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Los Angeles -- For former Peninsula Rep.Pete McCloskey, his return to North Korea after more than 60 years was a trip in a time machine.
In 1951 McCloskey shipped out as a young Marine second lieutenant to join the 1st Marine Division, which had been chewed up in the Battle of the Chosin Reservoir. When he left Korea less than a year later it was as a hero, with the Navy Cross, the Silver Star and a pair of Purple Hearts.
But it was peace, not war, in his thoughts when he landed in Pyongyang, North Korea's capital, earlier this week.
"I feel I've had an experience I've wanted to have for 64 years, which is to shake hands with one of the young kids I fought against and tell them how bravely they fought," McCloskey said after landing in Los Angeles on Friday.
The former congressman was in North Korea as part of a delegation from the Pacific Century Institute, an organization that promotes friendship and better commercial ties between the United States and the Pacific countries of Asia, including North Korea.
"I truly believe North Korea wants a better relationship with us," he said. "They're very anxious to duplicate the economic success South Korea has had, but need to get corporate leadership they don't have."
His meetings with North Korean trade officials weren't nearly as memorable as his get-together with Ji Young Choon, a retired lieutenant general who fought against the Marines all those years ago.
McCloskey met with Ji at a North Korean war museum, filled with relics of the fighting that included captured American weapons, artillery and even a jeep.
Despite the eerie surroundings, it was a tearful meeting on both sides, McCloskey said.
"We saluted each other and then embraced," he said. "We agreed that we didn't want our children, grandchildren or great-grandchildren to ever fight in a war."
The weeklong trip had its disappointments, however.
McCloskey and Donald Gregg, a former ambassador to South Korea who helped organize the trip, tried unsuccessfully to persuade North Korean officials to release Kenneth Bae, a 45-year-old Christian missionary who has been imprisoned in the country for 15 months.
Meeting with Deputy Foreign Minister Rhee Young Ho, McCloskey and Gregg asked for Bae's release. But with North Korean officials unhappy with what they see as unauthorized incursions by U.S. planes into their airspace, the release wasn't going to happen, the former congressman said.
Since the North Korean government had already rebuffed efforts of an official U.S. envoy to obtain Bae's freedom, "it was clear that the timing wasn't right," McCloskey said.
McCloskey didn't get to revisit the rugged part of the country where he led his rifle platoon. Like almost all the Americans who visit North Korea, he never made it outside the capital.
"We understood from everyone who's been there that North Korean officials don't want you visiting the countryside and talking with the people," McCloskey added.
His 10 months in North Korea was a baptism of fire for McCloskey.
He saw 58 of the 61 members of the platoon he led either killed or wounded in the heavy fighting.
"I was scared most of my time," McCloskey said. "But you're more scared that some other Marine might see that you're scared."
But the experience also gave him a face-to-face look at the horrors of war and memories that helped him become the first Republican congressman to come out against the Vietnam War.
"You don't forget the first time you're shot at," he said. "But soldiers who have fought against each other often have a continuing respect for each other."
After his service in Korea, McCloskey spent time as a deputy district attorney in Alameda County before opening a private law practice in Palo Alto in 1955. He beat the late Shirley Temple Black in a 1967 Republican primary and was elected to Congress, where he served until 1983.
In Congress, he was known as a maverick, running a no-chance, antiwar campaign against President Richard Nixon in 1972 and becoming the first GOP legislator to call for Nixon's impeachment after the Watergate scandal. He was a supporter of many environmental issues and was a co-sponsor of the first Earth Day in 1970 and a co-author of the Endangered Species Act.
McCloskey, who now lives on a farm in the tiny Yolo County town of Rumsey, returned to San Francisco on an airplane provided by Burlingame attorney Joseph Cotchett, a longtime friend.
John Wildermuth is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail:jwildermuth@sfchronicle.com.
(Fwd by Bruce Gagnon)