Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #5 2002

(continued): Israel, West Bank, Ramallah: June 6-14, 2002: There were a few Palestinian police stationed outside the military complex in half-destroyed, forty-foot shipping containers, which they had tried to make into guard shacks. We drove right in as the guards waived us through. 

As I climbed out of the car, I was struck by the awesome thoroughness of the destruction of the entire facility. The preventative security palace had been completed in 2000 with the help of millions of dollars of donations from the other Arab states. It was really the pride of Arafat and the entire Palestinian Authority. It had represented military and intelligence sophistication fitting a new Arab country, even if they were not yet recognized as such.

We walked around the large, four-floored main building. It had been a magnificent facility with fine architectural appointments. Carved marble eagles had been perched on spheres representing the world and adorned the grand glass and marble entrance to the main building. Now, everything was blown to bits. The domed glass roof on the entry atrium was mostly on the marble floor with a few remaining pieces dangling precariously from the original framework overhead.

Israeli tanks had encircled the facility and meticulously aimed their cannons at every strategic inch of the building while attack helicopters fired rockets from above.

We walked through the rubble and broken glass and marble right into the main part of the complex. Desks, office equipment, a newly framed oil painting of Arafat … all lay in ruins on the floors. Nothing in the building had been older than two years. Now everything lay in burned heaps of charred rubble.

We made our way cautiously to the grand marble stairway to the upper floors being careful not to accidentally step on any unexploded rockets or bombs. I reached down and turned over the tail fin of a high-tech “smart bomb” with all the burned wires still dangling.

The main intelligence department had been located in one corner in the upper floor. As we approached that area the texture of the ash and rubble changed. I don’t know what kind of incendiary missiles must have been shot through the thick walls of the building and into the intelligence headquarters. But the heat that was created must have been exceptional. Where the banks of computers and high-tech equipment once sat there was absolutely nothing. On the floor, however, was about six inches of very fine white ash, the only remains of the department’s contents. It was my understanding that the Israeli forces had notified the Palestinians to evacuate the buildings before the strike so that there would not be intentional loss of life.

Outside, and behind the complex, stood the remains of Arafat’s armed security vehicles. They were just like President George Bush’s armored Chevy Suburban SUVs. Bush’s were black, Arafat’s had been white. Systematically, the tanks and helicopters had blown up or totally disabled the fleet of prized vehicles. I would guess that about 100 vehicles had been destroyed. 

It was getting dark on Saturday night as we left the preventative security palace, and Mohamed’s uncle returned us to the old home place of the Jodeh family in Ramallah. It had been an incredible day of learning and emotion. The Middle East tensions and conflicts had gone on for centuries. Today, they remained complex and very serious, perhaps more complex and serious than ever before in history. There was no question that it was a literal life and death struggle.

Sunday, June 9

The Jodeh family had lived at the same location in Ramallah for over 50 years. Mohamed had grown up at the same address and had attended the local Arab schools. In subsequent years, most of the children had moved away. However, just a few years ago three of the sons decided to pay to have the family home enlarged so that they could eventually move back home. On top of the old original structure, which had been constructed of native Holy Land white stone, they built three additional levels. Each level contained a residence for each son. Mohamed’s mother was still alive; one of the single daughters now lived with and assisted her.

On the south side of the old home were two lots about one-third acre each. About fifty years earlier Mohamed’s father had started planting fruit trees and grapes on the two lots. Over the years the trees had matured and enlarged into quite an outstanding orchard and garden.

Before going to bed Saturday night, Mohamed asked me if I would like to get up early Sunday morning and tour the garden. Sunday morning, just as the sun was coming up we were out picking plums, apricots, almonds, figs, lemons and two different kinds of berries, which were growing on trees instead of prickly bushes. The grapes, pomegranates, and apples were not quite ripe but there were plenty of chickpeas to pull up and take to the house.

When we were finished, we sat under the shade of a beautiful lemon tree located on the patio and enjoyed a cool breeze and a cup of hot espresso coffee. It was difficult to believe that I was sitting so peacefully within the heart of one of the most explosive and strife-torn regions of the world.

Our first appointment Sunday morning was at the Red Crescent headquarters building. As we traveled by taxi across Ramallah we once again saw scores of automobiles lining the streets that had been run over by the Israeli tanks. The rules were that if an Arab car was left on the street and impeded the destination of an Israeli tank or tracked personnel carrier, the Army vehicle simply would run over the top of the vehicle. Once destroyed the vehicles were worth nothing, so they were left along the streets or pushed off onto a vacant lot.

Red Crescent’s headquarters were situated in an adequate three-story building, completely surrounded by white ambulances with the organization’s logo, a bright Red Crescent moon, on each side.

The director general, Feyeq Hussein, warmly welcomed us into his office. He had been a schoolmate with Mohamed. I explained that Project C.U.R.E. had worked closely with Red Crescent in Iraq, Senegal, Mauritania, Sudan, Somalia, Lebanon, and other Muslim countries around the world. The director general told me that he was already familiar with the fine work of Project C.U.R.E. and understood that we worked with Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, and others on a non-political basis. I assured him that our interest was in taking help and hope to the medically needy all over the world.

I went on to explain that in the past I had been disappointed that we had met with difficulty when we tried to deliver donated medical goods into Lebanon, West Bank, and the Gaza Strip.

“I sincerely apologize to you for any occasion where your efforts were hampered when trying to deliver needed goods to the Arab communities.”

“Well, Mr. Hussein,” I shared, “I really need your help in order to successfully deliver Project C.U.R.E.’s donated medical goods into West Bank. Will you help me?”

“I will not only help you, I will guarantee that you will no longer have problems even if we have to ship the goods in through ports in Jordan instead of Israel and truck the containers to Ramallah with our own vehicles,” he replied.

We talked about the desperate needs experienced by the small hospitals and clinics in West Bank. I told him that we would like to specifically donate some of the goods to the places where we had already finished the needs assessment studies, but in the future Project C.U.R.E. would also be happy to consider donating medical supplies additionally to Red Crescent. We had tea together, and Mohamed and I left with the assurance that it was now possible for our goods to arrive in Ramallah unhindered.

The rest of the day was filled with more meetings and about 9 p.m. we were driven to the lovely home of Mohamed’s brother-in-law and sister, where we ate an absolutely incredible dinner meal of rack of lamb, rice, cooked vegetables, and desserts. Of course, you will never find any alcohol in the home of a Muslim and when one of the five daily prayer times roll around, you stop doing whatever you were doing while they get out their prayer rugs, face Mecca, and pray with their foreheads on the ground.

Following dinner Mohamed walked with me to a cyber shop where I paid to get on the Internet and send an e-mail home to Anna Marie letting her know that everything seemed very peaceful in Ramallah, West Bank.

My message was premature and way wrong!

Next Week: This isn’t Tbilisi, Georgia 

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

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Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #4 June 2002

(continued): Israel, West Bank, Ramallah: June 6-14, 2002: Our next meeting proved to be quite interesting. There were four different officials representing different groups or municipalities needing medical supplies. Dr. Mofleh Nadi of the Palestine Arab Front also represented the Palestinian National Authority’s ministry of local governments. He explained how the regional hospital of Joresh was desperately in need of everything from examination tables to forceps to autoclaves for sterilization. I told him I believed we could help him. He then presented me with a handwritten list of the most urgently needed items for his region.

