During 1970-1971 I served in Vietnam working with that same top secret coding equipment allegedly reverse-engineered by the Soviets. That equipment used key cards to enter the codes used for that day, changed at the same time in equipment all over the world in land bases, ships, and even embassies. The cards were used once and then destroyed. Without those cards the equipment would be useless. Before the Pueblo even reached the North Korean port, fresh code cards would have been issued worldwide to existing crypto equipment subscribers. Coded US Military communication was never "monitored" by the Soviets. All of our equipment racks had stickers on them reading, "Remember the Pueblo!" All of our equipment had blocks of Thermite sitting on top, with the detonation wires hanging in plain sight. The Thermite could be set off with virtually any electrical source, from a cranking field phone to a single D-cell battery. Our issued M-16s with lots of ammo were kept at the communication center, and our prime mission was to defend the building at all costs. If it looked like it was going to be overrun the Thermite would be set off and everything would be destroyed, including the safe holding the key cards. During our Thermite training the instructor set a Thermite grenade, about the size of a beer can, on a dead truck engine and pulled the pin. Within 30 seconds, the Thermite had burned completely through the block, leaving globs of molten slag underneath. The ultimate shredder.
I was serving in a similar role doing communications and cryptography work on the same gear at that time as part of the USAF. At locations in the US and Europe, the Thermite was not installed, but anywhere in Asia it was at installed at ground locations. Thermite and ships and aircraft is a bad deal given it can melt through the hull. But we got a lot of training from lessons learned from the Pueblo. Many of the circuit boards in the equipment were labeled Secret, but the Top Secret component was just the key cards (think an old IBM computer card with punched holes). We had to contend with Russian spy ships all the time given most communications was by airwaves (HF) and the security of our encryption was key. I was also never aware that any communications were compromised. But possibly briefly interrupted. When I took a tour through the Vietnamese war museum in old Saigon in the 90's, I saw intact examples of the same equipment in the former US Command bunker (and now museum) in Saigon. Those could have easily been destroyed during the US withdrawal, but weren't, proving that it wasn't the equipment that mattered, but the one-time usage key cards, which are specific to the end points of any link (only two cards of each code are made, one for each end of a link) and distributed by military couriers carrying locked cases chained to their wrists with associated protection. Having the cards stolen (capturing the courier) was useless given if the case had been opened or courier intercepted or delayed, all the codes inside were instantly invalidated, and so could not be used by an enemy. Pueblo crew would have destroyed Top Secret documents and key cards first, and then work their way down to the equipment, which is very robust hardware and hard to destroy without Thermite. We had axes at all locations, and were supposed to use them if destruction was necessary. But it would have taken time to bust up that equipment in its heavy steel cases. Taking out the classified circuit boards and busting those up would have been the first act. Burning the Top Secret cards and paperwork would have been done in the facility if needed. Bottom line, the Pueblo capture was very bad for the crew, but it wasn't an event that led to a compromise of American military communications. The system was designed with this eventuality in mind.
I am surprised that the Peoblo was not abandoned and destroyed/sunk by the commander! Guess someone wanted our the Enemies to obtain all our secret communication equipment! Seams like the Dumbocrats are alway giving our Military Equipment to the Enemy, this one was LB Johnson, last one was Afganistan and was Biden!
Been a very long time since I've even thought of that equipment and the things we did to operate and maintain it. "Dark Seas" does take a bit of liberty here in making statements that any of us that were in service at the time would know was completely bogus.
Myself a Former enlisted Navy man. I sat next to Commander Lloyd Bucher at a Boys Town Dinner in the 1970s. He treated me as an equal. It would have been a pleasure to have served in his command. He was the kindest military man I had ever met.
Some of his crew, including some of the officers, held a different opinion. But he was placed in command of a poorly equipped ship that was badly in need of extensive time for refitting and repairing. He was also a sub sailor, not a surface sailor.
My father-in-law was Ops Offer on the Pueblo and I assure you no such opinion was ever offered in my presence. I find it supremely disrespectful, at best. If you do not know these men you have no business speaking for them. Remember the Pueblo. RIP Carl Schumacher
I was over there at the time serving on a destroyer. We went North along with other ships and did NOTHING. We are still paying today for doing nothing to a bully and showing weakness.
When USA is the world's biggest bully over 99% of the time, uh, yeah sure... Go look up how many nations USA have conducted coups in or tried to over the last year. Democratically elected is only worth something when you're obeying orders from USA, otherwise you're getting regimechange. Or John Bolton coming to meet you and "i know where your children live" as he did with the original chief of the OPCW when he didn't do what USA wanted. USA also conveniently pretends that SOME places includes air exclusion zones, like the Taiwan ones that extend FAR into Chinese mainland, so they can complain about how horrible the Chinese are for flying in it, regardless the fact that they are usually in their own airspace when that happens. To USA "freedom of navigation" means "anywhere we want to go, but noone else has this right anywhere near OUR coastlines".
That and the shootdown of PR-21. Incidents so heinous that even China and the USSR basically said they'd look the other way if the US wanted to retaliate.
How would Americans react to spy ships all over their coast and countries telling them how they should be running the country? Maybe America should stay at home and sort out there laughing stock of a country. Only intelligent Americans that travel realise how much the rest of the world laughs at the USA.
The problem with international waters claim is that NK always claimed a keep-out zone of 50 nm for foreign military vessels. Navy brass knew this and sent Pueblo within that anyway without any real means of defense. Someone in the Pentagon should have fried for this but of course they did not and we don't even remember their names. Bucher acted reasonably and valiantly in the best traditions of the Navy. Sacrificing himself and crew would have served little purpose. The Pueblo should have been bombed and destroyed long ago.
There was an excellent TV movie about this incident, simply titled "Pueblo" back in the 70's. Hal Holbrook played the Captain. I don't know if it is still available, but it is worth watching if you can find it.
@@Oldman808, Johnson was such a turd he made Jimmy Carter almost look intelligent. What most people don't know about him is that he and McNamara made up that ruse about the second Bay of Tonkin incident as a way of getting him re-elected (thankfully it didn't happen). It NEVER happened but he managed to convince enough of the top brass in the Pentagon that we wound up in a fiasco that only served to get a lot of our young men killed (including many of my buddies and some high school classmates), a lot of money wasted and the NVA far better equipped than the Russians had ever been able to do for them. Apparently that lesson didn't get taken to heart because the present turd in the White House did the same thing in frantically pulling our troops out of Afghanistan!
No however they were working on it. The Soviet Union had already helped them build Uranium enrichment facilities along with giving them technical expertisefor that purpose. Plus the Soviets were major North Korean Allies who had Nuclear Capabilities. So if a conflict did break out they surely would've gone to North Korea's Aid.
Crazy to send them there with no backup anywhere. No ship, no plane, nothing for thousands of miles. And then to blame them that they given up the ship, thats the navy for you
My father in law commanded the Talos Missile battery on the USS Oklahoma City off the coast of North Korea during the Pueblo incident and we just recently found out that the missiles were nuclear tipped when it was just declassified a couple years back.
If anything, Naval Command should have been relieved, just for the bad publicity, if not for parking an unarmed vessel so close to the coast of a country technically still at war with the USA. The captain and the crew were scapegoats, mistreated by their own leadership.
@tdkeyes1. Exactly who do you think the Naval Command is since you used extremely broad words and who do you think the Naval Command gets their orders from? Also, this is the name of the game, subterfuge and espionage, and it’s a dangerous one. Lastly, you don’t give up the ship and allow our enemies a chance to get their hands on equipment. That’s not scapegoating and investigations are warranted.
@@sharpright6887 Whoever ordered the ship to go there, unprepared, is the one who should have been canned. At the least, knowing the sensitivity of the mission and the exposure of an essentially unarmed ship, there should have been demolition charges pre-placed. Obviously the US Navy didn't think. Hubris is the root of this.
@@tdkeyes1 If there wasn't someone or someway to destroy all the most valuable equipment fast then the navy or whoever assigned people and equipment to that boat failed them.
There were a bunch of admirals and navy captains who should have faced disciplinary action for their roles in this project. SECNAV had responsibility also.
My dad joined the US Navy in 1950 when he turned 17. After spending time as an armorer loading bombs on Skyraiders on a carrier during the Korean War, he wound up working on Martin P4M-1Q Mercator spy planes at NAS Port Lyautey in French Morocco. They were armed with radar directed 20mm cannon so the squadron commander sent my dad and some others to avionics school in Tennessee. After that, the Soviets shot down at least one Mercator and others were lost mysteriously. Also, parts became scarce and the Navy disbanded the squadron and sent my dad to NAS Sanford to work AJ-2 Savage carrier capable nuclear attack bombers with VAH-9, and he made a few more deployments to Port Lyautey with them. After he met and married my mom, the Navy sent him to the Naval Ordnance Test Station China Lake CA, about as far as you could get from Florida and still be in the continental US, and that's where I came along. Dad got flight pay for going up in airplanes to prove out his avionics work, 8 dollars a month. He was sent to VF-193 "Ghost Riders" to work F3H Demon single seat fighters at NAS Moffett CA outside of San Francisco and lost his flight pay, he said it just about broke him. He went to sea for the last time on the USS Bon Homme Richard (CVA-31) for a nine month around the world cruise, I remember when he came home, the ships galley had cooked a feast for dependents who had come to greet returning sailors, laid out on tables that seemed to stretch out as long as the ship. The ship itself was as big as a mountain and blotted out the sky. Two weeks later, my dad got orders to go back out to sea, and my mom was extremely unhappy about that, so my dad crossed over to the Air Force. The Air Force was very happy to have him and put him on their biggest avionics headache of the day, the F-106A. Convair's F-106 was supposed to be the "ultimate interceptor," and some 2,000 of them were to be built, but only about 400 were built. They were tasked with defending the US against a Soviet bomber attack, so when thousands of US servicemen were being sent to Vietnam, my dad stayed home. Until the "Pueblo Incident" that is, with so many F-4 Phantom committed to the USAFE and Vietnam, the government decided to rotate F-106 squadrons to South Korea until the communist North calmed down. My dad was NCOIC of the avionics shop of the 48th FIS at Langley VA at the time and spent most of 1968 TDY in Korea. There were rumors that the 'Darts had shot down some North Korean MiGs, but the Air Force never confirmed or admitted to it. My dad retired from military service in 1970, the North Korean communists complicated his cold war status at the beginning and end of his time in the military...
