Former military chaplain recalls Korean War

Memories of the past include services in the trenches, staying with the soldiers, By Mark J. Yablonsky SPARTA — As John F. Kennedy once said, “the price for freedom is high, and Americans have always paid it.” That was just as true for the Korean War as it was for both world wars. The Rev. Ernie Kosa, who has resided in Sussex County since 1973, was a military chaplain in Korea. The conflict there became known as the “Forgotten War,” but Kosa has never forgotten it. He also served a year in Vietnam as a hospital chaplain and ultimately retired in January 1973 with the rank of lieutenant colonel. Recalling Korea “It was a war, period. We lost a lot of men in action and a lot of them were wounded.” Kosa is still called upon for numerous prayers, blessings and other invocations around the county at different events, including a recent dinner by the group in Franklin who relocated the former Hungarian Church/Edison Schoolhouse to Main Street. Recalling the war, he said, “I honestly believe we could have won that war. Mistakes were made, but we slowly built up and started training the South Korean soldiers.” The 38th parallel, the dividing line between the communist north and free south, was crossed by the North Korean army on June 25, 1950 and soon after much of South Korea had been overrun. President Harry Truman, in conjunction with action by the United Nations, sent American troops in and the tide was reversed. American forces pushed the attackers all the way back to the 38th parallel, and then began moving further into the north. But as American forces, commanded by Gen. Douglass McArthur, continued forward even after Truman ordered him them to stay away from the Yalu River. The general disobeyed the order, insisting that China would not enter the war and disregarding at first any evidence that many thousands of Chinese troops had already crossed the Yalu. But they had and the Chinese Fourth Army, referred to by historian David Halberstam as “one of the greatest infantry forces of the modern era, even though it consisted of peasants and remarkably little hardware,” stopped the American northward push. In particular, sub-zero temperatures in the mountains hurt U.S. forces, as did Chinese manpower. McArthur was eventually fired by Truman in April 1951, and after two more years of stalemate, and trench warfare, an armistice was signed on July 27, 1953, ending the conflict and restoring the 38th parallel. “We were up close to the front lines anyway, even when the armistice was signed,” Kosa recollected. “And I was up there when we were all sent back home. We had to be alert all the time in Korea. They would try to sneak in and kill somebody. There were battles at night, too. “The communists knew what we were going to do. They knew everything. They would welcome the (American) units as they came up to the front lines over the loudspeaker. I’m not saying it was as terrible as the Vietnam War when our men came home and they (protestors) would spit at them. Korea was different. But it was still a hard war.” Kosa was assigned to the 45th Infantry Division and to the 279th Infantry regiment, 2nd battalion in Korea. When asked if he had one particular memory from Korea, he recalled “holding services for them in the trenches, and I would be with them all day long. And I’d be out with them, going to different units. I would take their marches with them. I would even get into the tanks — in training — nd fire the tanks. I would do everything with them. And every time I fired, they would say I hit a bull’s eye. I don’t think I did. They just wanted to be nice to me.” But while Kosa was never permitted to be near combat, his life was saved one time when a sergeant knocked him to the ground and fell on top of him, as a shell exploded overhead. Kosa never heard the shell approaching, but the sergeant did.

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