Little Switch

The days of lethargy, of card games and of leisurely manning of marker balloons and searchlights at the Panmunjom truce-talk site were over. The U.N. was taking seriously the Communist offer to discuss immediate exchange of "seriously sick and wounded" prisoners of war. Working like beavers, U.N. crews rapidly set up a processing center and a mobile surgical hospital. The hospital staff ran through a practice drill. In cases of malnutrition, the medical people were ready to stuff the returnees with calories and vitamins. Every available helicopter was standing by; two hospital ships, one U.S. and one Danish, were anchored at Inchon. A huge galvanized-iron shed was erected as a stopover for disabled Chinese and North Koreans on their way north. The press train reappeared at Munsan, with phone lines to Seoul and teletype circuits to Seoul and Tokyo.

U.N. Commander Mark Clark was determined, with Washington's backing, that the enemy would have to make a hard & fast agreement, at the liaison level, on immediate exchange of disabled prisoners (nicknamed the Little Switch) before he would discuss full-scale resumption of the truce talks (the Big Switch), which he designated as a "second order of business." The Reds acquiesced. To head his liaison group, Clark appointed Rear Admiral John C. Daniel, 53, Annapolis graduate (1924), who has made a solid reputation in the Navy both as desk man and blue-water sailor. Organizer of the Navy's first underwater demolition team, John Daniel commanded a destroyer squadron in the Pacific, won the Navy Cross. He came from the first session this week reporting that the Communists were "very objective"--meaning businesslike, and not disposed to stall. At the second session, the U.N. briskly accepted the Red offer to exchange disabled POW's but reiterated its long-standing condition: that none be repatriated against his will.

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