I got to go to the bridge of no return once with the XO from this ship. It was surreal to see him stare across that bridge and imagine what he’s been through.
I remember the whole event, later I read the book "My Story" by Commander Bucher. The Navy stuck this little former US Army ship out there off the coast of N. Korea with no back-up and no support plans what-so ever. God help anyone who has to serve in such a navy.
Agreed. The US military has, I'm afraid, been utterly compromised, and Americans can nil longer count on them. Former military, possibly, but today's crop? forgetaboutit.
I was thinking the same. Court Marshal? BS! They sent them out ill equipped for defense of the ship, and no plans for support should the shyt hit the fan. The USS Pueblo was set up for failure if you ask me.
@@montanahiker48 He wasnt talking about brave individuals being willing to rescue them after they were captured. Hes talking about the Navy sending a little spit-kit with no meaningful weapons close to a country that is bat-shit crazy, and has just recently sent an armed force into a neighboring country to assassinate their president, without a destroyer or two in plain sight so they dont try to hijack it in the first place.
I knew a CWO2 supply officer on the USS Midway that was on the Pueblo when this happened, he was a E-1 MS when it happened. The base newspaper did a story on him in the early 90s about it.
Our ship, the USS Coral Sea, was sailing for Australia for R&R when the Pueblo was captured. We had completed approximately two months patrolling the Tonkin Gulf launching missions on North Vietnam. We were almost across the equator when our ships captain announced the capture of the Pueblo. Everyone on board that I knew wanted to bomb the hell our of the North and rescue the captured crew. Eventually after some weeks we were relieved and returned to Japan to resupply and get some shore leave. To this day I feel sorry for the poor Japanese that had to endure an aircraft carrier battle groups wild and crazy antics. Me included!
I was on Chicago (CG-11), we were just finishing up a PIRAZ tour, when we were diverted north. Like you, bomb the hell was my thought also. BTW A High school buddy was crew
Hmm. Same old story of putting troops in impossible situations with no support. Then blame them when they fail to save the ones that ordered them there’s asses.
@@charlestorruella8591 This was real life, not TV "Mission Impossible". North Korea should never have been allowed to get away with it. Then again, disallowing hot pursuit of USSR, I mean North Vietnam's MIGs was a catastrophic decision. So a precedent was set. The safety and effectiveness of the troops sacrificed on the altar of expediency.
Great video!! Good book to read about this event: The Pueblo Incident: A Spy Ship and the Failure of American Foreign Policy. According to the author, even though the .50 Cals were tarped over as a sign of non-aggression, at least one of them was encrusted in ice. Also, when PUEBLO was under attack and begging for help over the radio - there even was a US aircraft carrier not too far away from its position that was willing to launch an airstrike against the North Korean forces but was ordered to stand-down. Also remember reading that an American airbase in Japan was willing to fly at maximum speed to help out but were also ordered to stand down. Well, since you did a video about USS PUBLO, you may as well do a video about the USS LIBERTY incident with Israel in 1967 & the USS MAYAGUEZ incident with Cambodia in 1975. U.S. "spy" ships just did not have any luck/support back in them days. Cannot image sailing into potential hostile waters on a flimsy ship with barely any weapons to protect yourself with and then the un-imaginable happens. The 1970 song, "Ride Captain Ride", by Blue Image is "supposedly" in honor of the USS PUEBLO incident.
Poor liberty I have a lot of good pictures and articles on her. Too many times we shoulda smashed these clowns testing us but officials back in the states too weak to stand up.
My best friend jerry was on the uss Mayaguez .the incident was buried for years . His father spent over 30 yrs under ther ocean on subs .RIP Senior rear chief Remington .
This sounds like dear old Johnson. Several months later, I was on a mountain top in Germany in August 1968 watching a radar screen, at the American Air Force staffed southern aircraft corridor directing air planes flying to and from Frankfort and Berlin. All I could see of the Russian invasion was a thin stream of chaff from the east on my screen to Prague airport. The commanding general flew in to that airport the night before on a commercial air plane. The next morning the first Russian plane to arrive was loaded with soldiers who took over the airport and aircraft controllers who took over the control tower. Even the local German nationals knew in late 1967 that there were Russian tanks staged on the East German border with the Czech Republic ready for action... Nothing was done, overtly, by our government to stop or interfere with this Russian invasion of the Czech Republic.
Everyone forgets that the Pueblo's sister ship, USS Liberty, had been attacked by Israel during the 6-day War the year before. There was no retaliation against that attack, so the North Koreans felt free to assault this ship.
USS Liberty (AGTR-5) was a Belmont-class technical research ship (i.e. electronic spy ship) that was misidentified and attacked by Israel Defense Forces during the 1967 Six-Day War. She was originally built and served in World War II as a VC2-S-AP3 type Victory cargo ship named SS Simmons Victory. I don't think they were even the same size with the Pueblo being much smaller, being of the Banner class of ships.
Keep up the great docs. I would love to see more on the battles between the koreas in the late 60s that went unreported mainly due to Vietnam. My dad was there with the US Army he told me small bits and pieces of things but would love to learn more.
If you want to read an amazing book about the Korean war, check out "the coldest winter" by david halberstam. He was an stellar author and does the subject justice. A riviting tale with eye opening details that bring the confilct to life, on the battlefield, and behind the scenes. I highly recommend it!
I arrived in Korea 4 months after their return, spent over13 months on the DMZ, and your dad was right. If there were no bodies or wounded, the Army acted like the fire fights did not happen. Fire fights with infiltrators were short and intense. Kept us on our toes!
I was on the Enterprise just departing Sasebo. I was a reactor operator on watch when the CO called down on the Bitchbox and stated "If required to initiate battle short, this is my authorization to do so. Battle short removed all automatic protection from the reactors. A few minutes later Central control called out an all stations to ignore the engine order telegraph, initiate battle short, and open the throttles all the way. This has never been done even during sea trials. We initiated battle short, opened the throttles to the mechanical limits. Reactor power rose to 115% on all eight reactors. When I got off watch I usually went up to the hanger bay to stretch my legs but this time the hanger bay was closed off with marines guards, the weaps personnel were loading nukes. The fantail deck was closed off and the jet shop at the stern was shut down and evaced because the rooster tail had the entire deck awash. The pit sword said we were doing in excess of 50 knots, its limit was 50 and the pointer was well past that, up against the zero peg.. The guys in Nav noted we were at 62 knots. Apparently this record has never come close to being broken. We sat just off the 12 mile limit of DPRK for 93 days with planes loaded with nukes ready to bomb the Koreans to dust.
@@alexmelia8873 You forget that in standard nautical engineering, the length the beam ratio determines the maximum speed and 65 had the longest length to beam ration of any ship, plus the power involved. The 100% design speed of the ship has never been advertised but on sea trials after refueling in 1970, is did exceed the maximum range of the pit sword which is 50 knots. It is also known that above a given speed a flat bottomed ship rises and planes such that over the planing speed, speed increases far greater than the power demand are normal.
I was in Junior High School, Salina, Kansas, and remember that time, 1968. That was a very turbulent year with the Tet Offensive, LBJ not running for reelection, assassination of MLK and RFK and the Chicago riots. The only good things that year, was the music, Laugh-In and Apollo 8 orbited the Moon.
9:20 I wonder how many of those Admirals had ever faced a choice between surrendering, thus preserving the lives of their men, or fighting a hopless battle to the very end.
I remember that well. It was all over the news, I was 11 years old. A few years later, when I was in high school, we have the unique opportunity to hear a talk given by one, possibly two of the Pueblo crew members. I'm not sure if Bucher was on of them but they told us pretty much everything that went on.... we were in the Cafeteria room, and I sat pretty close to them - they described the torture and treatment they received at the hands of the N.Koreans. I remember they told us how they tried to resist and confound the N.Koreans, and one way was that they played "imaginary" golf where they would group off in twos or 4's (as the holding cells permitted) and they would behave as if they were actually playing golf.. teeing off, fairway shots, chip shots and putts, and they'd simulate walking from hole to hole, carrying imaginary golf bags...he said they would just totally flummox those captors with that, and the N.Koreans inability to understand the crew's behavior was unending source of (much needed) humor. RIP Bucher and the others who have passed. LBJ didn't you any favors.
LBJ did no one any favors....... This rotten son-of-a-bitch was a shit stain on the backside of America from day one. If the shooter in Dallas had moved his aim slightly to the right, it would have been a glorious day for the USA.
