Hey, history lovers. I'm Mike Rosenwald with Retropod, the show about the past, rediscovered.

From Truman to Trump, North Korea has vexed 13 presidents.

There was, of course, the bloody Korean War.

Then there was the time in 1976, where North Korea attacked and killed several American soldiers with axes in a demilitarized

zone. In 1994, a U.S. military helicopter was shot down, leaving the co-pilot dead. And in 2009,

North Korea sank a South Korean warship, killing 46 crew members.

But over the past few months, with tensions high, historians and national security analysts

have been reexamining one particular forgotten moment in the history of U.S. and North Korea

conflict.

The year was 1969.

North Korea had just shot down a U.S. spy plane. It's an incident that has

shaped U.S. military policy toward North Korea ever since. That April, back in 69, North

Korea was becoming increasingly belligerent to the West.

Amid the hostility, a U.S. Navy reconnaissance plane took off from an air base in Japan on a

routine mission to spy on the country.

Lieutenant Commander James Overstreet led the operation, codenamed Deep Sea 129.

Overstreet had been on dangerous missions before.

But something about the flight made the pilot from Mississippi nervous.

He told his wife he might not be coming back.

Overstreet's senses were sharp.

He didn't know it, but the North Koreans had been moving their fighter jets to a base

just off their coast. U.S. intelligence thought they were preparing for pilot training. They were wrong.

...