of all the guns trained at us.

We were taken into a tent that had been prepared for the representatives from different compounds, among whom, to our surprise, were three young women. We shook hands with one another and even hugged some men as though we had known them for a long time. The tent was humming with chattering voices, Korean and Chinese. The noise made me slightly giddy; I was excited to be here, affected by the euphoric ambience. Everybody looked jubilant and friendly. For the next half hour Colonel Choi described to the representatives how they had caught General Bell.

By May 7 the men in Compound 76 had been demonstrating for two days, demanding a face-to-face dialogue with Bell. At 1:30 p.m. the general finally came, escorted by a platoon of GIs. Major Leach accompanied him. Together they went over to the front entrance to talk with the Koreans. As they came toward the gate, the GIs all followed them. The Koreans pointed at the troops and asked Bell, "What's this about? We don't understand why you, an American general, are afraid of us unarmed prisoners." Bell looked at his men for a moment, turned to glance at the inside of the compound, then motioned the GIs to move back and keep some distance from the gate. Only Leach stayed with him.

The Koreans enumerated the prison authorities' violations of the Geneva Convention and then demanded that Bell plead guilty. In the beginning the general was quite serious. He told his aide-decamp to read out some articles of the convention, and then he tried to refute the prisoners' accusations. But as the Koreans continued to rail at him, he grew impatient and tired, so he stood aside and let Major Leach answer questions for him. He lit a cigarette and smoked absently; every once in a while he shook his head in frustration. Gradually the GIs, fifty yards away from the officers, slackened their vigilance, whispering to one another and standing in disorder.

At that point a team of latrine cleaners appeared from within the compound and headed for the front entrance, each man carrying two large buckets of night soil with a shoulder pole. The gate was opened for them. The American officers stepped aside, hands over their noses.

When the last bucket of night soil had come out, suddenly these latrine men, all members of the compounds shock unit in disguise, dropped their loads, grabbed the general and Major Leach, and dragged them back into the prison. Leach shouted to the GIs for help, clutching a brace on the gate with both hands, so the Koreans let him go. But General Bell, not as quick as the younger officer, was pulled into the compound. The prisoners immediately bolted the front gate.

The whole thing had taken place so suddenly that the GIs were too dumbfounded to react. When the idea of a kidnapping had finally sunk in, they rushed to the gate, but it was too late. All they could see was four husky men hauling the general away toward a nearby tent. Bell turned his head and shouted at his troops, "Help me! Goddammit, help me!"

"Halt! Halt!" Major Leach cried at the prisoners. The guards raised their rifles.

Two Koreans ran over, displaying the white scroll with the English words on it. Then a battalion of POWs, over seven hundred strong, poured into the yard, holding self-made weapons and ready to confront the Americans. Major Leach ordered the GIs not to open fire, so all they could do was watch their commander disappear from view. At the entrance to the tent, still blustering and swearing, Bell refused to move, so the four men simply carried him, his legs kicking.

Sirens screamed, one after another. Within half an hour marines in tanks and personnel carriers surrounded the compound while a plane circled overhead, ordering the prisoners to release General Bell without delay. The enemy, too confused to deal with the situation, seemed unsure whether to contact the kidnappers or just stay put and wait.

About an hour later an inmate went to the gate and presented a sheet of paper signed by General Bell to one of the American officers. The letter had apparently been composed by the Koreans. It read:

I order you never shoot POWs, so we can prevent the expansion of this crisis and keep my safety. I agree to hold the conference that includes representatives of prisoners from other compounds. Also agree to discuss the possibilities and search for solutions of the problems. Let our troops leave Compound 76. Stay away, please!

General Matthew Bell

But all the vehicles and GIs remained where they were. Forty minutes later came another slip of paper, a genuine letter bearing Bell 's handwriting. He ordered them to have a phone line connected to the barracks of Compound 76 and to follow his instructions closely from now on. He gave a list of things to be delivered without delay. Among them were blankets, canned meat, rice, pencils, pens, writing pads, brand-name cigarettes, folding tables and chairs, and a few things he needed for his personal accommodations. The acting commanding officer, General Fulton, who had just rushed here to take Bell 's place temporarily, was Bell 's friend, both having graduated from the Virginia Military Institute, so Fulton granted whatever Bell requested. Several jeeps were dispatched to different compounds to fetch POW representatives. Then a truck arrived to deliver the personal items for General Bell – there were even some bottles of spring water and a toilet. Later in the evening a larger truck came, loaded with supplies for the conference.

Behind a row of barracks a special tent had been pitched for the general. In front stood eight self-made red flags rippling in the breeze, each carrying a red star in a white circle. Dozens of pickets were posted around the tent, toting clubs, sharpened bamboo poles, long picks, shovels. One man, obviously a team leader, wore a shiny sickle in his belt. Chaolin and I were allowed to go in and have a look inside. A guard opened the door flaps for us. My goodness! I was struck by the fancy interior, which was thoroughly furnished and partitioned into four or five separate spaces; the entire floor was covered with army blankets. Even the walls were lined with blankets too, since it could still get chilly at night. Toward the back of the tent, a white curtain shielded an area for the bathroom. In the center of the front section stood a glossy desk and four chairs; on the desktop was a beer bottle holding a bunch of wild lilies, white and saffron, so fresh that some of the blossoms were still closed. In a screened corner were a cot and a tiny cabinet, on which perched the general's reading glasses and his cap. The curtain was not drawn. We could see Bell lying on the bed with his eyes closed, his face longer and flabbier than before. He looked old. Chaolin and I didn't disturb him, though I was sure the general knew someone had come in.