Tape 4 Side 2
Phoebe and Daily Life in Munich
The tape opens with an anecdote about his dachshund Phoebe encountering a Russian railroad wagon at the Oktoberfest. He describes her as possessing almost human-like sensibilities, playing evening games of football and hide-and-seek with her rubber duck toy.
Exile and Literature
He discusses Jerzy Kosiński’s novel The Painted Bird, criticising it as “sadistic” and emotionally detached. He makes observations about a Polish literary critic, Mme Lisiecka, who lost her faith at fourteen, joined then was expelled twice from the Communist Party, and now struggles with independence in the West, having lost her country, her social circle, and access to her library.
He reflects on exile communities generally, observing they are “always being detached from their own milieux” and develop negative attitudes where “everything is criticised; everything is wrong; everything stinks.”
Korea
Receiving Pentagon orders for Korean deployment while newly settled in Washington with Krysia and Phoebe, he attended Fort Benning’s regimental commander course, then departed on 23 January 1953 via Seattle, Vancouver, and the Aleutian Islands — described as “dreary, frightful” — to Tokyo, where the transit camp was luxurious by contrast.
He reached Daejeon headquarters, which had no information about him. After requesting assignment anywhere, he was posted to Busan, attached to agricultural and forestry divisions. Despite having studied forestry, he notes Korea “has no forests” — only reforestation challenges.
After notifying General Sibert in Tokyo, he was transferred to Seoul and assigned command of a partisan regiment.
Military Governor of Ganghwa Island
He relocated to Ganghwa island in the Han Estuary, serving as military governor for approximately 160,000 inhabitants across five or six islands. He commanded 4,000 Korean soldiers conducting nightly amphibious raids and intelligence operations.
The Yellow Sea presented extreme danger — strong, constantly shifting currents proved fatal. He recalls a sampan with twenty-five children capsizing less than twenty yards away; only ten or twelve survived.
During rough sea conditions with gales opposing tides producing six-foot waves, he experienced terror greater than facing gunfire. Sitting rigidly beside an elderly Korean captain for two hours, he could not move upon standing, nearly collapsing from muscle strain.