This Was the War

The famed "fog of war" that envelops most military actions did not obscure the Korean struggle. More than most wars, it had a plain and definite shape, determined by three obvious factors: 1) overwhelming Communist superiority in the early stages; 2) long-range superiority of the U.N. forces, especially in weapons, air power and sea power, and 3) Douglas MacArthur's vast superiority over the enemy generals in strategic planning.

After the first U.S. troops, committed in battle below Seoul, had carried out MacArthur's first step and forced the enemy to deploy (map 1), MacArthur was able to foresee and plan the future course of the war. He planned a delaying retreat to a defensible beachhead (map 2), a buildup of strength behind the perimeter (map 3) and finally a breakout aided by one or more amphibious attacks behind the enemy lines (map 4). Although the Korean war brought many surprises (of which the greatest was the sudden Red collapse), the shape of the war after the first two weeks was that imposed on it by MacArthur.

The first surprise was the tactical surprise achieved by the enemy when he attacked; the second was the high quality of his army. The sinewy, spring-legged little men of North Korea had good equipment and they knew how to use it. They handled their hard-hitting, Russian-made tanks well; they were smart, tireless infantrymen and they were close to wonderful with mortars and artillery. At one stage of the battle a U.S. soldier observed bitterly that they could drop a mortar shell "in your hip pocket."

There were other unpleasant surprises for the U.S.--the feeble armament, the initial weakness and panic of the South Koreans; the fact that the mere appearance of the first U.S. troops in the line failed to turn the tide of battle; the failure of light bazookas, 105-mm. howitzers and, finally, of Sherman tanks to stop the Red armor. The inexorable advance of invaders against defenders who had complete command of the air was something new under the sun.

There were pleasant surprises, too--the quick recovery of the South Korean army and its successful regrouping, under U.S. direction, as a fighting force; the rapid seasoning of U.S. troops, green and soft at first, into brave, battlewise and hardened campaigners.

Tank Terror. Like the Japanese at Pearl Harbor, the North Koreans attacked early on a Sunday morning (June 25), and struck south in a six-pronged drive, with a heavy force of armor aimed at Seoul. U.S. intelligence had reported that North Korean troops were massed on the border, but the enemy had achieved surprise by a prior series of false alarms in the form of border raids, so that no one paid enough attention this time. This time it was not a raid.

The South Koreans had no tanks, no combat aircraft. Since they also lacked effective antitank guns, the appearance of the enemy's squat, death-dealing T-34s spread terror. Seoul fell without any semblance of a real battle. Syngman Rhee's government fled to Taejon--the first of its three forced moves during three months of war.

The first U.S. commitment was ten F-51 Mustangs for the South Koreans to fly. Then on June 27 President Truman asked for and got U.N.'s decision to defend South Korea. With U.N. sanctions behind it, the U.S. began to send troops, ships, weapons, ammunition, supplies, and U.S.-flown airplanes. The North Koreans in their Russian-made Yaks found themselves no match for U.S. pilots and planes, and virtually disappeared from the air, never to reappear in combat. They did not even send up fighters to attack the unescorted B-29 Superforts which later began strategic raids north of the 38th parallel.

First Driblet. The South Koreans were in a complete and, apparently, hopeless rout. Suwon and its airfield were lost and Red flanking drives to the east were under way when the first driblet of U.S. ground troops--two battalions of the 24th Infantry Division--reached the zone of battle.

These two U.S. battalions were committed piecemeal at Osan, to delay the enemy's approach to the Kum River line and Taejon. The Americans, at this stage, had no tanks and their light bazookas and antitank weapons were no match for the Red armor. They fell back. But their gallant action had served, at least, as a temporary roadblock, and it forced the first great tactical mistake of the North Koreans. Apparently overestimating the U.S. strength, the Communists chose to deploy (see map). If they had driven straight on with their main armored force, they would have overrun the tiny U.S. contingent and barreled on through, without opposition, to the crucial supply port of Pusan. If they had done that, Douglas MacArthur, instead of receiving victory plaudits in Seoul last week, would probably have been sitting in Tokyo directing the reinvasion of Korea from Japan. MacArthur instantly recognized the Reds' vital error. Some people ridiculed him for saying on July 20: "The first phase of the campaign has ended and with it the chance for victory by the North Korean forces."

Horrid Word. When the first U.S. Sherman tanks (mounting 76-mm. guns) arrived, they were smashed by the harder-hitting 858 of the enemy's T-34 tanks. Thereafter the U.S. avoided tank-to-tank slugging until heavier Pershings, with 90-mm. guns, began to reach Korea at the end of July. The first damaging inroads on enemy armor were made by Allied airplanes and by 3.5-in. bazookas, capable of penetrating eleven inches of armor, the first of which were dispatched to Korea by emergency air shipment from the U.S. It was clear that if the Kum River line could not be held, the defenders would soon be compressed into a beachhead perimeter around Pusan. U.S. commentators began to bandy the horrid word "Dunkirk." Were the Allies in Korea being pushed into the sea?