Ibtisam Zeidan was a middle-aged Arab woman who attended our meeting. Somehow she had been able to obtain an American passport in the past and had spent some time in the Ohio area. She was telling me how she had also learned Hebrew and that by showing the Israeli guards her American passport and speaking the Jewish language, she was able to move about the West Bank quite freely.

Ibtisam represented the Palestinian Women’s Committee. It was really quite interesting to talk to her about what her committee was doing to influence the Arab women in the old occupied areas.

When we left that meeting Mohamed’s uncle drove us straight to Arafat’s Palestinian government headquarters compound. Mohamed’s uncle had been born in Ramallah, and since he knew nearly everyone, we just drove right through all the checkpoints and stopped very close to Arafat’s main residence building.

Just two nights earlier, in retaliation for the suicide bus-bombing incident, the Israeli tanks, attack helicopters, and troops had converged again on Arafat’s compound knowing that he was sleeping there. The devastation that had occurred just two nights earlier was just amazing. This raid wiped out several large buildings on and near the compound that had escaped destruction during the March and April retaliatory raids by the Israelis. 

The landscape looked like an earthquake had hit and leveled the area. There was not a lot of difference between what I was looking at and the flattened and demolished buildings I had viewed just weeks earlier at the epicenter of the super earthquake which had hit northwest India in Gujarat state.

There was still the fresh smell of burned gunpowder and spent explosives. It reminded me of sitting near the firing pit at a July 4th fireworks extravaganza and smelling the residue of the cannon-fired jumbo sparklers.

As we got out of the car I carried my camera in plain view and began snapping pictures. No one bothered me. I strolled right up to where the Palestinian Authority’s uniformed guards were probing around in the rubble. Scores of Palestinian Authority vehicles sat burned out or run over by Israeli tanks. I had definitely entered a war zone.

I continued to be amazed that no one seemed to be concerned that I was taking pictures and freely walking around inside the bombed-out executive compound.

Two of the main buildings were joined at the second level by an enclosed bridge way. From that bridge way there was a great view of the entire compound and of the lower end of Ramallah. That was where Arafat’s formal dining room was located. That was where he hosted the Arab country leaders when they visited. That was where Arafat held most of his interviews with BBC and CNN.

But the tanks had rumbled into the compound and successfully blown huge holes right through the middle of the swank bridge way. Mohamed’s uncle asked if I wanted to try to get an interview with Arafat. He was just inside the landing of the main building, no more than a hundred feet away from me conducting other press interviews. I declined the uncle’s suggestion saying that I did not think it appropriate nor did I feel comfortable with requesting an audience at such a tense time. 

I walked on continuing to take pictures. There were two Palestinian bulldozers trying to push around the rubble and broken buildings and clean up the mess from the previous nights.

I was just in the middle of trying to count the demolished vehicles inside and outside Arafat’s compound when Mohamed reminded me that we were about late for our next appointment.

I had not remembered from my previous visits to the West Bank that Ramallah was as large as it was. Well over 500,000 people lived there. Many of the residents traveled out of the city and out of West Bank to work every day in the Israeli areas. The Palestinians didn’t really have much industry or employment of their own. Their economics were dangerously dependent on the Israeli economy. Likewise, the Jewish economy depended heavily on the Arabs for laborers.

When we finished our other appointments, we stopped by the headquarters of Red Crescent, the Muslims’ counterpart to the West’s Red Cross. There we registered our confirmation for our meeting with the director general for the next morning.

Apparently, my interest in photographing the remains of Arafat’s governmental compound caught the attention of Mohamed’s uncle who was driving us around Ramallah. “How would you like to go look at Arafat’s preventative security palace, which the Israeli army destroyed about 60 days ago? I think I can drive there.”

“Yes,” I answered, “I would very much like to go and see it. Are you sure you can get me in to see it? Isn’t that where the elite Palestinian guards and intelligence forces are stationed?”

“Yes,” Mohamed’s uncle answered, “but no one is even there anymore. It is completely destroyed.”

Next Week: The Arab’s Preventative Security Palace in ashes 

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

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Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #3 from June 2002

(continued): Israel, West Bank, Ramallah: June 6-14, 2002: The bus had barely stopped burning when Sharon retaliated by sending in Israeli attack helicopters and tanks into the suicide bomber’s hometown of Jenin and into Arafat’s headquarters in Ramallah. Earlier, the Israelis had devastated the headquarters compound of Yasser Arafat, but the soldiers found plenty of new targets to blow up, including shooting high-caliber shells into where Arafat slept and ate. The exercise was not intended to kill or capture Arafat but the message was once again made very clear that if Arafat could not control the violence of his people against Israel then the Israelis would once again come in and capture and punish the terrorist perpetrators.

In fact, just the day before the bus bombing, George Tenet, the head of the US CIA had told Arafat that if he did not prevent attacks, he would stand alone in facing Israeli reprisals, an apparent threat that the United States would give Sharon a freer hand in retaliating.

Well, that was the Ramallah and West Bank into which I entered to do the needs assessment studies on Friday, June 7, 2002.

Our taxi van took Mohamed and me to the front gate of the Jodeh family home. It was a handsome, four-storied structure made of traditional, native, tan, Holy Land stone. The parents had lived on the main floor, and then in subsequent years they built three more floors hoping to accommodate three additional sons and their wives when they retired and moved back to Ramallah.

The Jodeh home was built on a hillside. Directly up the hill and across the street, Arafat had built his Palestinian Authority Hospital. Arafat’s government headquarters compound, the fancy new preventative security palace (housing his elite security forces and new intelligence technology), and the new hospital were the three symbols of pride and joy for the strutting Palestinian authority. They were badges of identity. 

After a fine Arab dinner, it was time to actually lie down and try to sleep after the two straight days and nights of constant travel.

Saturday, June 8

Mohamed had done an excellent job of setting our itinerary for the days of my visit. We would spend Saturday and Sunday in Ramallah. Monday we would travel to Jerusalem and possibly Bethlehem and perform needs assessments and meet key Palestinian health officials. Tuesday we would travel to Nablus in the north. Wednesday would be spent in the hotbed of most recent radicalism, the town of Jenin, then, back to Jerusalem for meetings before taking a taxi from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv for the midnight flight back to Toronto.

Our first meeting Sunday morning was with Friends of Patients Rehabilitation and Therapy Hospital. Steve Socabe, with whom I had worked before in Gaza Strip, West Bank, and the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, was associated with Rehabilitation Hospital in Ramallah. Ninety-four percent of the patients of that facility were there with war-related injuries. They handled a lot of cases of spinal cord injuries resulting from gunshot wounds or shrapnel fragment wounds resulting from the Palestinian-Israeli conflicts. The hospital served as a referral hospital for patients from all over the West Bank. Within just the past 60 days there had been 10,700 wounded Palestinians in the region, resulting in 1,500 patients with permanent disabilities requiring rehabilitation. Forty percent of all injuries happened to kids under age 18. 

Dr. Bitawi Ahmed was the medical director of the facility. He was a very qualified orthopedic surgeon and along with the chairman of the board of the center, gave us a very thorough tour of the institution and helped us with our needs assessment questions.

During the tour of the recovery rooms in the hospital, I was impressed with the number of young boys, in their teens and early 20s, who had been disabled by gunshot wounds or explosions. Many of them were permanently paralyzed either from their neck or waist down. I spent a little time with a tall thirteen-year-old boy and his father who was attending the boy’s bedside. The boy was a sharp, bright-eyed fellow with curly hair and a quick smile. A bomb explosion had severed the spinal cord in his lower back. He would not have use of his lower body for the rest of his life. His father really appreciated my taking an interest in his son. He could hardly believe that an American would travel to Ramallah to try to help them with their medical situation.

