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The Ice-Cream Parlor. At Panmunjom itself, a petty little game of one-upmanship still goes on. Long ago, the North Koreans built a circular guard-post on a hill (dubbed "the ice-cream parlor" by the U.N. side) so as to have the highest building at Panmunjom. When the U.N. command took away the altitude superiority by erecting a two-story building, North Korea put a star atop the ice-cream parlor to re-establish its height advantage by a couple of inches. U.N. guards at Panmunjom are mostly U.S. military police, chosen for their size and brawn to tower over the smaller North Korean MPs. When they pass each other, there are spates of slanging, spitting and even slugging. Each side delivers choice epithets in the other's language. "Bastard!" shrills a North Korean. "Kae seki [son of a bitch]," mutters a G.I.
Inside the truce hut, the game continues across the green felt table that is located precisely athwart the cease-fire line. A battle of flagpoles once went on for weeks as each side tried to have its flag stand higher in the meeting room. They finally agreed that only miniature flagpoles, both of precisely equal size, would be placed on the table, but North Korea has put a spike point atop its tiny table pole to gain a minute one-inch height advantage. Language across the table, which is predictably tough, reached a peak last year when the senior member on the U.N. side, U.S. Major General Richard Ciccolella, violated past practice and started addressing his opposite number directly with such salty salutations as "Pak, you bastard ..." Once, when Ciccolella stared out a window while the North Korean side was trying to make a point from a chart, North Korean Major General Pak Chung Kuk admonished him in passable English: "Look at the goddam chart!"
Once seated at the table for a session, the senior members of either side cannot leave before the meeting is over without signifying a walkout. Since the meetings sometimes run as long as nine hours, the confrontation is known informally as "the battle of the bladder." Only the two senior members speak, and they do not speak to each other but through intermediaries, communicating only by glares. Everything is translated not only into English and Korean, but into Chinese as well; four Chinese delegates are present at almost every meeting, with Mao badges displayed on their tunics.
Close Watch. Twice the U.S. was caught by surprise in Korea, once by the invasion from the North and again when the Chinese crossed the Yalu. Lately, in response to North Korea's new aggressiveness, it has increased its defenses along the DMZ to counter infiltration moves, has examined every possible North Korean strategy and has kept a close intelligence watch on the movements of North Korean troops and armor. So far, North Korea has confined itself to nasty words and restricted infiltration and sniping. There is, however, increasing concern that Kim II Sung may be planning something more substantial that could effectively write finis to the long and troubled truce.