That young sailor that was killed, was from Creswell, OR, I was part of the honor guard at his funeral. There were a lot of us that were angry and wanted payback or to at least send some SF in to blowup the ship, making it less of a prize for the North Koreans. Leaving just a bunch of twisted steel on the bottom of the harbor
I also remember a made for TV movie about this with Hal Holbrook as the captain. It was as I remember quite harrowing and stirred emotions in my young mind . Walking home from elementary school in the early 70’s I really thought I’d end up drafted and sent to Vietnam. What a scary time that was. Today the world it isn’t any safer considering lessons learned.
We should have started seizing ALL North Korean ships until they returned all our sailors, ship and equipment. In addition to that we should have stopped any business dealing we had or any aid we doing with China, North Korea and Russia immediately until our conditions were met. Best Wishes & Blessings. Keith Noneya
I have been on this ship in 2012 when I was travelling to North Korea. They tell the story a bit differently of course. :D But very interesting to see this video and the true story behind it.
We used to have to guard Army bases with empty magazines in our rifles. It is no different having empty weapons on ships. Americans are always disposable to our government.
LOL!!! I remember doing that in West Germany during the 1980s. One time when I was on patrol my partner and I discovered the perimeter fence breached. We reported it ASAP and.... Yep - got my weapon, magazine, and NO ammo!! The good old days of insanity.
Really pisses me off how our US government hung the crews of the Pueblo and Liberty out to dry. I joined the navy 12 years later and still thought that way. Treated almost as bad once returned home as they were on deployment.
That was the American mindset at that time. Many returning Vietnam vets got treated the same way by their own countrymen. And our government basically turned it's back on them even though a shit for brains president named Johnson caused it all...and for a totally fabricated reason. The second Bay of Tonkin incident NEVER happened. If you can ever get a chance to read the transcripts of the White House tapes at the beginning of the Vietnam fiasco it will really make your blood almost boil in anger. Johnson and McNamara invented the whole thing in an effort to try to get that POS re-elected! And it backfired on them!
One of my roommates at CTR "A" school was Ralph McClintock. He graduated early and was aboard the Pueblo when it was captured. And America did NOTHING! Thank you LBJ!
Pueblo seized January 23, 1968. Tet Offensive starts January 30, 1968. And on January 21, 1968 a B-52 carrying nuclear weapons crashed at Thule, Greenland. Must have been a busy week at the Pentagon.
I’m just an old soldier who has never set foot on a proper ship that didn’t have the word museum attached to it. But I would argue that the word “ship” in the phrase don’t give up the ship, refers to the crew. Not the steel hull. Letting them sink to the bottom would’ve served no purpose. Well done Captain.
Vic.. no offense, but 🙃FYI.. The Banner was at sea,, we were enroute, about 4 hrs away of relieving the Pueblo. That was supposed to have been our mission.. delayed by needing JP5 jet fuel error, sandblasted from our diesel tanks..🙃
I got to Yokosuka in February 1968 and was referring to after the taking of the Pueblo. I believe that the RADM at Yokosuka was relieved over this even though he had no assets to send. I was at the Naval Hospital and periodically talked to Banner crew while having physicals, etc. No offense taken. Long time ago.
If elected President of the United States, I will demand the Pueblo be returned or destroyed! This piracy will not stand EVER! 😁👍👍🇺🇲 And, right any wrongs done to her crew! 😁👍👍🇺🇲
There are three notable things that I would mention: 1) The song 'Ride, Captain, Ride' is supposed to be about the Pueblo Incident. 2) The ship's crew of the Pueblo during captivity in North Korea showed their North Korean guards the 'Hawaiian Good Luck' sign. The crew convinced their captors that the extended middle finger was this 'Hawaiian Good Luck' sign, and the US Navy crew regularly extended this greeting to the delighted North Koreans. Ironically this helped ease the tensions in captivity. 3) The Captain of the USS Pueblo fell out of favor in the US Navy for this incident and more importantly because in a prior US shore command, he was responsible for a US Navy Nuke Weapons storage facility., and he knew too much to be captured & interrogated. Of course this calls into question the wisdom of assigning this officer to the Pueblo and dangling the ship out close to North Korea!!!
My ship was at port in Guam when this happened. Later I met and became friends with a man who flew B52's at that time AND he (Bill) was stationed on Guam at that time. In talking with Bill he told me that every B52 on Guam was in the air circling Guam full of Nukes for delivery to N. Korea. Waiting for orders to proceed to N. Korea and bomb it. I am both sad and glad that it did not happen. I will say that the whole island of Guam shook for about 3 hours until the B52s were called off.
I remember that as a teenager. It was in the national news daily. It was egg on the face for the top brass in Washington. It’s my opinion that the Pueblo incident was the catalyst for the turning point of public opposition to the war in Vietnam and public protests in the streets here that continued for years.
They didn't "tap into US coms" because of this incident, they already had access to all US transmissions that they could pick up via radio. John Walker was already selling them the plans and repair manuals to the communications equipment, they already had what they needed, the capture of the machine barely sped up the progress as they no longer needed to build the machines from the repair manuals. Additionally, the codes used for decryption at this time were single use. So if they wanted to decrypt US coms, they needed to listen to all US transmissions (with some criteria of exactly when and where to listen), record the transmission, and then use the proper code to decrypt it. Sure Walker sold them several codes, but it would have allowed the soviets only single transmissions, not unfettered access to US coms. Besides, they got far more information directly from Walker himself than they ever did listening in on radio transmissions. The hysteria of what the soviets did or didn't steal is often over exaggerated. Clearly all they stole couldn't stop their collapse, given they can't even rival their own former bloc state using old NATO equipment, it's safe to say they never were at risk of taking on NATO powers. Their 'modern tanks' were obliterated by US 1980s weapons systems...
The Soviets couldn't build the KW-37's as they lacked the integrated chip facilities & other advanced electronics in the device. What you said about the codes is true, but the Soviets had access to RATT which was the backbone of naval message traffic until the early 90's. This gave them access to a lot of US classified message traffic including secret no-foreign CIA reports, & TS material. For ex. Naval security group, along with other special access programs had their own crypto codes which kept them safe from the Soviets prying eyes.
@@terrywilson4166 I seem to remember the TM's the Walker's sold were for the KW-7. After they were outed no clas traffic went on them except for Flash precedence.
@@mysterj1 I always thought it was the KW-37 as they were all removed in the early 90's when I was a ET. It may have been the KW-7 but those were long gone before I got to the fleet.
Bucher is pronounced like “Booker” as it was derived from “bookmaker”. The commando raid by NK was prior to the seizure of the Pueblo, not after. LTC Bucher was not informed of the raid which would have caused an immediate exodus from the area. NK expected retaliation and probably thought the Pueblo was part of a military response. The entire incident was a massive navy debacle yet it may have saved the world from nuclear destruction. Had Bucher kept running the ship would have been sunk and probably every crewman killed. That act of war on top of NK’s attempt to assassinate the SK president would have led to massive retaliation during a time the world was already on the edge of nuclear war. The surrender prevented direct military action by the United States and SK. It is not a stretch to say that the crew of the Pueblo saved the world . More specifically, fireman Duane Hodges who was mortally wounded below deck from a shell fired through the side saved the world. When Bucher went below deck and watched Hodges die from a horrific wound he probably saw the fate of himself and the entire crew. He did the best thing in an impossible situation and surrendered the ship, likely saving humanity from a worse fate.
buch is German for book and is pronounced similarly but a bit harder and longer on the double o's. Many people want to Anglicize the "ch" sound from 'k' to how it sounds in the word chow.
@@garymartin9777 Exactly. i didn’t try to be precise. I interviewed Rose Bucher in 2008 and she told me the origins of the name. It was the 40th anniversary of their release. She was an amazing woman. It’s too bad the creators of this video didn’t get into that part of the story. 1968 was “bookmarked” by the Pueblo incident. 11 months to the day. Her efforts to keep the 82 survivors in the minds of Americans with her “Remember the Pueblo” campaign was incredible. Pete Bucher became a very talented artist in his later years. I lived around the corner of the parents of Duane Hodges in 1968. The flagpole in the front yard his father installed after Duane’s death is still there. The memorial to Duane in downtown Creswell Oregon quotes the words of Jesus. “Greater love has no one than this that he lay down his life for his friends.”
IMO, its almost criminally neglectful to allow an essentially unarmed vessel near enemy waters without some level of combat support; especially following many violent North Korean border incursions.
The commanding officer was a Commander, not a Lieutenant Commander. If you look at your own photos you will see he has "scrambled eggs" on his cover (hat).
As a teenager I was living at Misawa Air Base in Japan, where my dad was stationed. I remember this incident & it was a very intense time to be that close to North Korea because every unit on the base was at high alert. There was a unit that had a listening antennae that was huge, It was nicknamed the "elephant cage". It was probably a half mile across and rumored to be the site that relayed all radio communications from that incident. Most people don't realize that we are technically still at war with North Korea. In the 1950's war was not officially declared & a cease fire agreement was signed but no peace treaty.
I just watched Drachinifel's video on the Pueblo lol. Crazy how two channels I'm subscribed to posted a video on the same ship within two days of each other.
