| Abstract: | This essay explores the case of twenty-three American POWs who refused to return to the United States at the end of the Korean War. It first highlights the role of resistance in liberal rhetorical theory and then uses resistance as a lens to analyze public discourse about the incident. Looking closely at the three most common explanations for the soldiers' turning (youth, impairment, and brainwashing), the essay shows how the debate over the nonrepatriates was fundamentally a controversy over the limits of persuasion. |
