Allow me to contribute some as well!
Korean War POWs:
Many don't know the story of POWs during the Korean War.
In the beginning, neither NK nor SK had a system for POWs, NK made some gathering points, but was otherwise oblivious of what to do with them. The same went for SK/UN captives.
After Chinese involvement, the death rates among the POWs was alarming, so the Chinese decided to treat the POWs more humane and get some propaganda material while they're at it. The Chinese requested medical support and were ordered to treat their POWs well. Though atrocities were committed like in every war, the POWs conditions improved significantly after chinese involvement.
Relocating POWs to the gathering points, that were often far away. Due to the harsh climate and long walks, the US dubbed these relocations "Death Marches".
American POWs after Chinese involvement, enjoying music.
American POWs after Chinese involvement, having some rest.
On the other hand, the POWs on UN side began to faction into former KMT and Communist groups, the KMT groups who resented the communist groups backed by their captors beat up the communist captives... The US/SK also barely changed much about their POW situation.
Though exaggerated by propaganda, the POWs who came in contact with Chinese overseers at their gathering points were treated quite well:
There wasn’t too much friction between prisoners and captors who were the Chinese. We understand the American life, what we wanted. I said, well look, I volunteered, I asked for recreation equipment, I asked if we could set up a recreation hall, I asked if some of the guys are religious, if we could let our cooks cook the way we like, so they agreed with everything we said and in about two and a half to three months, they brought in baseballs, we exercised every day and we began to get strong... I remained in camp until the end of war and the Chinese sent me away to study. Then they sent me back to camp to give lectures and I gave lectures on capitalism, imperialism, history of social development. I learned the difference between all of those, right there in a prisoner of war camp, and I told it to the other prisoners.
-Clarence C. Adams, US POW during the Korean War
After the War, the USA tried to pull an ideological blow to the "reds", knowing that a part of their forces were fromer KMT, they omitted existing repatriation rules and declared "Volunteer repatriation". Sure enough, the former KMT POWs prefered to go to Taiwan rather than live in China... but 23 Americans and 1 Briton chose to live in China. This was not anticipated by the US government and fearing for their psychological warfare's success, they repeatedly tried to convince the non-repatriates to reconsider. After only 2 of them reconsidered, the US government dishonorably discharged the non-repatriates. They also started spreading rumours about Chinese methods of converting them. The word "Brainwashing" was invented and put into the dictionary. They also spread lies about the non-repatriates, coined them as traitors (while the non-repatriate chinese were still doing the "right thing"). Though all of this was obviously bullsh*t, the US citizens readily believed it with their warped imagination of China (to be fair, China's view of the west was also quite warped, as seen in the cultural revolution).
Clarence Adams and his new family. As black man, Clarence was accused of being feeble-mindedand swayed by false promises of the Chinese proclaiming acceptance of all races while forgetting that his home Country was truely free and even to all. Ironically, America was having heavy racist problems regarding their black population at that time and Adams had no problems with being accepted in China, or even getting a wife.
As for the non-repatriate G.I.s, they weren't given any special propaganda-based special treatment. Most of them learned Chinese and lived happy lives in China (2 with low IQ who weren't able to learn Chinese went back after a few months because they ouldn't live in China in practice. No special treatments!). They sometimes married and had families, but they all returned when China fumbled itself during the cultural revolution with the exception of James Veneris who remained as doctor at a hospital.
After their return, the non-repatriates were treated as traitors and scum, they had difficulties to find a job. American sources always obscure their presence by presenting the casualty numbers including the time before Chinese involvement and listing the number of Chinese (mostly KMT) non-repatriates.
A mostly untold story, in which China, accused of Human Rights issues throughout its past was partially more humane in practice than 'the free World'. The testimonies are a book written by Adams and the Canadian movie "They Chose China".