I was in the U.S. Air Force when they took the Pueblo. We went on alert at Norton AFB in California and spent the night in the engine shop waiting to see what was going to happen. The next day my roommate who was a staff sergeant was sent TDY to Korea equipped with all the cold weather gear the Air Force had. He came back months later after being finally being sent to Vietnam still packing all that cold weather gear😳😊
It is exactly the kind of boat used in Mr. Roberts. The boat used in Mr. Roberts is currently docked at Fishermen's Terminal in Seattle Washington. Its current name is Seabird.
i was serving at Ft Benning when the Pueblo was seized, I remember seeing the report of it's seizure come over the leletype machine on the 5th floor of the HQ building. In 1089 I was in Korea on a very remote radio site and remember grtting a call from the CO telling us to be on the lopokout for infiltrators - nobody got any sleep on that site that night. The failure of the US to respond to both these provocations just emboldened the communists. We were lucky to have a CG (Gen Bonesteel) who was a no nonsense commander that made NK pay dearly for any incursions south of the 38th parallel.
US dropped the Ball in assuming No One would attack. Also, not having a Rapid Deployment Aircraft/Navy ready to intervene in the Pueblo behalf. Thanks.
Spy ships and aircraft are always unprotected, especially back then. And now, look at the spy drone that the Russians took down just a few weeks ago near Ukraine. No people involved, but still an illegal attack on an USAF warcraft in international waters (drones can be configured to fire weapons). A few wagging fingers is about it. At the geopolitical level, everything is weighed against greater goals. Just glad no servicemen were involved in this one. Servicemen are always pawns in some greater conflict.
i mean, this has clearly been researched from the US side of things, where when you deeply look into it, you'll note a few things there were a lot of reports of the ship crossing the 12 mile limit, a number of times before the interception, which even after the ship started to retreat seems to be universally (apart form the US, which in public records of the time changed the distance claimed seemingly every other week) agreed that it happened within 8 miles of sure the US reaction was to deny it was their ship, to deny that the sailors were Navy, or intelligence gathering etc etc etc, and pretty much refuted each and every claim that north korea made, and I am fairly sure that if given a chance the US would have deny that it was a boat and claimed it was a kayak if they could, only changing/admitting to elements when there was no other place to refute hell to this day, the US still deny basic things like the purpose etc of the ship
1:00 It should be noted that if the North Korean position reports of the USS Pueblo are accurate, the ship would have had to spend quite a while moving at well over 100 knots *AND* it would have had to spend time traveling over land.
A few years ago at Annapolis ran into some pueblo crew members and told them the USS Bon Homme Richard was just off the coast with the USS Enterprise ready to go in we waited days but then sent to Yankee station. They said they new we were out there but we left
Please clarify. Pictures of Pres. Johnson and Gov. Reagan were shown on this video. Johnson because he was president during the capture and 11 month imprisonment and toruture of the crew. What part did then Gov. Reagan play in the release of these American servicemen. "I am ashamed of the way we have failed to take a position, and many Americans feel the same." Viewers can do their own research (outside of this video) on the handling of this crisis.
during negotiations with Korea in the future The US should use the Pueblo as an issue to demand return of the Pueblo in trade for some facilitation or concession. The Pueblo has been a prisoner of North Korea in the mind of the leadership of the country ever since its capture, being forced to exchange it for something more useful to their future success in formal public negotiations would shift relations in favor of long term stability. bringing the Pueblo back to the United States would honor the men who endured capture by the North Korean Military.
Did you really think showing a pile of 22 Long Rifle rounds at 4:11 would add to the video? Every person thats ever handled guns knows exactly what they are! Scary 22 rounds.... Cone on..
Was a Navy Electronics Technician in the Philippines when this went down. We had to change out all of the codes worldwide within 24 hrs. We were real close to WE3 that day.
They just another bunch of haters that's all. Fat boy always trying to get one over on the US and failing miserably wallowing in his diabetic anger as the heaviest set man in North Korea.
@@PixelmechanicYYZ There seems to be some difference of opinions on this. Wikipedia mentions that the Arizona is not perpetually commissioned but is allowed always to fly the flag. Britanica says that the Arizona was symbolically recommissioned in 1950.
It's been my impression since forever that the USS Arizona remains a permanently commissioned vessel in the United States Navy. When visiting Honolulu Hawaii in the early 1980's the voice tape commentary on the boat trip that took tourist out there described the USS Arizona as still being a commissioned ship in the US Navy. This was out of respect for all Sailors killed during the Japanese sneek attack on September 7th 1941.
I was in South Korea in 1974 and we camped on the beach and a North Korean gunboat shot over our camp at a missile site that was up on a hill. That Gunboat was way closer than 12 miles more like a half a mile
Why did the N. Koreans want the ship? They didn't. What could they do with the ship? Nothing. But the Soviets wanted the coding machines. The Navy was convinced that no one could use the equipment to read American traffic and so were totally negligent in operating the ship. The machines couldn't be operated without the daily code updates. But the Walker family spy ring provided the Soviets with all the software that was necessary to use the machines to read the coded traffic they had been collecting, for over a decade. Did the U.S. capture the Walkers? No -- Walker's wife, herself a spy, turned Walker in and the whole family enterprise collapsed.
Because of the Pueblo, the crypto gear was installed on some destroyers and cruisers. I was assigned to one of those destroyers. Made for a really fun Med cruise. The only time we were around the US Navy was if we needed gas or groceries. It also got us our of plane guard duty (for US carriers)
During 1970-1971 I served in Vietnam working with that same top secret coding equipment allegedly reverse-engineered by the Soviets. That equipment used key cards to enter the codes used for that day, changed at the same time in equipment all over the world in land bases, ships, and even embassies. The cards were used once and then destroyed. Without those cards the equipment would be useless. Before the Pueblo even reached the North Korean port, fresh code cards would have been issued worldwide to existing crypto equipment subscribers. Coded US Military communication was never "monitored" by the Soviets.
All of our equipment racks had stickers on them reading, "Remember the Pueblo!" All of our equipment had blocks of Thermite sitting on top, with the detonation wires hanging in plain sight. The Thermite could be set off with virtually any electrical source, from a cranking field phone to a single D-cell battery. Our issued M-16s with lots of ammo were kept at the communication center, and our prime mission was to defend the building at all costs. If it looked like it was going to be overrun the Thermite would be set off and everything would be destroyed, including the safe holding the key cards.
During our Thermite training the instructor set a Thermite grenade, about the size of a beer can, on a dead truck engine and pulled the pin. Within 30 seconds, the Thermite had burned completely through the block, leaving globs of molten slag underneath. The ultimate shredder.
That's cool
Thank you for your service.
I was serving in a similar role doing communications and cryptography work on the same gear at that time as part of the USAF. At locations in the US and Europe, the Thermite was not installed, but anywhere in Asia it was at installed at ground locations. Thermite and ships and aircraft is a bad deal given it can melt through the hull. But we got a lot of training from lessons learned from the Pueblo.
Many of the circuit boards in the equipment were labeled Secret, but the Top Secret component was just the key cards (think an old IBM computer card with punched holes).
We had to contend with Russian spy ships all the time given most communications was by airwaves (HF) and the security of our encryption was key. I was also never aware that any communications were compromised. But possibly briefly interrupted.
When I took a tour through the Vietnamese war museum in old Saigon in the 90's, I saw intact examples of the same equipment in the former US Command bunker (and now museum) in Saigon. Those could have easily been destroyed during the US withdrawal, but weren't, proving that it wasn't the equipment that mattered, but the one-time usage key cards, which are specific to the end points of any link (only two cards of each code are made, one for each end of a link) and distributed by military couriers carrying locked cases chained to their wrists with associated protection. Having the cards stolen (capturing the courier) was useless given if the case had been opened or courier intercepted or delayed, all the codes inside were instantly invalidated, and so could not be used by an enemy.
Pueblo crew would have destroyed Top Secret documents and key cards first, and then work their way down to the equipment, which is very robust hardware and hard to destroy without Thermite. We had axes at all locations, and were supposed to use them if destruction was necessary. But it would have taken time to bust up that equipment in its heavy steel cases. Taking out the classified circuit boards and busting those up would have been the first act. Burning the Top Secret cards and paperwork would have been done in the facility if needed.
Bottom line, the Pueblo capture was very bad for the crew, but it wasn't an event that led to a compromise of American military communications. The system was designed with this eventuality in mind.
I am surprised that the Peoblo was not abandoned and destroyed/sunk by the commander! Guess someone wanted our the Enemies to obtain all our secret communication equipment! Seams like the Dumbocrats are alway giving our Military Equipment to the Enemy, this one was LB Johnson, last one was Afganistan and was Biden!
Been a very long time since I've even thought of that equipment and the things we did to operate and maintain it. "Dark Seas" does take a bit of liberty here in making statements that any of us that were in service at the time would know was completely bogus.
Myself a Former enlisted Navy man. I sat next to Commander Lloyd Bucher at a Boys Town Dinner in the 1970s. He treated me as an equal. It would have been a pleasure to have served in his command. He was the kindest military man I had ever met.
Some of his crew, including some of the officers, held a different opinion. But he was placed in command of a poorly equipped ship that was badly in need of extensive time for refitting and repairing. He was also a sub sailor, not a surface sailor.
My father-in-law was Ops Offer on the Pueblo and I assure you no such opinion was ever offered in my presence.
I find it supremely disrespectful, at best.
If you do not know these men you have no business speaking for them.
Remember the Pueblo.
RIP Carl Schumacher
Probably one of the most technologically advanced ships in the North Korean navy.
I remember when this happened. I still believe we should have at least gone in and sank the ship if we weren't going to take it back.
Captain of the ship should have ordered the sea-cocks opened, and let her go down.
