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'Forgotten War': Korean War veterans honored at State Capitol

'Forgotten War': Korean War veterans honored at State Capitol

Sacramento, CA, January 21, 2020 | KCRA

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Korean War veterans were honored with an Ambassador of Peace medal at the State Capitol on Friday.

U.S. Rep. Ami Bera, D-Elk Grove, and the South Korean Ambassador to the United States, Lee Soo-hyuck, held a ceremony for about a dozen veterans who attended the ceremony at the Purple Heart Memorial.

"It's important for the veterans of the Korean War to know that we haven't forgotten their sacrifice and service," Bera said.

The Korean War spanned from 1950 to 1953.

"Seventy years have passed, the war lasted for three years -- 37,000 American soldiers were killed," Lee said. "We didn't forget your sacrifice. We don't forget. And we will not forget."

The Korean conflict against communism has often been called the Forgotten War.

"To think that 70 years later, there's some recognition," veteran Dick Ryder said. "For that period of time that we spent in that ‘little war over there,' in Korea, kind of a forgotten war, everybody thinks of the second World War."

"I'm happy to see the appreciation people have for us being over there. When we came home, nobody knew where we were," veteran Earl Hummell said. "They call it a forgotten war, but it wasn't forgotten to me. It was real."