Dr. Ahmed shared with me his big dream. As an orthopedic surgeon he was pushing for a new orthopedic operating theater at the facility. At the time of our assessment, he was in the practice of going to another Ramallah hospital to perform patients’ surgeries. They were then moved to the rehabilitation center. The board of directors had already given him permission to extend the size of the main building for the surgical room, but none of them had any idea of how they would get the needed pieces of operating equipment or supplies for the new project. You could only imagine how excited he was when he learned that it might be possible to get Project C.U.R.E. to help in supplying the necessary pieces of medical equipment, surgical supplies, and orthopedic devices.

Before we left the facility, Dr. Ahmed compiled a very extensive list of items needed and presented it to me in hopes that Project C.U.R.E. could be of assistance in the future.

We then traveled across the city of Ramallah for an interesting meeting with an organization called “Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees.” Dr. Jihad Mashal, the director general, explained how their organization tried to represent the needs of a large number of facilities within the West Bank and Gaza. Their primary concern was with the rural clinics and small town hospitals where it was extremely difficult to arrange for any medical assistance from the outside. The health ministry was stretched in their capacity to serve the larger hospitals in the major cities of Nablus, Jenin, Bethlehem, Ramallah, and Hebron. Most of the secondary hospitals and clinics had to go begging for assistance.

The mayor of one of the smaller towns presented me with a list of desperately needed medical goods for the Qabuan municipality. His hospital and his clinics were trying to do their best but had no way to access basic medical goods to meet the general needs of the people. 

Once more we climbed into the small car driven by Mohamed’s uncle and re-crossed the city of Ramallah to our next appointment. As we drove, I remarked about the many buildings that had been damaged or destroyed by what appeared to be bombs or tank fire. Many of the streets and curbs had been torn up by tracked vehicles traveling through the city of Ramallah.

Mohamed asked, “When we are finished with the next appointment would you like to take a little tour and get a better look at the damage to our city?”

“Yes, of course,” I answered.

Next Week: Personally observing Arafat in his bombed out headquarters and home 

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

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Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #2 from June, 2002

(continued): Israel, West Bank, Ramallah: June 6-14, 2002: Peace seemed unattainable and the world opinion seemed to shift to accept the growing fear that Arafat didn’t really want peace at all, that he had more to gain by seeing how close he could come to a final accord then slipping away from the table. It was feared that the other Arab states would continue to financially support the arrangement in place when the Arab refugees were contained in camps rather than being integrated into a new state or into the borders of the other areas of Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, etc.

The fear that seemed to startle the outside world was that the Arab and Palestinian forces would never be satisfied with any concession other than the dissolution and disappearance of an Israeli state in the Middle East and a return to a status prior to 1917.

Accompanying the growing fear emerged a new frustration. Arafat didn’t seem capable of controlling the violent acts of terror carried out by his groups of Hamas and other Islamic jihad organizations. World opinion raised the question as to whether Arafat was the one to be at the negotiating table at all.

Prior to our traveling to West Bank the terrorist situation had escalated to an almost unbelievable level. Nearly two years had seen the second round of intifada produce numbers of suicide bombers, where Palestinian individuals with belts or backpacks stuffed with explosives would walk into a crowded establishment where Jews had gathered and trigger a detonator to blow up themselves and everyone else in the crowded area. Young teens and even schoolgirls were being recruited as lethal human bombs. Other Arab countries would even pay the children’s families large sums of money for their “brave acts of martyrdom.”

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon declared that if Arafat could not call in the terrorists, then the Israeli military would go back into the West Bank cities and root out the pockets of terrorists. His tanks and helicopter gunships went into Ramallah and completely destroyed Arafat’s newly built and equipped preventative security palace of his elite guard. Following another suicide bombing where many Israelis were killed, Sharon sent his tanks and helicopters right into Arafat’s headquarters compound and destroyed a large percentage of the facility while Arafat was in residence. Then Sharon left his troops there and confined Arafat to the shelled out headquarters for nearly four months. Arafat finally agreed to verbally condemn the suicide bombings and Israel let him go free.

Thursday, June 6

Thursday morning Anna Marie took me to the airport to board Air Canada #582 to Toronto, Canada. My flight would take me to Toronto, and then I had a non-stop flight Air Canada #886 right into Tel Aviv. Mohamed had already flown into Tel Aviv and it was agreed that he would meet me at the airport when I arrived.

Friday, June 7

Per our agreement, Mohamed met me at the Ben Gurion airport. He had hired a van with the correct color of license plate on it to transport us into the West Bank. Our trip from Tel Aviv to Ramallah was not as complicated as it could have been. At the military checkpoints I simply showed my American passport, told them I was a visitor and humanitarian and the Israeli guards waived me through.

The night that I was traveling, Sharon gave orders to the Israeli military to retaliate for the latest suicide bombing. The incident by the Hamas had taken Arab terrorism to a strange new level.

In the early days of intifada the Islamic jihad groups like the Popular Front for Liberation of Palestine used cars packed full of explosives. They would park the cars near the targets to be blown up or along the street where the intended victim would be traveling and detonate the car bomb by timer devices or remote control detonators. Those bombs were effective in blowing up the intended targets but also struck fear in the hearts of the Israelis. 

But the car bombs advanced to more lethal and more frightening methods of terror. People who were radically active in the Palestinian cause were recruited to be trained on how to use their bodies to deliver the deadly explosives. The terrorist group of Hamas became very brazen and prolific at selling, especially young people in their teens and early twenties, on the glories of suicide martyrdom. The young suicide bombers were very difficult to detect and quick and eager to take risks. They took on the mission knowing, but probably not fully understanding, that they wouldn’t be coming back to receive accolades after their daring mission.

About 8 a.m. Thursday, as I was in Denver preparing to leave for Israel, the Islamic jihad ratcheted their insidious terrorist methods up one more notch. Never before had they employed the use of a young teenager to drive a small van totally packed with explosives into another moving object. A suicide bomber driving his bomb into a moving bus was unthinkable.

The Israeli bus had left Tel Aviv at 5:50 a.m. full of sleepy passengers headed for Tiberius on the Sea of Galilee. Many of the fares were military passengers headed for their assignments. As the bus passed through the town of Megiddo (Hebrew for Armageddon) a sixteen-year-old boy pulled alongside the back portion of the bus and detonated enough explosives to lift the bus and flip it over twice before coming to rest totally engulfed in deadly flames.

At least 17 people died immediately. Thirteen of those incinerated were Israeli soldiers. Many more were taken to the hospital in critical condition. “It was timed to mark the 35th anniversary of the 1967 Six Day War when Israel captured the West Bank and Gaza Strip,” said the spokesman of Islamic jihad, which quietly claimed credit for the bombing.

Next Week: Community health needs . . . plus war-related injuries 

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

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Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #1 from June 2002

(Note: There are so many more episodes to be shared from the saga of North Korea and my many trips into the unique country. Perhaps we can return to more journal excerpts in the near future. Please be assured that all of my field journals for over the past nearly twenty-five years will be included in the multi-volume Roads I Have Traveled . . . Delivering Help and Hope series soon to be published by Winston-Crown Publishing House. But now, I want to share a bit of excitement surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Project C.U.R.E.’s unique involvement.)