We should have sank the North Korea fleet first.
It's not too late !
@@DARisse-ji1yw
I was thinking the same thing.......This would be a fine hobby activity for some retired specialists in that sort of thing.
Kim should be told in 30 days our ship is going to be hit with a nuclear cruise missile. Where that happens is his choice.
I was over there at the time serving on a destroyer. We went North along with other ships and did NOTHING. We are still paying today for doing nothing to a bully and showing weakness.
When USA is the world's biggest bully over 99% of the time, uh, yeah sure...
Go look up how many nations USA have conducted coups in or tried to over the last year. Democratically elected is only worth something when you're obeying orders from USA, otherwise you're getting regimechange. Or John Bolton coming to meet you and "i know where your children live" as he did with the original chief of the OPCW when he didn't do what USA wanted.
USA also conveniently pretends that SOME places includes air exclusion zones, like the Taiwan ones that extend FAR into Chinese mainland, so they can complain about how horrible the Chinese are for flying in it, regardless the fact that they are usually in their own airspace when that happens.
To USA "freedom of navigation" means "anywhere we want to go, but noone else has this right anywhere near OUR coastlines".
That and the shootdown of PR-21. Incidents so heinous that even China and the USSR basically said they'd look the other way if the US wanted to retaliate.
Which ship were you on? If you don’t mind my asking. My dad was on a destroyer during the Tet as well
How would Americans react to spy ships all over their coast and countries telling them how they should be running the country? Maybe America should stay at home and sort out there laughing stock of a country. Only intelligent Americans that travel realise how much the rest of the world laughs at the USA.
I was on the aircraft carrier USS Coral Sea. Read my comments.
The problem with international waters claim is that NK always claimed a keep-out zone of 50 nm for foreign military vessels. Navy brass knew this and sent Pueblo within that anyway without any real means of defense. Someone in the Pentagon should have fried for this but of course they did not and we don't even remember their names. Bucher acted reasonably and valiantly in the best traditions of the Navy. Sacrificing himself and crew would have served little purpose. The Pueblo should have been bombed and destroyed long ago.
They should have been shadowed by a sub that took out those ships when they approached.
Being in the Pentagon means never having to say sorry. Ask the idiots who engineered the route in Afghanistan. Speaking of frying.
By acknowledging the pretend done of 50 nm would give it credit.
There was an excellent TV movie about this incident, simply titled "Pueblo" back in the 70's. Hal Holbrook played the Captain. I don't know if it is still available, but it is worth watching if you can find it.
It is on RUclips Pueblo very long
And it won emmies.
Note Hal Holbrook also played Cmdr. Joe Rochfort in the movie Midway.
CAPT Lloyd Bucher also wrote a book.
Lyndon Johnson.
@@Oldman808, Johnson was such a turd he made Jimmy Carter almost look intelligent. What most people don't know about him is that he and McNamara made up that ruse about the second Bay of Tonkin incident as a way of getting him re-elected (thankfully it didn't happen). It NEVER happened but he managed to convince enough of the top brass in the Pentagon that we wound up in a fiasco that only served to get a lot of our young men killed (including many of my buddies and some high school classmates), a lot of money wasted and the NVA far better equipped than the Russians had ever been able to do for them. Apparently that lesson didn't get taken to heart because the present turd in the White House did the same thing in frantically pulling our troops out of Afghanistan!
I am fairly sure N'Kotea was not a nuclear power then.
Ussr was
Right, Bill Clinton gave them nuclear reactors.
Stalin gave Kim all he needed and they did have the A bomb then so russia would have gladly gave it to them against us/nato
No however they were working on it. The Soviet Union had already helped them build Uranium enrichment facilities along with giving them technical expertisefor that purpose. Plus the Soviets were major North Korean Allies who had Nuclear Capabilities. So if a conflict did break out they surely would've gone to North Korea's Aid.
It wouldn't be the last time the US promised nuclear force with North Korea. Don't forget about the later axe murder.
Crazy to send them there with no backup anywhere. No ship, no plane, nothing for thousands of miles. And then to blame them that they given up the ship, thats the navy for you
My father in law commanded the Talos Missile battery on the USS Oklahoma City off the coast of North Korea during the Pueblo incident and we just recently found out that the missiles were nuclear tipped when it was just declassified a couple years back.
If anything, Naval Command should have been relieved, just for the bad publicity, if not for parking an unarmed vessel so close to the coast of a country technically still at war with the USA. The captain and the crew were scapegoats, mistreated by their own leadership.
What else is new?
@tdkeyes1. Exactly who do you think the Naval Command is since you used extremely broad words and who do you think the Naval Command gets their orders from? Also, this is the name of the game, subterfuge and espionage, and it’s a dangerous one.
Lastly, you don’t give up the ship and allow our enemies a chance to get their hands on equipment. That’s not scapegoating and investigations are warranted.
@@sharpright6887 Whoever ordered the ship to go there, unprepared, is the one who should have been canned. At the least, knowing the sensitivity of the mission and the exposure of an essentially unarmed ship, there should have been demolition charges pre-placed. Obviously the US Navy didn't think. Hubris is the root of this.
@@tdkeyes1 If there wasn't someone or someway to destroy all the most valuable equipment fast then the navy or whoever assigned people and equipment to that boat failed them.
There were a bunch of admirals and navy captains who should have faced disciplinary action for their roles in this project. SECNAV had responsibility also.
My dad joined the US Navy in 1950 when he turned 17. After spending time as an armorer loading bombs on Skyraiders on a carrier during the Korean War, he wound up working on Martin P4M-1Q Mercator spy planes at NAS Port Lyautey in French Morocco. They were armed with radar directed 20mm cannon so the squadron commander sent my dad and some others to avionics school in Tennessee. After that, the Soviets shot down at least one Mercator and others were lost mysteriously. Also, parts became scarce and the Navy disbanded the squadron and sent my dad to NAS Sanford to work AJ-2 Savage carrier capable nuclear attack bombers with VAH-9, and he made a few more deployments to Port Lyautey with them. After he met and married my mom, the Navy sent him to the Naval Ordnance Test Station China Lake CA, about as far as you could get from Florida and still be in the continental US, and that's where I came along. Dad got flight pay for going up in airplanes to prove out his avionics work, 8 dollars a month. He was sent to VF-193 "Ghost Riders" to work F3H Demon single seat fighters at NAS Moffett CA outside of San Francisco and lost his flight pay, he said it just about broke him. He went to sea for the last time on the USS Bon Homme Richard (CVA-31) for a nine month around the world cruise, I remember when he came home, the ships galley had cooked a feast for dependents who had come to greet returning sailors, laid out on tables that seemed to stretch out as long as the ship. The ship itself was as big as a mountain and blotted out the sky. Two weeks later, my dad got orders to go back out to sea, and my mom was extremely unhappy about that, so my dad crossed over to the Air Force. The Air Force was very happy to have him and put him on their biggest avionics headache of the day, the F-106A. Convair's F-106 was supposed to be the "ultimate interceptor," and some 2,000 of them were to be built, but only about 400 were built. They were tasked with defending the US against a Soviet bomber attack, so when thousands of US servicemen were being sent to Vietnam, my dad stayed home. Until the "Pueblo Incident" that is, with so many F-4 Phantom committed to the USAFE and Vietnam, the government decided to rotate F-106 squadrons to South Korea until the communist North calmed down. My dad was NCOIC of the avionics shop of the 48th FIS at Langley VA at the time and spent most of 1968 TDY in Korea. There were rumors that the 'Darts had shot down some North Korean MiGs, but the Air Force never confirmed or admitted to it. My dad retired from military service in 1970, the North Korean communists complicated his cold war status at the beginning and end of his time in the military...
I got to go to the bridge of no return once with the XO from this ship. It was surreal to see him stare across that bridge and imagine what he’s been through.
Ive been there as well. Moving, to say the least. My good friend was stationed at the DMZ and gave me a tour that most others never got.
I remember the whole event, later I read the book "My Story" by Commander Bucher. The Navy stuck this little former US Army ship out there off the coast of N. Korea with no back-up and no support plans what-so ever. God help anyone who has to serve in such a navy.
Agreed. The US military has, I'm afraid, been utterly compromised, and Americans can nil longer count on them. Former military, possibly, but today's crop? forgetaboutit.
I was thinking the same. Court Marshal? BS! They sent them out ill equipped for defense of the ship, and no plans for support should the shyt hit the fan. The USS Pueblo was set up for failure if you ask me.
Just like they did with the USS Liberty. Sent a spy ship in to the Mediterranean to monitor the 6 day war without any cover or support.
@@montanahiker48 He wasnt talking about brave individuals being willing to rescue them after they were captured. Hes talking about the Navy sending a little spit-kit with no meaningful weapons close to a country that is bat-shit crazy, and has just recently sent an armed force into a neighboring country to assassinate their president, without a destroyer or two in plain sight so they dont try to hijack it in the first place.
I knew a CWO2 supply officer on the USS Midway that was on the Pueblo when this happened, he was a E-1 MS when it happened. The base newspaper did a story on him in the early 90s about it.
Who’s idiotic idea was it to have the pueblo out there unprotected? Boggles the mind at the stupidity!
