U.S. Deserter Jenkins Gets Dishonorable Discharge

CAMP ZAMA, Japan (Reuters) - A U.S. soldier who deserted to North Korea four decades ago was on Wednesday given 30 days confinement and a dishonorable discharge, after confessing he had been scared and wanted to leave the army.

The sentencing of Sergeant Charles Robert Jenkins was the climax to one of the Cold War's strangest dramas and resolves a diplomatic headache for the United States and its close ally, Japan, which had sought leniency out of sympathy for his Japanese wife. They married after she was abducted to North Korea in 1978.

Jenkins, 64, frail and dressed in army uniform, pleaded guilty at the court martial held at the U.S. army's Camp Zama base near Tokyo to deserting to North Korea in 1965, and to aiding the enemy.

"I no longer wanted to be in the military," Jenkins said, as his wife, Hitomi Soga, and two North Korean-born daughters watched solemnly.

http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=6698452

That's my best reactionary imitation.

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