Israel, West Bank, Ramallah: June 6-14, 2002: It seemed like the right thing to do. The dates of June 6-14 opened nearly miraculously, allowing me to commit to traveling to the Middle East. I had planned to be in Republic of Guinea in West Africa on those dates with Seko Diallo. He had even traveled to Colorado and viewed all our facilities. He was so impressed that Project C.U.R.E. could make such a huge difference in the healthcare system of Republic of Guinea. All his paperwork was filed with our office and our flight plans had been made.

Then, on May 15, Seko Diallo called me. He was in a panic. He had just been informed by the US immigration department that he would be allowed to leave the US to host me on the trip to Republic of Guinea but that he would not be allowed to re-enter our country. He could stay here but not go out and then back in on the visa he held. He was beside himself. (I think that’s OK, being “beside himself,” at least he knew his own location).

In his call he begged me, “Dr. Jackson, could we please delay our trip until my attorney can plead my case to the government? I really want to go with you to my country.”

On the very next day, May 16, I received a phone call and eventually met with Mohamed Jodeh, Denver’s main Islamic leader and head of the Islamic mosque.

“Dr. Jackson, the Muslims of Colorado and the Jews of Colorado under the leadership of Rabbi Steve Foster want to do something special together to ease the suffering of the people in the West Bank and Gaza. We need Project C.U.R.E. to join our efforts by donating a considerable amount of emergency medical goods and by being the neutral catalyst for our coalition. Can you help?” I reminded Mohamed of our policy to perform a needs assessment of the institutions prior to our sending any medical goods, but that Project C.U.R.E. would be happy to join the efforts if the details could be worked out.

“Okay,” Mohamed replied, “how about going with me to the Holy Land on the dates, June 6-14?”

I stuttered a little and said, “That’s interesting that you called and more interesting that you would pick those dates. Had you called two days ago my answer would have been ‘no,’ but as of today I can commit those dates to you.”

I had visited Gaza and also the West Bank towns of Hebron, Nablus, Ramallah, and Bethlehem before. I had also visited Beirut, Lebanon, and all the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon on previous trips. It had not been safe at all to visit even then. But, now, the classification had moved from “not safe at all” to “downright dangerous.” The political situation had grown a great deal more complicated and hundreds of people, both Israeli and Palestinian, had been murdered.

The West Bank was situated west of the Jordan River between the state of Israel and the country of Jordan, and also bordered the Dead Sea. I knew the twelve disciples wouldn’t like me to say this, but it’s really quite ugly in the West Bank as compared even to North Korea. The temperatures can easily exceed 100 degrees in the summer; it’s rocky and dry and doesn’t have a lot in the way of natural resources. 

The Romans were the ones who gave the area the name of “Palestine.” But before that even the West Bank was part of the Hebrew kingdom established and ruled by King David and his descendants. Following conquests by the Babylonians, Assyrians, later the Persians, and finally the Greeks and Romans, Palestine was taken over by the Arabs in about 600 AD. In the 1500s the Ottoman Turks ruled until after the First World War when Palestine was declared a British mandate. During that time the Balfour Declaration of 1917 pledged British support, setting up a national home for the Jews in Palestine, but oddly enough it also insisted that the civil and religious rights of the non-Jews be protected in the area. That represented the same fuzzyheaded thinking that the Brits displayed in partitioning India and Pakistan and leaving Kashmir dangling for folks to later sort out.

In 1949 the newly formed United Nations voted to partition the area into two states, one Jewish and one Arab, with Jerusalem maintaining an even different status of its own. When Israel actually became an independent nation in 1948, the Arab states that chose to oppose the UN action declared war on Israel, which they did again in 1956, 1967, and 1973. Israel’s victory in 1967 was so decisive that it moved to occupy the West Bank (which had belonged to Jordan), Syria’s Golan Heights and Egypt’s Gaza Strip, and the Sinai Peninsula. East Jerusalem was also taken over and occupied by Israel.

At the 1979 Camp David Accords, the Sinai Peninsula was given back to Egypt and the status of West Bank and Gaza was placed on the table for later negotiations. But peace negotiations during the 1980s really went nowhere, which led a frustrated Arab side to declare an independent state of Palestine in 1987. The uprisings known or referred to as “intifada” became clashes of greater and greater severity. The West Bank and Gaza became flash points of violence between the Arabs and the Israeli forces of occupation.

A peace conference between Palestine and Israel took place in 1991 and finally resulted in the Oslo, Norway, agreements of 1994. The agreements called for an end of the 17 years of occupation by the Israeli forces in the West Bank and Gaza. It also allowed for eventual self-rule in Gaza and the city of Jericho in the West Bank.

As the Israeli soldiers withdrew, the Palestinians had to replace them with their own policeman. In 1994 Yasser Arafat, chairman of the activist Palestine Liberation Organization (P.L.O.), was elected head of the Palestine National Authority. Additionally, an 88-member Palestinian council was elected.

Expectations were high on both sides, and the West Bank and Gaza economics started to sputter into a higher gear and Arabs from around the world started to build homes and businesses in the West Bank and Gaza. 

However, Israelis started their own expansion program of building settlements throughout the West Bank. The hopes of accord fostered by the Oslo agreements soon soured and violent terrorist attacks in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and even previously unaffected areas like Netanya, escalated the feelings of betrayal and distrust. Peace seemed a long way away.

In 1999, Israeli Prime Minister Ehad Barak went further than any Israeli leader before him in offering concessions to the Palestinians in order to reach peace. The outside world was surprised at the extent to which Barak had gone with his offer. Surely the Arabs would all agree to practically returning to the borders prior to 1967, where 94% of Gaza and West Bank would become the basis for a new separate Palestinian state, along with a joint rule agreement for jurisdiction over Jerusalem. 

But, the world was to be even more surprised at Arafat’s flat refusal of the proposition. What in the world was Arafat thinking?

Next Week: Arafat unable to control Islamic Jihad terrorist organizations. 

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

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Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #5 from September 1995

(cont: North Korea)  On our way to breakfast, they informed us that as soon as we finished, the cars would be waiting for us to go to Nampho. Again, I could hardly believe my ears. Nampho was their strategic port city, and for reasons of security and defense, I don’t believe any other American had ever been allowed to visit the spot.

We headed west through Pyongyang and a little south toward Nampho. Nampho is about sixty-five or seventy miles out of Pyongyang. We passed the tight security checkpoint line that encircled the city, about ten miles out. The checkpoint ensured that no one would wander outside the city, but more important, if you were just a worker, you could not have access into the city. You could only go into the great city if you were requested, and then only with an official pass. You had to be the best little street sweeper, or the best crew worker before you were privileged to go into the city. Travel, even across town, was never encouraged, and if for some reason you needed to meet with other family members who lived in the city, those members would, more than likely, have to travel outside the great city to meet with you. (And they say that Socialism is classless!)

The farther we got from the city, the more we saw the ox carts carrying loads and the oxen pulling the plows in the field. In preparation for winter, the villagers were spreading their kernels of corn on the concrete road to dry them in the September sun. The display reminded me of a huge yellow quilt bedspread.

We passed the famed North Korean iron-ore mountains and steel mills. I was shocked at the deferred maintenance everywhere. They had the plants operating with bellowing smoke, but the metal buildings and structures were badly rusting, the machinery was out of the 1950s, and the crawler tractors were probably left over from the Korean War. And everywhere I looked, things were old and unpainted and in bad disrepair.