Our ship, the USS Coral Sea, was sailing for Australia for R&R when the Pueblo was captured. We had completed approximately two months patrolling the Tonkin Gulf launching missions on North Vietnam. We were almost across the equator when our ships captain announced the capture of the Pueblo. Everyone on board that I knew wanted to bomb the hell our of the North and rescue the captured crew. Eventually after some weeks we were relieved and returned to Japan to resupply and get some shore leave. To this day I feel sorry for the poor Japanese that had to endure an aircraft carrier battle groups wild and crazy antics. Me included!
I was on Chicago (CG-11), we were just finishing up a PIRAZ tour, when we were diverted north. Like you, bomb the hell was my thought also.
BTW A High school buddy was crew
New Clear Weapons don't exist and New Clear Power is Water Turbines.
All Wars are Fake & MM = 33.
Hmm. Same old story of putting troops in impossible situations with no support. Then blame them when they fail to save the ones that ordered them there’s asses.
THEY WEREN'T IN AN IMPOSSIBLE SITUATION THEY WHERE SPYING ITS WHAT THEY DO THEY UNDERSTAND WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF THEY ARE CAUGHT
@@charlestorruella8591 And the captain violated the code of conduct.
@@charlestorruella8591 This was real life, not TV "Mission Impossible". North Korea should never have been allowed to get away with it. Then again, disallowing hot pursuit of USSR, I mean North Vietnam's MIGs was a catastrophic decision. So a precedent was set. The safety and effectiveness of the troops sacrificed on the altar of expediency.
They didn’t give him ammo yet had the Gaul to give him shit for “Giving up a ship”. Wtf?
God bless and keep the soul that America forgot. The soldier who died during the gunfire that occurred after the captain was injured.
Fireman Duane Hodges
I'm always here staying tuned. Here in the High Plains border of Southern Colorado.. I wouldn't want to miss any of your broadcasts.
Great video!! Good book to read about this event: The Pueblo Incident: A Spy Ship and the Failure of American Foreign Policy. According to the author, even though the .50 Cals were tarped over as a sign of non-aggression, at least one of them was encrusted in ice. Also, when PUEBLO was under attack and begging for help over the radio - there even was a US aircraft carrier not too far away from its position that was willing to launch an airstrike against the North Korean forces but was ordered to stand-down. Also remember reading that an American airbase in Japan was willing to fly at maximum speed to help out but were also ordered to stand down.
Well, since you did a video about USS PUBLO, you may as well do a video about the USS LIBERTY incident with Israel in 1967 & the USS MAYAGUEZ incident with Cambodia in 1975. U.S. "spy" ships just did not have any luck/support back in them days. Cannot image sailing into potential hostile waters on a flimsy ship with barely any weapons to protect yourself with and then the un-imaginable happens.
The 1970 song, "Ride Captain Ride", by Blue Image is "supposedly" in honor of the USS PUEBLO incident.
Poor liberty I have a lot of good pictures and articles on her. Too many times we shoulda smashed these clowns testing us but officials back in the states too weak to stand up.
My best friend jerry was on the uss Mayaguez .the incident was buried for years . His father spent over 30 yrs under ther ocean on subs .RIP Senior rear chief Remington .
This sounds like dear old Johnson.
Several months later, I was on a mountain top in Germany in August 1968 watching a radar screen, at the American Air Force staffed southern aircraft corridor directing air planes flying to and from Frankfort and Berlin. All I could see of the Russian invasion was a thin stream of chaff from the east on my screen to Prague airport. The commanding general flew in to that airport the night before on a commercial air plane. The next morning the first Russian plane to arrive was loaded with soldiers who took over the airport and aircraft controllers who took over the control tower.
Even the local German nationals knew in late 1967 that there were Russian tanks staged on the East German border with the Czech Republic ready for action...
Nothing was done, overtly, by our government to stop or interfere with this Russian invasion of the Czech Republic.
And worse, the Liberty was (dang near) sunk by one of our own allies, who without enormous US support would have ceased to exist decades prior.
They should have just kept on going east, come what may, out of there. Those fast small chase boats only had a limited fuel supply, no doubt.
Yep and scuttled it when hope was lost.
They may have been able to outdistance the torpedo boats depending on their respective speeds, but they couldn't outrun the Migs.
@@brianwilson6403 lol they have even less loiter time
Right. Fact is the made the WRONG call and gave up like the cowards they all are.
They are a massive disgrace on the US navy.
@@festungkurland9804 nothing stops them from sending in other airplanes to relieve eachother.
Everyone forgets that the Pueblo's sister ship, USS Liberty, had been attacked by Israel during the 6-day War the year before. There was no retaliation against that attack, so the North Koreans felt free to assault this ship.
I was just going to point out that these two sisters have horrible luck!
USS Liberty (AGTR-5) was a Belmont-class technical research ship (i.e. electronic spy ship) that was misidentified and attacked by Israel Defense Forces during the 1967 Six-Day War. She was originally built and served in World War II as a VC2-S-AP3 type Victory cargo ship named SS Simmons Victory. I don't think they were even the same size with the Pueblo being much smaller, being of the Banner class of ships.
Keep up the great docs. I would love to see more on the battles between the koreas in the late 60s that went unreported mainly due to Vietnam. My dad was there with the US Army he told me small bits and pieces of things but would love to learn more.
These aren’t really “docs”…. They’re more for entertainment than anything
If you want to read an amazing book about the Korean war, check out "the coldest winter" by david halberstam. He was an stellar author and does the subject justice. A riviting tale with eye opening details that bring the confilct to life, on the battlefield, and behind the scenes. I highly recommend it!
I arrived in Korea 4 months after their return, spent over13 months on the DMZ, and your dad was right. If there were no bodies or wounded, the Army acted like the fire fights did not happen. Fire fights with infiltrators were short and intense. Kept us on our toes!
I was on the Enterprise just departing Sasebo. I was a reactor operator on watch when the CO called down on the Bitchbox and stated "If required to initiate battle short, this is my authorization to do so. Battle short removed all automatic protection from the reactors. A few minutes later Central control called out an all stations to ignore the engine order telegraph, initiate battle short, and open the throttles all the way. This has never been done even during sea trials. We initiated battle short, opened the throttles to the mechanical limits. Reactor power rose to 115% on all eight reactors. When I got off watch I usually went up to the hanger bay to stretch my legs but this time the hanger bay was closed off with marines guards, the weaps personnel were loading nukes. The fantail deck was closed off and the jet shop at the stern was shut down and evaced because the rooster tail had the entire deck awash. The pit sword said we were doing in excess of 50 knots, its limit was 50 and the pointer was well past that, up against the zero peg.. The guys in Nav noted we were at 62 knots. Apparently this record has never come close to being broken. We sat just off the 12 mile limit of DPRK for 93 days with planes loaded with nukes ready to bomb the Koreans to dust.
There is no way any ship is doing twice the speed with only 15% more power. The hull speed of a CV is probably in the 40kt range
Should of bomb them to dust.
@@alexmelia8873 You forget that in standard nautical engineering, the length the beam ratio determines the maximum speed and 65 had the longest length to beam ration of any ship, plus the power involved. The 100% design speed of the ship has never been advertised but on sea trials after refueling in 1970, is did exceed the maximum range of the pit sword which is 50 knots. It is also known that above a given speed a flat bottomed ship rises and planes such that over the planing speed, speed increases far greater than the power demand are normal.
The USS Bon Homme Richard was off your Port with two F 8s ready to launch with some strange looking bombs under the wing's
Thank you for your service sir.
4:11 lmao the b roll footage of 22lr😂💀 .. truly the most feared show of force in any naval encounter.
I was in Junior High School, Salina, Kansas, and remember that time, 1968. That was a very turbulent year with the Tet Offensive, LBJ not running for reelection, assassination of MLK and RFK and the Chicago riots. The only good things that year, was the music, Laugh-In and Apollo 8 orbited the Moon.
USS Scorpion was lost that year too. But we had that nice Earthrise picture by Anders of Apollo 8
@@shengyi1701 I forgot about the USS Scorpion but remember the Czech rebellion and the USSR entered Prague.
9:20 I wonder how many of those Admirals had ever faced a choice between surrendering, thus preserving the lives of their men, or fighting a hopless battle to the very end.
USUAL TOP SIDE PROTECTING THEM SELVES.
I remember that well. It was all over the news, I was 11 years old. A few years later, when I was in high school, we have the unique opportunity to hear a talk given by one, possibly two of the Pueblo crew members. I'm not sure if Bucher was on of them but they told us pretty much everything that went on.... we were in the Cafeteria room, and I sat pretty close to them - they described the torture and treatment they received at the hands of the N.Koreans. I remember they told us how they tried to resist and confound the N.Koreans, and one way was that they played "imaginary" golf where they would group off in twos or 4's (as the holding cells permitted) and they would behave as if they were actually playing golf.. teeing off, fairway shots, chip shots and putts, and they'd simulate walking from hole to hole, carrying imaginary golf bags...he said they would just totally flummox those captors with that, and the N.Koreans inability to understand the crew's behavior was unending source of (much needed) humor. RIP Bucher and the others who have passed. LBJ didn't you any favors.
LBJ did no one any favors....... This rotten son-of-a-bitch was a shit stain on the backside of America from day one.
If the shooter in Dallas had moved his aim slightly to the right, it would have been a glorious day for the USA.
I really enjoy your videos, the way they’re structured and I appreciate your efforts.
