Chat Series

June 2000 marks the first-ever summit between the leaders of North and South Korea and the 50th anniversary of the start of the Korean War. CNN.com hosted a series of live, online chats with people familiar with the war and the tensions that followed. Bookmark this page for updates on transcripts of completed chats.

CHAT TRANSCRIPTS

CNN's Sohn Jie-Ae on the inter-Korean summit

"It's difficult not to exaggerate about how symbolic the meeting itself was," says CNN Seoul Bureau Chief Sohn Jie-Ae. "South and North Korea have had so many problems, even in the best of times, that to actually see the leaders together was quite a shock for many. It did sort of rekindle the hope for possible unification for many Koreans. It's something that we will have to closely watch." Read the full transcript of the chat.

Author William Dannenmaier on the Korean War

"We were allocated a shower a month," says author and Korean War veteran William Dannenmaier, whose book, "We Were Innocents," is a compilation of his letters from the front and his thoughts on the war. "One fellow called and said he kept track of when they were going home by how many showers they had left! Another caller said, "What's this about showers?" He didn't know about any allowance at all. He arrived in December and had his first bath in April, in a creek!" Read the full transcript of the chat.

Author Elizabeth Kim on being a Korean War orphan

"I have been extremely depressed all of my life," says author Elizabeth Kim, whose memoir, "Ten Thousand Sorrows," chronicles her life as an Asian-American orphan of the Korean War. "It has only been recently that hope has become a strong factor. But, as a child, literature kept me sane and kept my eyes focused on a world in which other people suffered and still triumphed." Read the full transcript of the chat.

Professor Victor Cha on the North-South Korea summit

"It is very clear that where we go from here is not at all certain," says Victor Cha, assistant professor in the Department of Government and School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University in Washington. "The summit did not set up specific institutions in which to continue dialogue. It set no firm date for a return visit by the North Korean leader. And the security issues still remain far from resolved. I don't mean to put a damper on the enthusiasm over the summit, but clearly the hard work is yet to come." Read the full transcript of the chat.

Author Margaret Juhae Lee on the Korean War

"The Korean War is often called the 'forgotten war,'" says Margaret Juhae Lee, a Korean-American writer whose new book,"Starry Field: A Memoir of Lost History," is a personal account of her familyÕs history through three generations. "It is sandwiched between World War II and Vietnam and is not discussed in any detail in most history books. This loss of memory is extremely detrimental -- for those who lived through the war and those who didn't. The loss means that someone else can interpret history for the rest of us."Read the full transcript of the chat.

Military historian John S.D. Eisenhower on the Korean War

"The Korean War was very important because it was a wake-up call of the communist threat," says John S.D. Eisenhower, military historian, author and son of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. "The Korean War was all encompassing to our people for a short time, but it did not destroy or damage our society. In other words, the domestic implications were not severe, and we remember what affects us domestically." Read the full transcript of the chat.

Author Raymond B. Lech on POWs in the Korean War

Raymond Lech is author of "Broken Soldiers," which examines the plight of U.S. POWs during the Korean War and is being published by the University of Illinois Press in late 2000. "The entire book spans a time period of five years, 1950 to '55, and it covers all of the POW camps in Korea," Lech says. "Although the war was over in 1953, the book continues for another two years with the court-martial in America of 14 soldiers who were POWs. And the question any author would have on this subject is, why 14? Why not 24? Why not 1,400, when every soldier who was a POW admitted collaborating with the enemy!" Read the full transcript of the chat.

Dorothy and Melvin Horwitz on their Korean War letters

"When Mel left for Korea a year after we were married -- just one year after we were married -- I stayed in New York with my mother, who had been recently widowed. He and I wrote daily letters so that 'we would not be strangers' when we would meet again. During that 10-month period, we wrote a million words," says Dorothy Horwitz, who, with her surgeon husband Melvin, has published a collection of their wartime correspondence. Read the full transcript of the chat.

Author James Brady on the Korean War

"I was a very unsure and rather immature 23-year-old when I arrived in Korea. Nine months later when I left, I was a grown-up and a pretty good Marine officer," says James Brady, who commanded a rifle platoon in Korea and went on to write books about the war and columns for Parade magazine and Advertising Age. "War is a strange country, with its own rules. You can't really learn about war in a training camp in the United States. It has to be on-the-job training on the battlefield." Read the full transcript of the chat.

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