megaphones. Madame Chon hadn’t spoken yet and I wasn’t sure if she would. Probably not. Maybe the KCIA had arrested her. Jill wasn’t visible either. Were Jill’s assurances that we’d be able to slip onto the compound during the demonstration a diversion to distract us while she looked for an opportunity to slip away herself? I didn’t think so. Something was going to happen soon.
No more vehicles were leaving Camp Casey. The rest of the Division, other than the four or five dozen MPs guarding the main gate, had already moved out.
“This is bull!” Ernie said. “We have to make something happen.”
A roar went up from the crowd. Two, maybe three thousand people were jammed into the road in front of Camp Casey, and it seemed that each and every one of them had riveted their attention on the KNPs lined up along the railroad tracks.
But then I saw that it wasn’t the railroad tracks the crowd was staring at but rather a soldier, in a U.S. Army uniform, who’d just climbed up on a platform. The soldier’s back was to me but I could see the black leather armband and the shining black helmet of an MP. Then one of the students handed the MP a megaphone and the MP turned around to face us. The crowd roared their approval. It was Military Policewoman Corporal Jill Matthewson, in full regalia. Once again, she looked squared away. A real soldier. Then she saluted the crowd, which exploded into applause.
It dawned on me that every action of Jill’s to this point had been done with a purpose in mind. Jill raised the megaphone to her mouth and started to speak. As she did so, a young Korean man climbed onto the platform next to her, and using his own megaphone, repeated what she said in Korean.
Her speech was nothing new to me and Ernie. But coming from a soldier in uniform, its impact was overwhelming. The crowd was energized by her words and as she continued to speak, the level of outrage seemed to grow, swelling each heart with indignation.
Jill Matthewson spoke of arrogance. Of the arrogance of the men running Camp Casey who thought of women as objects for their entertainment. Of the arrogance with which they flouted the laws of the Republic of Korea, selling cheap imported PX goods on the black market, thus stifling the growth of indigenous Korean industry. Of the arrogance of men who allowed American soldiers to operate dangerous vehicles under poor driving conditions and didn’t hold them accountable for their recklessness. Of the arrogance that caused Korean women to be raped behind closed doors. Of the arrogance that caused the bosses on Camp Casey to sneer at the Korean judicial system. Of the arrogance that allowed two GIs-GIs who had admitted killing Chon Un-suk-to return to the United States without facing Korean justice.
The crowd was in a frenzy now, surging toward Jill, reaching out their hands. The Korean student with her was shouting through his megaphone, “Chon Un-suk kiokhei!” Remember Chon Un-suk! “Jil Ma-tyu-son mansei!” Long live Jill Matthewson!
As the crowd reached up to her, Jill touched their hands and then grabbed the rim of her MP helmet and whipped it off. With a sweeping motion, she tossed it into the crowd. The crowd screamed and men jumped to grab the helmet. Then she reached behind her head, unhooked a metal clasp and, shaking it loose, allowed her long, reddish blonde hair to swing free. The crowd roared madly.
She lifted her megaphone to her lips and pointed at the giant MP looming some twenty yards behind the Camp Casey Main Gate.
“He must die!” she shouted.
Then she swiveled and pointed at the KNPs lining the railroad tracks across the MSR from Camp Casey. This time she spoke in Korean.
“Bikyo!” she shouted. Make way. “Bali bikyo.” Make way quickly.
Behind the tracks, from amongst the shops that lined the road that led to the Western Corridor, an engine roared. Almost as loud as a train but not running on rails. From between the shops a wooden prow appeared. Dark green. Massive. Growing larger as its engines groaned. And then the huge moving mass crossed the slight ridge behind the tracks and came fully into view.
“What the hell is it?” Ernie asked.
I’d seen one before. When I was in the artillery and we practiced moving trucks and howitzers across fast- flowing rivers.
“A pontoon,” I shouted. “Mechanized.”
Eighteen wheels below, a boat-shaped body and a folding platform on top. Only just enough space in a carved-out corner for a driver with goggles. The driver stepped on the gas and aimed the enormous river-crossing vehicle directly at the line of Korean policeman.
Jill shouted through her megaphone once again. “Bikyo. Balli Bikyo.” Get out of the way. Quickly get out of the way.
The KNPs turned, staring in amazement at the great vehicle bearing down on them. Some of them broke ranks. The rolling pontoon bounced as it crossed the ridge and roared directly at them.
The KNPs dropped their weapons and ran.
Before the crowd had time to cheer at this development, Jill and the student next to her were screaming into their megaphones for them to make way, too. The crowd parted like the Red Sea. Ernie and I jumped, but we were only a few feet from the wheeled pontoon as it chugged past us, heading directly for the main gate of Camp Casey.
Jill Matthewson didn’t order the American MPs to disperse; she didn’t have to. They scattered, clearing a path for the huge vehicle as it headed right at the MP guard shack in front of the gate. At the last second, the pontoon swerved to the right, clipped the guard shack and then plowed into the tall chain link fence that surrounded Camp Casey. The fence buckled, held for a second, and collapsed. The pontoon kept rolling and the wooden arch above the gateway-the one that said 2ND INFANTRY DIVISON, SECOND TO NONE! — folded backwards and then fell onto a growing pile of chain link, concertina wire, and splintered wood.
The crowd roared once again and the student protestors surged through the gate, ripping and tearing as they went.
Ernie and I fought our way through. When we passed the giant MP and neared the front door of the Provost Marshal’s Office, we ripped off our white bandannas of protest. MPs had gathered there, preparing to make a last stand. Because we were Americans, the MPs didn’t take notice of us-the dragnet for two 8th Army CID agents was forgotten. They allowed us to enter the premises of the 2nd Division Provost Marshal’s Office.
The front desk was pandemonium. The on-duty desk sergeant was on the radio, signaling frantically to Division headquarters out in the field and then I Corps headquarters down in Uijongbu. A couple of MP lieutenants ran into one another, shouting orders, but I wasn’t sure what they expected to accomplish. The mob was on compound now, moving wherever it wanted to.
Temporarily, the student demonstrators had become fascinated with tearing down the PX hot dog stand, only ten yards inside the main gate. Sodas and buns were being tossed out to the crowd. The white-smocked Korean girl who ran the hot dog stand fled in terror. The pontoon vehicle was blocked by the debris of the main gate but the driver was backing it up, and some of the students were helping to untangle the chain link and wire knotted beneath the front axle. In a matter of minutes, it would be back in operation.
Had the timing of the Division-wide move-out alert been sheer coincidence? I didn’t think so. Colonel Han Kuk-chei came from a revered yangban family and would have connections throughout the ROK military and the government. Jill might be involved in something bigger than she’d admitted to us. Perhaps Colonel Han’s friends in high places were able to maneuver the United Nations Command in Seoul into ordering an alert just when Colonel Han needed it. This melee might be part of a larger coup against the government.
But what I needed desperately was proof that the Division honchos had been illegally black-marketing, which would be a motive for murdering both Private Marvin Druwood and the entertainment agent, Pak Tong-i. And attempting to murder Corporal Jill Matthewson and Agents George Sueno and Ernie Bascom, because we were on the verge of exposing them. Their careers would be over; they’d be stripped of privilege and rank and, not incidentally, their retirement checks. And very likely they’d do hard time in a federal penitentiary.
So far, the Korean National Police and the American MPs had shown admirable restraint. They had not fired on the crowd. Only a few ineffective tear gas canisters had been launched, but they’d been haphazardly placed and had been disposed of quickly by the braver students.
Ernie and I ignored the pandemonium of the PMO front desk and trotted down the hallway toward Colonel Alcott’s office.