Driving through Nampho, I saw the docks where our cargo container of medical goods would be unloaded. It would have been fun to be there the day of its arrival. 

We drove on west and out of Nampho along the Taedong River toward the sea. As we approached the sea, there were several miles of partitioned salt fields between the road and the sea where they were processing their own salt. As we came around a small mountain and past an old, rusted-out concrete batch plant, there loomed two more giant marble gateways that formed an arch effect across the road. The huge statues that faced each other were of workers being led by Great Leader Kim Il-Sung, depicting the conquering of the sea and the victory of the Worker’s Army. 

In 1981 the government decided to build a sea barrage some eight miles long to span the mouth of the Taedong River. The idea was to not only make a land bridge to connect the northern province to the southern province and eliminate the long trip inland around the wide mouth of the river, but also to separate the seawater from the fresh river water. High tides on the sea would send damaging waves back up river and wash out crops and dwellings. By building the sea barrage, it also allowed the separated freshwater to be stored at a designated level and pumped back up the river as far as needed for irrigation. But the sea barrage did not allow the ships to move up and down the wide river, so a series of four sets of locks was designed to handle the boat traffic. The sea barrage was wide enough to accommodate not only a highway but also a rail line. Estimates were that it would take a minimum of ten years to accomplish the construction. But one advantage of being a dictator was the option Kim Il-Sung would have to throw as many of his twenty-seven million workers as possible at any project he might choose. Thirty thousand workers and five years later, the job was completed. It had become one of the strategic developments of the recent past. However, one of the weaknesses of the Socialist’s division of labor was that when you take rice farmers and have them build huge concrete structures, you may have a problem with quality control. The structure in just this short time already showed signs of flaws and was in need of repair.

We got lots of good pictures of the project and were even shown a chronicled video of the process. (It was surprising, but this time our overseers had not been so fussy about our picture taking. Last time they hadn’t wanted me to take pictures of buildings, common people, or vehicles, and especially not anything that had to do with the military or the Korean People’s Army.)

On the return trip to Pyongyang, I had time to do some reflecting. I had now been in so many of the developing countries, which for the past fifty years had tried every variation of Socialism imaginable—Zimbabwe, Kenya, Zambia, Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Bolivia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Romania, Russia, Mexico, Cuba, China, Germany, Austria, Israel, Denmark, Belgium, India, and others, and even in some measure Ireland, Canada, England, and the USA—and all had gotten caught up in social projects, wealth redistribution, reversal agendas, and welfare markets. In their feverish pitch to create a brand-new world of absolute dreams, they had all neglected one thing: the power and basic principles of economics. And now, once the wealth of previously created establishments had all been redistributed and they had discovered that you couldn’t keep dividing up nothing, the grand and glorious revolutionary dreams were coming unraveled, and to greater or lesser degrees, the experiments were now falling apart while the drivers tried to double their futile efforts to keep the ungreased wagon wheels from falling off the wagons. 

I watched hundreds of North Koreans on my way back to Pyongyang walking along the roads or sitting along sides of the fields, or in groups under trees—not a car or a bus in sight, not a shovel or a hoe in their hands, no place to go, and absolutely no motivation to get there if they could go. And really, why should they be motivated? Their group leaders gave them food, government clothes, a house, parades and dances, signs with slogans of hope, and the assurance that they had it better than anyone else in the world. It is true, in one sense, that there is no unemployment. But the other side is equally true: There is no employment either. 

Pyongyang is a gorgeous propaganda city with no graffiti and very little crime, but outside the city, it’s ox carts, candles, and cholera. Oops! Sorry for the musing … back to work! 

When we returned to the hotel, my good friend Chun Song Gap, the senior man at the Department of Disarmament and Peace, was there. It was so good to talk with him. He had already received the transcripts of the Los Angeles summit I had attended, and we talked in detail about the positions taken by the DPRK as well as the US State Department. We talked about the embargo and the need for Project C.U.R.E. to continue to ship the terribly needed medical supplies. He related to me some incidents indicating that his government was now very serious about getting the liaison offices set up in Pyongyang for the US, and Washington, D.C., for the DPRK as the next step for lifting the embargo. 

He said, “We are very much looking to you to help build those bridges of friendship.”  

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

Permissions granted by Winston-Crown Publishing House

Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #4 September 1995

(continued) Pyongyang, North Korea: September 8, 1995: Mr. Ri Su Kil, the deputy vice minister of the ministry of health had been with us every minute since we had arrived. He was ultimately in charge of all four thousand clinics. So we had no problem with full access when he gave the word to let us inspect them. The facilities were all very clean, orderly, and well organized, and the staff members all wore whites and even “chef hats,” as Jay called them. Yes, the facilities were tidy … but, wow, were they ever third-world. In all my travels, I had not seen more outdated equipment. I guessed that most of the equipment was reclaimed pieces from the Korean War in the 1950s. That included the diagnostic equipment, operating-room equipment … everything. 

I didn’t know if their pride could handle it, but Project C.U.R.E. would probably have to bring doctors and technicians over to train some of their people to go out and train the rest of the medical staff in the four thousand clinics how to use instruments we take for granted. The process would have to be slow and gentle, because these folks had believed the Juche idea for so long that they really thought they had the best health-care system in the world right now. The borders had been so tightly closed and information kept out so successfully that it was not going to be easy for them to adjust to reality. There were two or three informational generations totally missing. My heart really hurt for the people and their future. How would they handle it? 

When we pulled away from the facility, it started to dawn on me how unusually rare this trip had been. Jay’s and my eyes had already seen more than could have been expected, and I was reminded of the Bible verse, “To whom much has been given, much will be required” (NRSV). There was a scary amount of responsibility that accompanied that privilege of being the first. 

Back out through the town we went once again … back up the beautiful canyon, back over the road washed out by the high floodwaters, back past the Buddhist monastery, back past the Palace of Gifts, right on up the winding road that grew narrower and steeper with each mile. We pulled off the road where there were a few houses clustered and a stone building with the ever-smiling face of Great Leader Kim Il-Sung plastered on the front. The driver honked the car’s horn, and a girl in her early twenties popped out of nowhere and got into the second car. The girl was to be our guide, and we were headed to Manpoktong Mountain. The girl had grown up in the mountains, there along the river, had passed the entrance tests and gone to the university, and was assigned to go back to her home and act as guide for people privileged enough to be able to climb the mountain. 

Manpoktong means “ten thousand waterfalls.” The mountain was gorgeous, with white and light-gray granite, and where there was topsoil, it was covered with heavy undergrowth and trees. 

After pushing our way up a very narrow and steep concrete road, our driver brought the car to a halt in a small, paved cul-de-sac. It had just started to rain lightly, so each of us was given an umbrella and a walking stick, and our guide told us, through Mr. Rim, that it was going to be very slippery and especially muddy and slick where the rains had washed away the trail. 

The mountain rose 9,909 meters, nearly straight up. Our first trek would take us more than 500 meters up in rapid elevation. The girl had to take us on several detours but always got us back to the trail. I asked her when she had first climbed the mountain. She said she was too young to remember. 

All the time we were climbing, we could hear the crashing of the waterfalls. Our first stop delivered to us an astounding site. She told us that if we thought that was great … just wait. Kim Jong Il had visited the site and had instructed the workers to carve steps in the granite face in some places and install chain handrails to make it easier and safer for the people to climb. 