That young sailor that was killed, was from Creswell, OR, I was part of the honor guard at his funeral. There were a lot of us that were angry and wanted payback or to at least send some SF in to blowup the ship, making it less of a prize for the North Koreans. Leaving just a bunch of twisted steel on the bottom of the harbor
I also remember a made for TV movie about this with Hal Holbrook as the captain. It was as I remember quite harrowing and stirred emotions in my young mind . Walking home from elementary school in the early 70’s I really thought I’d end up drafted and sent to Vietnam. What a scary time that was. Today the world it isn’t any safer considering lessons learned.
I remember learning of this Cold War episode in grammar school. I bet it’s not taught in school today!
It was when I was in school and I graduated only 10 year's ago.
@Jon Jahr yeah, but history is racist now, apparently
@@Nightdiver20 oh please
@@michaeleasterwood6558 oh, right. I forgot, noticing things is bad.
My brother was involved in getting the crew released from N. Korea. So I remembe this very well, the ship is on display in N. Korea today.
We should have started seizing ALL North Korean ships until they returned all our sailors, ship and equipment. In addition to that we should have stopped any business dealing we had or any aid we doing with China, North Korea and Russia immediately until our conditions were met. Best Wishes & Blessings. Keith Noneya
AND THEN WE WOULD HAVE BEEN AT WAR WITH NOT ONLY NORTH KOREA BUT USSR AS WELL DUMBASS
I have been on this ship in 2012 when I was travelling to North Korea. They tell the story a bit differently of course. :D But very interesting to see this video and the true story behind it.
Cheers to you mate for staying the course on interesting content.
I didn't think there was much use for 22 Cal Rimfire ammo on a Navy ship?😮
I seen and was thinking that myself. Lol, well he did say the ship was lightly armed.
Beats nothing at all.
Good work!
After the story on the USS Liberty, I was hoping this one would
be covered on Dark Seas.
We used to have to guard Army bases with empty magazines in our rifles. It is no different having empty weapons on ships. Americans are always disposable to our government.
LOL!!! I remember doing that in West Germany during the 1980s. One time when I was on patrol my partner and I discovered the perimeter fence breached. We reported it ASAP and.... Yep - got my weapon, magazine, and NO ammo!! The good old days of insanity.
Really pisses me off how our US government hung the crews of the Pueblo and Liberty out to dry. I joined the navy 12 years later and still thought that way. Treated almost as bad once returned home as they were on deployment.
That was the American mindset at that time. Many returning Vietnam vets got treated the same way by their own countrymen. And our government basically turned it's back on them even though a shit for brains president named Johnson caused it all...and for a totally fabricated reason. The second Bay of Tonkin incident NEVER happened. If you can ever get a chance to read the transcripts of the White House tapes at the beginning of the Vietnam fiasco it will really make your blood almost boil in anger. Johnson and McNamara invented the whole thing in an effort to try to get that POS re-elected! And it backfired on them!
One of my roommates at CTR "A" school was Ralph McClintock. He graduated early and was aboard the Pueblo when it was captured. And America did NOTHING! Thank you LBJ!
Pueblo seized January 23, 1968. Tet Offensive starts January 30, 1968. And on January 21, 1968 a B-52 carrying nuclear weapons crashed at Thule, Greenland. Must have been a busy week at the Pentagon.
I’m just an old soldier who has never set foot on a proper ship that didn’t have the word museum attached to it. But I would argue that the word “ship” in the phrase don’t give up the ship, refers to the crew. Not the steel hull. Letting them sink to the bottom would’ve served no purpose. Well done Captain.
We have a Pueblo POW in the American Legion Post in Overland Park, KS
Just a side note, I was stationed in Yokosuka as this unfolded and the Pueblo's sister ship the USS Banner remained in port.
Vic.. no offense, but 🙃FYI.. The Banner was at sea,, we were enroute, about 4 hrs away of relieving the Pueblo. That was supposed to have been our mission.. delayed by needing JP5 jet fuel error, sandblasted from our diesel tanks..🙃
I got to Yokosuka in February 1968 and was referring to after the taking of the Pueblo. I believe that the RADM at Yokosuka was relieved over this even though he had no assets to send. I was at the Naval Hospital and periodically talked to Banner crew while having physicals, etc. No offense taken. Long time ago.
North Korea and china. We own the ocean.
America: Really?
Never underestimate those that will eat your family mascot!
it's in-between the two countries dumbass they should have a right to it why do they call it the china sea stupid
America: We own the ocean
China: Really!?
If elected President of the United States, I will demand the Pueblo be returned or destroyed! This piracy will not stand EVER! 😁👍👍🇺🇲
And, right any wrongs done to her crew! 😁👍👍🇺🇲
Leave it to politicians to screw up at the expense of lives
There are three notable things that I would mention: 1) The song 'Ride, Captain, Ride' is supposed to be about the Pueblo Incident. 2) The ship's crew of the Pueblo during captivity in North Korea showed their North Korean guards the 'Hawaiian Good Luck' sign. The crew convinced their captors that the extended middle finger was this 'Hawaiian Good Luck' sign, and the US Navy crew regularly extended this greeting to the delighted North Koreans. Ironically this helped ease the tensions in captivity. 3) The Captain of the USS Pueblo fell out of favor in the US Navy for this incident and more importantly because in a prior US shore command, he was responsible for a US Navy Nuke Weapons storage facility., and he knew too much to be captured & interrogated. Of course this calls into question the wisdom of assigning this officer to the Pueblo and dangling the ship out close to North Korea!!!
My ship was at port in Guam when this happened. Later I met and became friends with a man who flew B52's at that time AND he (Bill) was stationed on Guam at that time. In talking with Bill he told me that every B52 on Guam was in the air circling Guam full of Nukes for delivery to N. Korea. Waiting for orders to proceed to N. Korea and bomb it. I am both sad and glad that it did not happen. I will say that the whole island of Guam shook for about 3 hours until the B52s were called off.
This should also have been seen as an act of war
I remember that as a teenager. It was in the national news daily. It was egg on the face for the top brass in Washington. It’s my opinion that the Pueblo incident was the catalyst for the turning point of public opposition to the war in Vietnam and public protests in the streets here that continued for years.
Had the pleasure to meet Capt.
P.O.W, Leader, American.🇺🇸
They didn't "tap into US coms" because of this incident, they already had access to all US transmissions that they could pick up via radio. John Walker was already selling them the plans and repair manuals to the communications equipment, they already had what they needed, the capture of the machine barely sped up the progress as they no longer needed to build the machines from the repair manuals. Additionally, the codes used for decryption at this time were single use. So if they wanted to decrypt US coms, they needed to listen to all US transmissions (with some criteria of exactly when and where to listen), record the transmission, and then use the proper code to decrypt it.
Sure Walker sold them several codes, but it would have allowed the soviets only single transmissions, not unfettered access to US coms. Besides, they got far more information directly from Walker himself than they ever did listening in on radio transmissions.
The hysteria of what the soviets did or didn't steal is often over exaggerated. Clearly all they stole couldn't stop their collapse, given they can't even rival their own former bloc state using old NATO equipment, it's safe to say they never were at risk of taking on NATO powers. Their 'modern tanks' were obliterated by US 1980s weapons systems...
The Soviets couldn't build the KW-37's as they lacked the integrated chip facilities & other advanced electronics in the device. What you said about the codes is true, but the Soviets had access to RATT which was the backbone of naval message traffic until the early 90's. This gave them access to a lot of US classified message traffic including secret no-foreign CIA reports, & TS material. For ex. Naval security group, along with other special access programs had their own crypto codes which kept them safe from the Soviets prying eyes.
@@terrywilson4166 I seem to remember the TM's the Walker's sold were for the KW-7. After they were outed no clas traffic went on them except for Flash precedence.
@@mysterj1 I always thought it was the KW-37 as they were all removed in the early 90's when I was a ET. It may have been the KW-7 but those were long gone before I got to the fleet.
Gotta love the concept of one time pads
Nice story as you filled in some details i didnt know
Bucher is pronounced like “Booker” as it was derived from “bookmaker”. The commando raid by NK was prior to the seizure of the Pueblo, not after. LTC Bucher was not informed of the raid which would have caused an immediate exodus from the area. NK expected retaliation and probably thought the Pueblo was part of a military response. The entire incident was a massive navy debacle yet it may have saved the world from nuclear destruction. Had Bucher kept running the ship would have been sunk and probably every crewman killed. That act of war on top of NK’s attempt to assassinate the SK president would have led to massive retaliation during a time the world was already on the edge of nuclear war. The surrender prevented direct military action by the United States and SK. It is not a stretch to say that the crew of the Pueblo saved the world . More specifically, fireman Duane Hodges who was mortally wounded below deck from a shell fired through the side saved the world. When Bucher went below deck and watched Hodges die from a horrific wound he probably saw the fate of himself and the entire crew. He did the best thing in an impossible situation and surrendered the ship, likely saving humanity from a worse fate.
buch is German for book and is pronounced similarly but a bit harder and longer on the double o's. Many people want to Anglicize the "ch" sound from 'k' to how it sounds in the word chow.
@@garymartin9777 Exactly. i didn’t try to be precise. I interviewed Rose Bucher in 2008 and she told me the origins of the name. It was the 40th anniversary of their release. She was an amazing woman. It’s too bad the creators of this video didn’t get into that part of the story. 1968 was “bookmarked” by the Pueblo incident. 11 months to the day. Her efforts to keep the 82 survivors in the minds of Americans with her “Remember the Pueblo” campaign was incredible. Pete Bucher became a very talented artist in his later years. I lived around the corner of the parents of Duane Hodges in 1968. The flagpole in the front yard his father installed after Duane’s death is still there. The memorial to Duane in downtown Creswell Oregon quotes the words of Jesus. “Greater love has no one than this that he lay down his life for his friends.”
