Marine Corps hero who saved thousands of lives in Korea dies at 88
The Washington Post
By Bart Barnes
Posted March 15, 2014
WASHINGTON — Kurt Chew-Een Lee, a retired Marine Corps major who received the Navy Cross during the Korean War for his lone, head-on charge into hostile fire to force enemy troops to reveal their positions, an action that saved thousands of American lives, was found dead March 3 at his home in Washington. He was 88.
A niece and family spokeswoman, Lynn Yokoe, confirmed the death but did not know the cause.
The son of Chinese immigrants, Lee was said to have been one of the first officers of Asian ancestry in the Marine Corps.
As a first lieutenant and platoon leader in 1950, he earned the Navy Cross and the Silver Star, two of the military’s highest combat decorations for valor, in a 36-day period that included some of the fiercest and highest-casualty fighting of the Korean War.
In September of that year, U.S. forces had landed at Inchon in South Korea, forcing North Korean troops back north near the Chinese border. Chinese forces then crossed into Korea and joined in the fighting.
Lee, leading a machine-gun platoon in the far north of the Korean peninsula, often advanced to within hearing distance of the enemy forces, shouting to them in Mandarin Chinese to sow confusion.
He received the Navy Cross for action on the night of Nov. 2-3, when his unit was outnumbered and under heavy attack. He had instructed his men to shoot at the muzzle flashes from enemy weapons. According to the citation on the award, he “bravely moved up an enemy-held slope in a deliberate attempt to draw fire and thereby disclose hostile troop positions.”
Wounded in the knee and elbow during the firefight, Lee was evacuated to an Army field hospital, where he learned a few days later that he was about to be sent to Japan to recuperate.
With a sergeant and a commandeered jeep, but without authorization, he left the hospital and returned to combat.
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