When we reached the concrete pavilion about two hundred meters from the top, it had really set in to rain. The heavy clouds moved in, and we were enshrouded by rain and fog. We decided to wait there for it to clear so we could take some pictures. 

I eagerly admit that I had seen few sights that rivaled the ten thousand waterfalls of Manpoktong. When the clouds passed and the sun came out, the view was the best of all possible dreams. I had seen Niagara Falls and Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, but for rare beauty of an undisturbed nature, this was special. Of course, as a disrespectful entrepreneurial American, my first statement to Jay was, “Man, if we could relocate this thing between Denver and Colorado Springs or Denver and Idaho Springs and develop the twenty thousand acres around it, we would be set!” 

There was one more steep climb above the pavilion of some one hundred meters to a footbridge that went across the falls just below the primary cascade. Our trip down the mountain was more precarious than the one up. When we reached the cul-de-sac, the cars were there and so were a couple of other people. They were the waiter and waitress from the hotel dining room. Mr. Jong had arranged for a picnic lunch to be brought to us at the foot of the mountain. However, it was again raining hard enough that they all made the decision to go back down toward the river and see if we could find a dry spot. 

They picked a spot under a high bridge, where previously they had a docking spot for riverboats. All of that was washed away, but there still was a sandy, dry area with the high bridge as a roof. 

I need to tell you … that was no ordinary holiday picnic. They had brought along two charcoal burners and all the trimmings. Soon the chosen spot was transformed into a beautiful linen banquet setting. White tablecloths were spread on the sand. Dishes, cups, glasses, and even sterling-silver chopsticks. When the fires were ready, we all gathered and sat on marble slabs they had rounded up. I had no idea of the names of all the different oriental dishes that were prepared for us. I was afraid to even ask about the meat dishes, but I did recognize several types of fish, beef, and calamari. 

Mr. Jong said that the head minister of foreign affairs had already called him a couple of times since we had arrived there by train, making sure everything was going all right and that the Jacksons were happy. He said that it seemed that word had gotten around the Pyongyang officials regarding the gift and the Jacksons’ work for reunification, and they were declaring Mr. Jackson an “honored patriot.” 

One of the most personally significant things that happened on the whole trip took place around those charcoal pots at that picnic setting. Mr. Ri Su Kil began to relax and unload his emotional basket. He kept saying, maybe four or five different times, how when he heard that the Americans were coming to Pyongyang, and since he was representing the health ministry, he would have to be with us and just didn’t know if he could personally handle it. 

Then, as if he couldn’t keep the emotion bottled up anymore, he said through Mr. Rim, the interpreter, “I just didn’t know if I could be with Americans, because the Americans are my enemies. I am now fifty-three years old, and the Americans killed my father and all my family in 1952. It is the Americans who have their troops in South Korea today, and that is the only thing that is keeping the two halves of my country from coming back together. The Americans have been my enemy all my life. And now Mr. Jackson comes and spends these days with us, and I like him. Today he has become a brother to me, and he is an American. Please, Mr. James W. Jackson, do not only bring to us the greatly needed medical supplies but also bring something more important to us. Please talk to someone about taking the American army out of South Korea so that we can be one country again.” 

I assured Mr. Ri that I would continue to do all I could to bring that dream to pass, because indeed he was my brother and my friend. I proposed a toast to our friendship and told Mr. Ri that when the day of reunification came, I wanted to have him come to my home in the mountains of Colorado and meet a lot more wonderful Americans. I toasted him with a glass of mineral water, and he told me jokingly that he would not even consider it if all I offered to him when he got there was mineral water. 

Well, the US State Department had wanted me to build bridges of friendship between the USA and North Korea. It was my humble opinion that we were making headway.

 © Dr. James W. Jackson    

Permissions granted by Winston-Crown Publishing House

Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #3 DPRK from September 1995

(continued) Pyongyang, North Korea: September 8, 1995: At 4:15 a.m., the lights in my room came on. That was the North Korean version of a wake-up call. It seemed like it was awfully early, since I had stayed up past midnight trying to keep up with my journal writing. No hot water had been turned into the pipes, again, so the ice-cold shampoo and shower helped to wake me up quite completely. 

At a little after 5:00 a.m., a knock came on the door, and Mr. Rim said they were ready to take us to the train station. As I indicated before, no American to my knowledge had been allowed to go outside Pyongyang city. But we had found favor enough now for them to invite us to go on a train for a nearly four-hour trip north to the Mount Myohyang area in the county of Hyangsan. I was thrilled beyond belief. I had seen trains pull out of the downtown station when I had visited Pyongyang before and wondered what it would be like to ride on one of them. In fact, on that trip I had inquired if anywhere in their country they still might have steam locomotives in operation, and Mr. Chun had said that there were steam trains up in the northern part of the country. But at that time I never even dreamed I would ever leave Pyongyang, except by air to Beijing. 

The station was very neat and clean and mostly directed by military women in the station and out on the platform. We passed up the general open-seating cars and were directed to board the last passenger car, which was old but a nicely complemented wooden coach with private compartments. It was still dark outside, but the first rays of sunshine were beginning to crack through in the east. There were four berths in each compartment of the passenger car, two upper and two lower, with a small table set for tea located under the window and between the two lower berths. The beds were made up for sleeping, but at that hour we chose to sit. 

It was really strange. Jay and I had come to the station in separate Mercedes cars, and we were shown to two separate compartments. There was no effort to keep us apart once we were on the train, but it just kept pushing my paranoia when it was not clear whether the gesture was for their safety or for our comfort and as a compliment to us.

The train pulled out of the station on time, of course, and my eyes were kept busy drinking in the sights seen by so very few in the past fifty years. The sunrise was beautiful, but Jay and I had picked up the feeling that it would be frowned upon if we were observed taking a lot of pictures. We passed the port at Nampho, where the container would arrive, and about one hour into the trip. I looked out the train window and then turned to Jay and pointed to him and quietly told him to quickly grab the camera. About a half mile from the train tracks was a whole hilltop covered with antiaircraft guns, missile launchers, and other weapons. The missiles were in a defensive position pointed south, and I presumed they were protecting something on ahead to the north. Sure enough, up the track about five miles was a large chemical plant and refinery. It made sense that they would be defending the installation in case of an attack from the south. 

Having personally owned a real live steam locomotive and consist (all the passenger cars, the Pullman cars, the caboose cars, and additional rolling stock) that we used to lease to Hollywood movie makers, and still owning a small narrow-gauge steam train that today is on loan to the Forney Museum of Transportation in Denver, I had a great interest in locations where steam locomotives were still used. I was keeping my eyes and ears wide open in hope that I might catch a glimpse of some live steam power or the shrill sound of a steam whistle. 

Jackson on MGM movie set with Jackson Brother’s steam train, staring William Holden, Vince Edwards, Cliff Robertson and pictured here with actor Claude Akins. Train was featured in movies such as Cat Ballou, The Professionals, and The Devil’s Brigade.


 I kept moving from my compartment window out into the narrow-windowed hallway of the coach looking for telltale signs of steam power. As the train slowed, approaching one of the village stops, I thought I spotted an overhead water facility with a pipe and spigot about four inches in diameter. That has to be for filling a boiler, I thought. I couldn’t spot any live steam, but as the train slowed down, what I did see burned a hole in my memory. There on a siding was a passenger train that had pulled off onto the siding to let our fast train past. It consisted of about ten very old-style wooden coaches. The windows and doors were all open, and the people who were aboard were headed into Pyongyang for the national holiday celebrations. Most were clutching small colorful flower arrangements, which they were taking to place before the huge bronze statue of Kim Il-Sung situated in the city square. 