The tricky Reds infiltrated U.S. lines at night, or by day disguised as white-clad peasants, and shot up U.S. positions from the flank and rear. The Kum line could not be held. The U.S. 1st Cavalry Division and the 25th Infantry Division arrived from Japan to help the battered 24th, and Lieut. General Walton Walker was appointed MacArthur's ground cornmander in Korea. The Americans fell back from Taejon to Kumchon, the next important junction on the rail and road line to Pusan.

The South Korean army had recovered from its panic and was fighting bravely and well on the U.S. right flank. But the U.S. left flank was open: there was a yawning gap between this flank and the west coast. Around it the North Koreans poured two crack divisions, the 4th and 6th (described, in Douglas MacArthur's overoptimistic communiques of that period, as "roving bands). In a matter of days they swept through the southwestern corner of Korea and raced east for Pusan. They were in sight of Masan, 30 miles from Pusan, before they were stopped by a small, determined force of the 24th Infantry (later replaced in that sector by the 25th). It was the closest the enemy ever got to Pusan during the entire war.

To The Perimeter. The North Koreans had missed another big chance. They were still maintaining heavy pressure on the main axis of their advance--Taejon-Kumchon-Taegu--trying to turn the U.S. retreat into a rout. In this they failed. If, instead, they had diverted a heavier force to the south-coast drive--four divisions, for example, they would almost certainly have smashed through the thin U.S. crust and seized the vital port.

By this time, the Allies, having lost Kumchon, were standing on a fairly well-defined perimeter--with flanks on the south and east coasts--which was to grow smaller before it grew bigger. The south flank rested just west of Masan, the center of the line shielded Taegu, the vital "turntable," and on the east coast the line touched the sea north of Pohang. To defend his perimeter, Walker had, or soon would have, elements of five U.S. divisions--the 24th, 25th and 2nd Infantry, the 1st Cavalry, the 1st Marine.

Unknown to the U.S. public and the troops in the field, General MacArthur had received approval of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for his daring invasion plan at Inchon.

Last Gasp. In the south, Walker on Aug. 7 mounted the first sustained U.S. counterattack of the war, to drive the enemy back from his disquieting proximity to Pusan. General Craig's marines joined this "spoiling attack," but Walker pulled them out after they had helped to upset the enemy. He had to make shift with what troops were already at hand, shuttling them from one crisis to another. The next reserves due to arrive--the bulk of the 1st Marine Division from the U.S. and the 7th Infantry from Japan--were earmarked for Operation Chromite, the invasion at Inchon.

In bloody battles, the U.S. beat back a massive enemy thrust at Taegu and shrank or wiped out the Red bridgeheads across the Naktong River. On the east coast, the South Koreans lost Pohang, regained it after U.S. reinforcements sped to help them.

The great retreat had slowed down and stopped. Under constant and growing harassment from the air, it looked as though the North Koreans were running out of tanks and ammunition. Walker said something about their "last gasp." But the appearance of Communist weakness was illusory. The invaders were saving up for the big push, in the first two weeks of September--which really was their last gasp.

The power of this offensive was amazing. Once more the enemy won bridgeheads across the Naktong, bigger than ever. Once more Taegu was threatened, not only frontally but by envelopment from the east. The northern front, from Taegu to the Japan Sea, sagged menacingly. On the east coast the South Koreans were thrown into chaotic disorder.

Something Was Up. Then the whole aspect of the war changed suddenly and completely. Operation Chromite hit the North Koreans on Sept. 15. The Reds undoubtedly knew that something was up: carrier planes from Task Force 77 had been blasting Inchon, Seoul and Pyongyang for days. But the enemy, apparently, did not expect the blow to fall at Inchon; its 28-ft. tides made it the most difficult spot that MacArthur could have picked on the west coast.

The North Koreans must have felt abandoned by their Big Brothers in the Kremlin, but they fought savagely for Seoul while U.S. spearheads from the southeast raced to a junction with the 7th Infantry below Suwon. MacArthur announced the fall of Seoul eleven days after the Inchon landing (street fighting continued for three days more). While the Eighth Army, streaming out of the old perimeter in all directions, mopped up the liberated countryside, the South Koreans crossed the 38th parallel.

Douglas MacArthur, the victor of Korea, called on Pyongyang to surrender (see below).

So soon after the battle it was hardly possible to assess the full extent of what Russia had lost in her ill-starred gamble. But it was clear that she had lost a great deal. She had aroused the U.S. to an awareness of its weaknesses and a determination to build up strength. Russia had enabled the U.S. to prove to the whole world that it would shed the blood of its men on foreign soil to defend an ally. Russia had aroused the U.N.--to which its representative had made a degraded and fruitless return after seven months of boycott--to a consciousness of new power and prestige. Russia had showed herself to the troubled peoples of Asia and to all the Red satellites of Europe as a puppet-master who abandons the puppet when things go wrong.

Stalin's defeat in Korea would not prevent him from trying again--whenever he saw an opportunity to extend the Kremlin's sway. But Korea would almost certainly make Stalin more cautious about further adventures. Korea had looked like a sure thing, and it had blown up in Stalin's face.

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