The U.S. military on Wednesday commemorated the 75th anniversary of an operation rescuing Korean children orphaned in the winter of 1950, when North Korean communist troops threatened to take Seoul. Under Operation Kiddy Car, more than 1,000 children and caretakers were airlifted to safety to the southern island of Jeju from Seoul on Dec. 20, 1950, thanks to the humanitarian operation led by chaplain Lt. Col. Russell Blaisdell and Staff Sgt. Merle Strang. The U.S. airmen initially rescued lost children from the streets and worked to provide them with shelter and food. But as communist forces threatened U.N. troops and forced a retreat southward, Blaisdell and others loaded the orphans onto trucks at the port of Incheon and transported them to an air base in Gimpo, from where they were flown to safety. "I love the fact that it really was a reminder of this great partnership that we have between the Republic of Korea and the U.S.," Maj. Gen. Trent Davis, the chief of chaplains at the U.S. Department of Air Force, told reporters. "And it is that partnership ... it's really a partnership uni