The people were so packed on that train that literally they were hanging out the windows and sitting on the steps of the coach entrance, hanging on to the handrails so as not to fall out. But what was so riveting was the looks on their faces—the sadness, the emptiness, almost as though they were confused or abandoned; no smiles, no chatter. As we slowly passed the many windows and doorways of the coaches and I studied the eyes and body language of the passengers, I myself felt drained. Then the train, once past the siding, picked up speed and raced on north. 

Just before we entered the next village, I spotted them! Yes, indeed, there they were … two old locomotives under a full head of steam sitting on sidings attached to a consist of freight cars. Steam was coming from the turbine generators on the top and hissing from around the main driver pistons in the front. It appeared to me that they were hand-stoked coal engines of either a 2-8-0 or 2-6-0 configuration. By the time I grabbed my camera to capture them on film, we were past them. 

Jay came out of his compartment and excitedly hollered, “Did you see that?”
I said, “Yeah … rats … I didn’t get a picture!”

Later he told me that he spotted another in a switching yard while I was out talking to Mr. Ri Su Kil and Mr. Rim Tong Won. Actually, Mr. Rim had asked me where I was born, and I told him Idaho. And he said, “Oh yes, I rike berry mush the story of Idenhoe; good story.” I didn’t have the heart to correct him, so I just smiled.

Next Week: North Korea (continued)

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

Permissions granted by Winston-Crown Publishing House

Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #2 North Korea September 1995

(continued) Pyongyang, North Korea: September, 1995: Before going to our rooms Wednesday night, Mr. Rim informed us that we should wear our black suits the next morning. But we didn’t know where we were going until after breakfast, when our entourage of black Mercedes picked us up, and we drove across town and pulled in where there were several hundred military officers in full dress uniforms standing around waiting for something. There were also a few civilians in black suits mixed into the crowd.

It had started to rain, so we stayed sitting in the car. I could feel at least a thousand eyes on us as we got out of the car and took our place in a single line. You have to remember that most of the military had never seen an American man except in training films, where they were taught the best and fastest ways to kill us in hand-to-hand combat. They had no outside TV coverage, no outside newspapers, no contact with what was happening outside their borders. So when they encountered a real live, fair-skinned American man within reach of where they were standing, it was no wonder they at least stared.

While standing in line, Jay and I were temporarily given back our passports. We eventually made it up to the front of the line and stepped under a couple of big blue umbrellas. There, our overseers showed the others their passports and explained who we were and showed our passports. The officials nodded and motioned us through. Jay and I still did not know where we were going. We were queued up in front of a trolley station with a group of about one hundred military and civilians.

Soon a trolley, nicer than any other I had ever seen in Pyongyang and nicely painted a green color, pulled alongside the platform, and military women directed us on board. About three miles away, our trolley pulled alongside another platform, and we exited and began a walk for about another mile. In the meantime the men had asked for our passports back. The pedestrian road led us to a huge new marble complex. We later found out it was called the Kumsusan Memorial Palace. I doubt that a hundred million dollars would have covered the new construction … and it was still being built.

Soon we guessed where we were going. We had been chosen to be some of the first individuals to ever personally view the body of Great Leader Kim Il-Sung lying in state. But we were not through with the ceremony yet. As we approached the new white marble walkway (literally acres of white marble patio), we walked over an area that washed our shoes—too bad if your socks got wet.

After waiting in a single-file line for a long while, we were eventually led inside through a very big set of hand-carved, double-wooden doors, twenty feet tall, through the entry rooms, and eventually into a very large marble room, where at one end was a pure-white alabaster statue about thirty feet tall of Great Leader Kim Il-Sung in a standing position. Three by three, the military marched up within fifteen feet of the statue, saluted, turned, and marched out. The experience made me shiver. Here was a pure-white statue with backlighting of blended red, pink, blue, and white colors graduating from the bottom up in an all-marble room in an all-marble building.

When it was our time to approach the statue, we were lined up side by side about seven in a straight line. We all walked up together, took a bow, turned right, and exited through another set of tall, hand-carved doors. From there the single-file line headed up three flights of marble stairs cordoned off by bright-gold ropes. Coming down the other corresponding stairway was another single-file line—mostly military officers. All the women officers were crying.

As I approached the top of the third landing, there was a sound of huge air blowers. Before we were allowed entrance into the next room, we had to pass through a short hallway where there were high-powered air jets blowing from both sides. Little did they care if it nearly blew the hair off our heads. There was no loose dust on us when we entered the room.

Jay and I had been afforded a great honor that day. We had been placed near the front of the line to view the body of Great Leader Kim Il-Sung. We had been put in a visible place of privilege at the head of many of the military generals and heads of the North Korean government. We were the only Americans to be there and be so honored.

The room was another large marble, black-and-gray, highly polished room, and in the very center was a glass-covered marble display shelf and table with Kim Il-Sung lying in state. Soft organ music was playing some of the Korean patriotic songs, which I recognized from the Friendship Arts Festival. The lighting techniques were extremely effective, and there were four stations around the coffin where we were to stop and bow in respect. I looked to see if the large growth on the back of his head, which I had seen in person in 1993, was still there, or if it had been removed for the viewing. I concluded that it had been removed.

After making a full circle of the body, we exited out the rear and back down the long marble stairways. I won’t take time to discuss my feelings about Kim Il-Sung, but it was a privilege—and I guess kinda fun—being part of world political history. And I really was glad that Jay had a chance to be part of an unusual bit of history.

We walked the mile back to the trolley station and rode the three miles back to the car. I glanced down at my watch as the driver opened the door for me: Over three hours for that homage ordeal.

We drove out of the parking area, with all the military folks still staring at us, and headed on out toward the outskirts of Pyongyang city.  

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

Permissions granted by Winston-Crown Publishing House

Journal Highlights: Roads I Have Traveled ... Excerpt #1 from September, 1995

Note: Our diplomatic and humanitarian experience with Pyongyang, North Korea over the years has been an unusual saga of intrigue and fulfillment. The involvement has been highly applauded by our own Department of State as well as the leaders of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). I would like to share with you some of the saga by letting you read excerpts from my actual Journal entries and photo albums. The Journal segments cover the eight trips where I was involved, my meetings in New York and Los Angeles with my DPRK contacts, and the different incidents where we brought the North Korean leaders to our home in Colorado. More recently, Dr. Douglas Jackson, our current President and CEO of Project C.U.R.E. recently returned from Pyongyang.

Pyongyang, North Korea: September, 1995: The next morning, Jay (my second son) and I ate breakfast at the Radisson and caught the bus to the Tokyo airport at 7:30 a.m. for the three-hour flight to Beijing. 

I had told Jay that DPRK’s Mr. Hyun Hak Bong from the United Nations office in New York had assured me that they had notified their Beijing embassy, and someone would be there to give us any needed assistance we might require during our stay in Beijing. But no one was there to meet us.

