Possible 101st ABN Vietnam Belt Buckle - Gift from Korean 2nd ROK Marine Div

[Mr. Scratch]

Okay, working to clear up a mystery here, maybe you guys can help. 

I've had this belt buckle for probably 10-15 years. It's somewhere in the heaps of junk anyway, right now I can't locate it. Anyway...

It has been a bit of a puzzle. The inscription is definitely Korean, but the insignia in the middle seems pretty clearly Viet Cong. North Korean? But then why the NLF colors? A head scratcher. 

Well, here a bit ago I remembered I had a picture of this, and handed it over to some Koreans to translate. And they really went to town on it. 

They told me it says: 

 

top left: 종군기렴

종군 = serving (as in, the military or serving in war)

기렴(기념) = celebration, in celebration of. In reference to an object, this is the Korean equivalent of "war commemorative."

Top right: 화랑 in hanja. "Hwarang". This is a name of a legendary elite unit in history (something like "knights" or "samurai"). It implies a special kind of soldier. Likely it’s the nickname used by a specific army unit, or a reference to elite troops, 

Bottom: 육군101사단, Army 101st Division

As for the presence of  the Viet Cong emblem, they suggest this buckle may have been made from captured enemy brass (as y'all know, a typical and plentiful "trench art" material), thus making it not just a souvenir, but a kind of war trophy on which placing a defeated enemy emblem would be an appropriate way to mark as such. 

The theory here is that these may have been given as a gift from the 2nd ROK Marine Div. to officers or men of the 1st Bn 101st ABN Div. in commemoration of Operation Van Buren (1966), where both units fought the NVA/VC in the Tuy Hoa Valley, Vietnam. 

Has anyone seen or heard of such a buckle? It's a neat theory but I'd really like to see it nailed down.