June 26, 2025
SEOUL – Park Tae-seung, 92, vividly remembers the day he was conscripted into the South Korean military to fight against North Koreans. It was near the end of August 1950, only three months after the 1950-53 Korean War began. He was 17.
“Age didn’t really matter — if we were physically big enough, then the country deemed us sufficient to enter the war,” Park, who now lives in the quiet city of Yeongju, North Gyeongsang Province, told The Korea Herald on Wednesday.
“I saw so many of us — both allies and enemies — fighting in the war and getting killed. It still haunts me to this day how I had to leave behind my friends on the battlefield just to survive,” he added.
Park is one of the 29,603 soldiers aged 17 and under who were conscripted for the Korean War, according to data provided by the Institute for Military History under the Defense Ministry in 2011. Among them, 2,573 were killed in the war.
While most were part of the Republic of Korea Armed Forces, some served in the United Nations Command. Some 470 of the 30,000 were identified as female.
The institute’s report tied to the data said that such conscriptions of child soldiers were not carried out “through standard procedures,” indicating that many were forced to enter the war.
Park was allowed to be discharged from the armed forces in February 1955, some two years after the war ended. He was 22 at the time.
With the country attempting to rebuild itself, Park at first saw hope, but his life was quickly filled with despair and crippling challenges.
“My mother had sent all three of her young sons to war. My eldest brother died in the war, leaving his wife widowed … the years following the war were filled with poverty and struggle to earn a meager portion of rice to sustain my family for the day.”
It did not help that the South Korean government had turned a blind eye toward the service of child soldiers during the Korean War in the following decades. It was only in 2010 that the Defense Ministry officially acknowledged the existence and service of child soldiers, upon the suggestion of the Anti-Corruption & Civil Rights Commission.
“We lost our chance to be educated and live better lives. And the country abandoned us,” Park said.
Under the current law, former child soldiers are recognized as war veterans but not as registered patriots. Registered patriots receive bigger rewards and better health benefits compared to those classified as war veterans. Bereaved families of registered patriots can also continue receiving similar benefits after his or her death. Families of war veterans cannot.
A bill to amend the Act on Honorable Treatment of War Veterans and Establishment of Related Associations, aiming to establish a compensation and support system for child soldiers, has been repeatedly drafted, yet scrapped at the National Assembly throughout the past decade. It has never been prioritized, according to attorney Ha Kyoung-hwan, who has worked closely with the survivors of the forgotten group since 2014.
In October 2015, the Constitutional Court dismissed a complaint filed the previous year by five former child soldiers who argued that they were forcefully conscripted by the government during the war and failed to receive legal compensation. The court cited the failure to file the complaint within “the prescribed time limit.” Ha represented the former child soldiers in the case.
In South Korea, a constitutional complaint must be filed with the Constitutional Court within 90 days after the violation of fundamental rights is known, and within one year after the cause of the violation occurs.
However, the court did admit that it would be “appropriate” for the state to recognize the “sacrifice of child soldiers and seek out ways to compensate” if the government budget allows.
He recently attended a memorial service for child soldiers held in Daegu on June 18, the first of its kind to be held in 6 years. A decade ago, 100 survivors attended the event; this year, there were only two.
On top of it, a veterans group of former child soldiers launched in 1996 had disbanded in 2019, with many of its members having died of old age and having undergone financial difficulties in managing the group. Observers say there are now fewer than 2,000 survivors, though there has been no official record stating the exact number of such, to date.
“The survivors are now aged well over 90, and time is running out,” Ha, whose uncle was a Korean War child soldier himself, said via phone.
President Lee Jae Myung on Tuesday called for the Cabinet members to “review whether sufficient rewards and respectful treatments are handed to those who made special sacrifices to protect South Korea.”
Nodding towards Lee’s remarks, Ha expressed hopes of change this year.
“I hope the former child soldiers would finally receive the sufficient rewards and respectful treatment they deserve after all these years.”