As North and South Korea head towards conflict, two Thai veterans who were in the country during and after the Korean War of the 1950s recall the hardships imposed on the people and the suffering they endured.
FRIENDS TOGETHER: Sub-Lt Pramool Hutasingh, left, and his Thai and US friends pose with a sign showing the military demarcation line on Nov 8, 1952.
By the time Chalermchai Hirunard arrived in South Korea in 1966, the fighting had long been over. His job, as part of a United Nations taskforce, was to help with the country's rehabilitation. More specifically, he assisted people living in a small village close to the military demarcation line to get their lives back to normal.
"The villagers were living in really poor conditions after suffering six months of snow," Lt Gen Chalermchai, who's now 79, said.
"The UN troops who were really well equipped could hardly endure the cold. So imagine how hard it was for the villagers who had only thatched huts to shelter them," he said
Pyongyang's recent declaration that it was entering a "state of war" with South Korea, followed by its nuclear weapons test, brought back bad memories of the consequences of the Korean War (1950-3) for Lt Gen Chalermchai.
Lt Gen Chalermchai, then a cavalry lieutenant, said the mission of his unit in 1966 was not only to secure the border but also to give the villagers any help they needed.
"Food and fuel were rationed. Fuel was what they need the most to keep them warm," he said.
The Thai soldiers and South Korean people seemed to quickly build trust. Thailand was among the first nations to join the Korean War, he said.
He also had a few encounters with North Korean troops when he patrolled close to Panmunjom village, which straddles the border between the two Koreas in the middle of the Demilitarized Zone.
"They [the North Korean soldiers] were like mannequins. They didn't talk. They didn't move. The war made them so," he said.
For Col Pramool Hutasingh, who saw active combat, said that what he witnessed in Korean will never leave him.
Now 87, Col Pramool was an army sub-lieutenant at the time.
He remembers a shell landing on the command centre of his unit, which wiped out the entire 2nd platoon.
"The unit deputy commander [Capt Juan Wannarat] and I narrowly escaped because we were standing several metres away. I can still see all the body parts lying all over the place," he said.
"When the day ended, we patrolled the area and found North Korean troops dead in the snow," he said.
At that time they were his enemies, to be crushed.
"Now as I look back, they were just victims of war," he said.
According to Col Pramool, civilians and troops suffered alike in the time of violent conflict. Civilians, and especially children who strayed too close to the front line suffered the most.
"They depended on soldiers to help them get through the cold and hardship. Shortages were everywhere _ food, fuel and clothes," he said.
According to Lt Gen Chalermchai, the current tension is simply because North Korea's young leader Kim Jong-un wants to show off his power and gain the respect of the military.
"It would be nice to see a Korean reunification. They could become powerful as a single country, with the resources they have," he said.
Col Pramool said war has only one purpose: to serve politics.
"The politics of North Korea is to blame," he said.
"But I do hope there won't be anyfighting. When the war breaks out, it is the people who suffer," he said.
The Korean War began when the North invaded the South in 1950. It raged on for three years until a cease-fire was signed on July 27, 1953. However, no peace agreement has ever been signed, so the North and the South remain technically at war.
Thailand sent 11,776 troops in 23 rotations to fight in the war, keep peace and rehabilitate South Korea. The last troops went there in 1972.
Lt Gen Chalermchai served in a rehabilitation phase from 1966 until 1967, while Col Pramool served from 1952 to 1953.
WELCOME: Lt Chalermchai Hirunard, left, is greeted by a UN delegation as he and other Thai troops arrive at Gimpo international airport by US C-141 aircraft in 1966.