An article by Irek Sabitov, a Russian journalist, and myself will appear in the Winter 2020 edition of the U.S. Navy War College Review. Our article concerns the April 1969 North Korean downing of a U.S. Navy EC-121 spy plane in the Sea of Japan.
It’s a well-known Cold War story, but seen from both the U.S. and Soviet sides... with a twist.
On April 15, 1969, the U.S. and Soviet Union took part in a rare, 4-day, joint search-and-rescue (SAR) operation to locate and retrieve the bodies off a U.S. Navy EC-121 spy plane that was shot out of the sky by North Korean fighters.
And yet, despite the fact that three Soviet destroyers took part in this SAR operation, and a Soviet sailor (who we interviewed) said he personally placed human remains into plastic bags and then transferred those body parts to a U.S. ship (USS Turner), the Russians were never given credit for recovering of the dead airmen’s remains and their transfer to U.S. custody.
The draft of a speech to be given by President Nixon five days after the shootdown failed to mention the Russians.
Following the incident, the U.S. Navy handed out photos of the recovered wreckage and coffins of the two EC-121 crewmen’s bodies pulled from the sea. But again, none of the photos’ captions mentioned the Russians.
The photo of a Soviet destroyer (taken by a U.S. Air Force Reserve aircraft) appeared on the front page of the New York Times on April 17, 1969. There was mention of how the destroyer’s whaleboat was to pick up “debris,” but nothing about human remains.
After the recovery effort had ended, a newly-declassified top-secret DIA (Defense Intelligence Agency) memorandum described the SAR operation. But, once again, there was no mention of the Russians.
Had the President of the United States and the U.S. Navy deliberately kept the Soviet role in this episode of Cold War history from the American public?
Editorial Board, Journal of Oriental Studies (Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow)
Editorial Board, Journal "Vostok”