@@garymartin9777 thanks for your explanation. The best I could do was: boo kerr. I just put them together when I say it.
IMO, its almost criminally neglectful to allow an essentially unarmed vessel near enemy waters without some level of combat support; especially following many violent North Korean border incursions.
The commanding officer was a Commander, not a Lieutenant Commander. If you look at your own photos you will see he has "scrambled eggs" on his cover (hat).
could be that he was selected during his time of capture and when he was released he was a Commander.
In the Navy, only an O-5 and above wear the eggs. An O-5 is the rank of Commander, not a Lt. Commander, which is an O-4
@@ntmaster He wasn't.
This is the a little knowledge is dangerous channel, great content, but facts and basic prounciation off.
Thanks for clarifying Commander Bucher’s rank.
As a teenager I was living at Misawa Air Base in Japan, where my dad was stationed. I remember this incident & it was a very intense time to be that close to North Korea because every unit on the base was at high alert. There was a unit that had a listening antennae that was huge, It was nicknamed the "elephant cage". It was probably a half mile across and rumored to be the site that relayed all radio communications from that incident. Most people don't realize that we are technically still at war with North Korea. In the 1950's war was not officially declared & a cease fire agreement was signed but no peace treaty.
WHEN THEY KNEW THEY WERE GOING TO BE BOARDED THEY SHOULD HAVE PULLED THE PLUG AND SANK THE SHIP, AND SET IT AFIRE. SEMPER FI
I just watched Drachinifel's video on the Pueblo lol. Crazy how two channels I'm subscribed to posted a video on the same ship within two days of each other.
I was in the U.S. Air Force when they took the Pueblo. We went on alert at Norton AFB in California and spent the night in the engine shop waiting to see what was going to happen. The next day my roommate who was a staff sergeant was sent TDY to Korea equipped with all the cold weather gear the Air Force had. He came back months later after being finally being sent to Vietnam still packing all that cold weather gear😳😊
About as useful as a screen door on a submarine.
Thank you excellent info and narrative.
Cape Cod Mass. Listening
The false confession wouldn't really be false then
Is that the same kind of boat used in Mr. Roberts? Looks awfully familiar. "I forgot my motorcycle!!" 🤣
It is exactly the kind of boat used in Mr. Roberts. The boat used in Mr. Roberts is currently docked at Fishermen's Terminal in Seattle Washington. Its current name is Seabird.
i was serving at Ft Benning when the Pueblo was seized, I remember seeing the report of it's seizure come over the leletype machine on the 5th floor of the HQ building. In 1089 I was in Korea on a very remote radio site and remember grtting a call from the CO telling us to be on the lopokout for infiltrators - nobody got any sleep on that site that night.
The failure of the US to respond to both these provocations just emboldened the communists. We were lucky to have a CG (Gen Bonesteel) who was a no nonsense commander that made NK pay dearly for any incursions south of the 38th parallel.
US dropped the Ball in assuming No One would attack. Also, not having a Rapid Deployment Aircraft/Navy ready to intervene in the Pueblo behalf. Thanks.
Spy ships and aircraft are always unprotected, especially back then. And now, look at the spy drone that the Russians took down just a few weeks ago near Ukraine. No people involved, but still an illegal attack on an USAF warcraft in international waters (drones can be configured to fire weapons). A few wagging fingers is about it. At the geopolitical level, everything is weighed against greater goals. Just glad no servicemen were involved in this one. Servicemen are always pawns in some greater conflict.
i mean, this has clearly been researched from the US side of things, where when you deeply look into it, you'll note a few things
there were a lot of reports of the ship crossing the 12 mile limit, a number of times before the interception, which even after the ship started to retreat seems to be universally (apart form the US, which in public records of the time changed the distance claimed seemingly every other week) agreed that it happened within 8 miles of sure
the US reaction was to deny it was their ship, to deny that the sailors were Navy, or intelligence gathering etc etc etc, and pretty much refuted each and every claim that north korea made, and I am fairly sure that if given a chance the US would have deny that it was a boat and claimed it was a kayak if they could, only changing/admitting to elements when there was no other place to refute
hell to this day, the US still deny basic things like the purpose etc of the ship
Disgraceful what Johnson did to the crew.
1:00 It should be noted that if the North Korean position reports of the USS Pueblo are accurate, the ship would have had to spend quite a while moving at well over 100 knots *AND* it would have had to spend time traveling over land.
A few years ago at Annapolis ran into some pueblo crew members and told them the USS Bon Homme Richard was just off the coast with the USS Enterprise ready to go in we waited days but then sent to Yankee station. They said they new we were out there but we left
The US should fink the Pueblo where it sits.
Does anyone remember the bumper sticker that said "Remember the Pueblo. "
Nein, but we still have "For Das Vaterland" stickers here in Missouri.
Please clarify. Pictures of Pres. Johnson and Gov. Reagan were shown on this video. Johnson because he was president during the capture and 11 month imprisonment and toruture of the crew. What part did then Gov. Reagan play in the release of these American servicemen. "I am ashamed of the way we have failed to take a position, and many Americans feel the same." Viewers can do their own research (outside of this video) on the handling of this crisis.
The NSA report on this was declassified in the 1990’s . The work was for NSA.
during negotiations with Korea in the future The US should use the Pueblo as an issue to demand return of the Pueblo in trade for some facilitation or concession. The Pueblo has been a prisoner of North Korea in the mind of the leadership of the country ever since its capture, being forced to exchange it for something more useful to their future success in formal public negotiations would shift relations in favor of long term stability. bringing the Pueblo back to the United States would honor the men who endured capture by the North Korean Military.
And to think there are airbases less than an hour away and they received no support.
NK was not a nuclear power at the time, not even close.
Did you really think showing a pile of 22 Long Rifle rounds at 4:11 would add to the video? Every person thats ever handled guns knows exactly what they are! Scary 22 rounds.... Cone on..
Was a Navy Electronics Technician in the Philippines when this went down. We had to change out all of the codes worldwide within 24 hrs. We were real close to WE3 that day.
I’ve never seen a parabolic antenna working before. Is that really what they look like in use
Our ship USS Chara AE-31 was pull out of the South China Sea to Sasebo, Japan. USS Chara crew was there for approximately three months.
Great video, it seems NK has always been the thorn in the side of the US.
Didn't have to be that way. If Truman would have let Macarthur push the communists back to China the peninsula wouldn't be divided to this day.
@@scottw5315 OR had Mac not pushed as far then China would have stayed out and Korea would be one country.
They just another bunch of haters that's all. Fat boy always trying to get one over on the US and failing miserably wallowing in his diabetic anger as the heaviest set man in North Korea.
I think we have been the thorn in their side we killed over two million of them in the Korean War
@@mikecummings6593 Good savages
So where is the nuclear threat part.
Very good vid. Interesting & informative. thks.
Second oldest commissioned ship? I believe that the USS Arizona is older and still commissioned.
I don't think the Arizona is still commissioned.
Arizona was struck from the registry in 1942. It's a common myth she's still in commission but she isn't.
AZ was decommissioned Dec 29, '41. Look it up.
@@PixelmechanicYYZ There seems to be some difference of opinions on this. Wikipedia mentions that the Arizona is not perpetually commissioned but is allowed always to fly the flag. Britanica says that the Arizona was symbolically recommissioned in 1950.
It's been my impression since forever that the USS Arizona remains a permanently commissioned vessel in the United States Navy. When visiting Honolulu Hawaii in the early 1980's the voice tape commentary on the boat trip that took tourist out there described the USS Arizona as still being a commissioned ship in the US Navy. This was out of respect for all Sailors killed during the Japanese sneek attack on September 7th 1941.
I was in South Korea in 1974 and we camped on the beach and a North Korean gunboat shot over our camp at a missile site that was up on a hill. That Gunboat was way closer than 12 miles more like a half a mile
It's basically the old guy who would steal any ball that fell in his garden. On an international level.
Can someone explain WHY there was no contingency plan, and no backup available? It couldn't have been sheer neglect or oversight, or even hubrus.
We need to bring the ship back.
Wasn't the Blue House Raid on Jan 21? Video may need a slight correction.
Holey, blunders, Brass Tacks!
Why did the N. Koreans want the ship?
They didn't.
What could they do with the ship?
Nothing.
But the Soviets wanted the coding machines. The Navy was convinced that no one could use the equipment to read American traffic and so were totally negligent in operating the ship.
The machines couldn't be operated without the daily code updates. But the Walker family spy ring provided the Soviets with all the software that was necessary to use the machines to read the coded traffic they had been collecting, for over a decade.
Did the U.S. capture the Walkers? No -- Walker's wife, herself a spy, turned Walker in and the whole family enterprise collapsed.
In actuality the crew suffered needlessly & 57,000 of our boys died because the Johnson administration was playing politics!
I remembered when this happened. Those US Navy sailors suffered brutal punishment, humiliation, and torture by the North Koreans .
I had only been discharged from the navy December 23, 1968. I was worried I would be recalled back into service.
Because of the Pueblo, the crypto gear was installed on some destroyers and cruisers. I was assigned to one of those destroyers. Made for a really fun Med cruise. The only time we were around the US Navy was if we needed gas or groceries. It also got us our of plane guard duty (for US carriers)
Leaving this site now with such an obvious error. No nukes for many years after this in N K.