After about an hour of fretting, we grabbed a taxi to the Holiday Inn, Central Plaza on Wangfujing Avenue, near the heart of Beijing. The next morning Jay and I worked out quite strenuously in the hotel’s exercise room and then cleaned up, ate breakfast, and prepared for the task of the day: heading to the North Korean embassy. After a bit of an ordeal we received our visas and airplane tickets. Our flight leaving Beijing for Pyongyang was scheduled to depart at 3:00 p.m. The agent at Air Koryo had told us to check in by 1:30 p.m. 

The plane’s flight course was low and sustained, which gave us a great opportunity to view the beautiful mountains, rolling hills, and cultivated farmland of North Korea. That’s as close to a firsthand view of the DPRK as any Americans have gotten since 1953. I had not heard of any American being granted permission to travel the countryside of the DPRK. All were confined to the limits of Pyongyang city. 

I watched closely out the window and tried to imagine what one of the rural health clinics would look like that served the communities of the communal farm areas. My mind wandered, wondering whether Mr. Chun and Mrs. Rim, our micromanagers on the previous trip, would again meet us at the airport. 

Jay and I deplaned and cleared the passport and immigration authorities. We loaded our boxes and bags on carts when they arrived on the conveyor belts and headed for customs. The officers began to give me a hard time about the contents of the hand-carried boxes of sample medical supplies and the suitcase containing all the gifts. At the next booth the official was giving Jay an equally bad time and was rummaging through his carry-on bag. The official pulled out a large firefighters training textbook that Jay had been studying, and it looked like the official had the full intention of confiscating it. Fortunately, just at that moment a short man in his late forties stuck his head around the security barrier and hollered out “Jackson” to me. When I responded, he pushed his way past security and came up to the customs officials. He took Jay’s book out of the official’s hand, put it back in the bag, zipped it up, said something to that official, and sent Jay out the door. He then came over to my booth, put my boxes and bags back on my cart, spoke to the official, and sent me out the door. 

Once outside the terminal, it was time for introductions. My curiosity was answered—no, Mr. Chun and Mrs. Rim would not be there. Mrs. Rim no longer worked for the service, and Mr. Chun was now a very important member of the powerful Disarmament Committee dealing with issues like nuclear treaties and reunification. However, the short man who came to our rescue was named Mr. Rim Tong Won, so that would be easy to remember. The deputy vice minister of the health ministry, Mr. Ri Su Kil, was there, and Jong Won Son was also there as an official of the ministry of foreign affairs.

They had two older black Mercedes waiting for us, and as was their tradition, they took our passports and separated us into two different cars. If I hadn’t already gone through that routine before, I would have been spooked, especially since it was my son they were separating from me. 

It was dusk, and the sun had set before we left the airport. The road into Pyongyang from the airport was a beautiful drive. North Korea is very mountainous and green. The long, wide highway was dotted with workers still along the roadsides sweeping leaves off the freeway with their homemade branch brooms. The workers were not in danger from traffic, because you hardly ever see a car in DPRK. Occasionally you might see a farm truck or a government vehicle carrying troops, but very few cars. 

It was almost dark when we rounded a corner on one of the city’s main streets, and I recognized one of the beautiful performing-arts theaters, where I had visited on the previous trip. Just across the street from the theater was the Pyongyang Hotel, an older, large marble hotel built within a convenient walking distance to the river parks and many of the important buildings. We pulled into the entry, and I was ushered out of my car, and Jay out of his. 

The next morning we were scheduled to view and perform a needs assessment on the Kim Man Yu Hospital. A man born in Korea but displaced to Japan at a very early age had become a very wealthy businessman in Japan. Before he died he wanted to do something for his mother country, so he agreed to build and furnish a totally modern hospital facility for Pyongyang. That he did, and it was completed in 1986. When I visited the hospital in 1993, I thought it strange to see the finest and newest equipment available there in Pyongyang. It was used as a showpiece, and the propaganda message to visitors was that the DPRK had the finest medical-care plan for its people and was totally free to all citizens from cradle to grave, and this was the quality of health care that was provided. 

I remembered asking to see one of the rural or village clinics when I was there before. No way. In fact, it was my understanding that fewer than two hundred Americans had been allowed into the DPRK in the past, and none were allowed outside Pyongyang.

The hallways of Kim Man Yu were empty and dark. We were taken to the room where the CAT-scan machine was installed. They turned on the lights and uncovered the control board and then explained that the machine was used in the mornings. Sorry, we couldn’t see it work. The same process was repeated for the ultrasound machine, the angiographic machine, the EKG machines, and so on. But it was apparent that the machines were not used but were just there for show and tell. 

The sad thing was that now those state-of-the-art machines are not the latest equipment available. In the years since the hospital was built, several generations of new technology have become available. Soon show and tell wouldn’t even be a featured attraction.

We left Kim Man Yu Hospital and returned to the hotel, where we were scheduled to have a meeting with one of the most influential members of the Disarmament Committee. There was also such a committee in South Korea, and I had previously met with them while I was in Seoul. The committees were organized to work out the details of reunification possibilities, and in the north to also oversee such issues as the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. I was eager to meet with the committee members.

They seated Jay and me on one side of the conference area, when to my great surprise the man they ushered in to sit on the other side and represent the Disarmament Committee was none other than my good friend Mr. Chun.

Mr. Chun had been our interpreter, along with Mrs. Rim, for the nearly two weeks I was in the DPRK in 1993. He attended almost all of my meetings with the ministry heads and ambassadors, and the last time I had seen him was in the U.S. in January 1995. 

You can only imagine the thrill and excitement when we saw each other in the conference room. We stepped across the room and hugged each other like brothers. The looks on all the other dignitaries’ faces in the room would have been worth a picture. The whole trip turned on that moment.

At formal meetings like that, each side opens with introductory remarks with the assistance of government interpreters. Then, following the opening remarks, the dialogue goes back and forth, taking turns in formal procedure. After expressing several pleasantries regarding our previous meetings, and after sending his respects and affection to Anna Marie and saying nice words of greeting to Jay, Mr. Chun began to unload to all those in the conference room.

“Since 1993, when Mr. Jackson was here before and to this date, many things have taken place. We of the DPRK find ourselves and the government of the United States in better relations than at any time in the past forty-five years. I want to say for the official record that Mr. Jackson and his great efforts are greatly responsible for those improved relations. He has done a lot for our cause. Mr. Jackson is the first to ever bring from the United States any gift of such significance. Others have talked and made promises. Mr. Jackson has not talked but has rather acted. This government sees Mr. Jackson as a friend and a true man of his word. 

“Since this is the first of such an action, his efforts shall be recorded in the book of Korean history and will never be lost or forgotten. Mr. Jackson is expected to bring contacts and other aid with him; therefore, we see him as our ambassador. Yes, relations have progressed greatly, and Mr. James Jackson had a lot to do with that.” 

Mr. Chun went on to say how much the government appreciated and was impressed by my sending the official letters of condolence to His Excellency, Kim Jong Il, at the time of the death of his father, Great Leader Kim Il-Sung.

I said that it had taken great effort and focus to bring about the shipping of the gift of medical supplies, and in essence we were the first to receive an official license to ship and had successfully shipped the supplies, thus actually breaking through the long-standing embargo.

I presented my case, then, to Mr. Chun about needing to view some rural or village clinics and have meetings with health-ministry officials and local doctors to discover the most appropriate items for future shipments. He assured me that I would have the meetings and would also receive lists that would help me make decisions for the future. 

Next Week: Frank and Open Discussions

© Dr. James W. Jackson   

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