The Korean War: The Untold Truth

Chapter 57 China's Intervention (1)
On the morning of October 10, a battalion of the ROK 25th Division moved northwest from the small village of Onjeong at the intersection, the first of a planned advance to Bitong on the Yalu River, 6 miles away.The morning operation started off well and the battalion advanced about 40 miles in a few hours before coming under enemy fire.

South Korean soldiers boldly jumped out of the trucks and fanned out to drive off what their commanders imagined to be a small contingent of North Korean holdups.But catastrophe loomed: the opponents were a large number of Chinese, who broke the South Korean battalion in the ensuing firefight.In a matter of minutes, the battalion suffered heavy casualties, with 750 out of 350 killed, wounded or captured.

Another Korean battalion hurried forward along the same road.Although it did not drive out the Chinese, it took two prisoners.One of the people said that Chinese troops had been on standby in the mountains since October 10, ambushing advancing South Korean troops.

In the early morning of the next day, the Chinese stormed Wenjing along the road, expelling and defeating the remnants of the Korean defenders.When another regiment of the South Korean army came to the rescue, it also encountered the densely populated Chinese and lost all the vehicles and three artillery batteries of the regiment.

On October 10, the South Korean army dropped another regiment in the area.The regiment encountered a Chinese roadblock near the golf course hole and was able to escape with close support from the US Air Force.However, when night fell and the air cover ended, the Chinese killed or captured a few more South Korean soldiers who did not escape into the mountains.Of the 28 officers and men of the regiment, only 3 escaped.By October 552, the ROK advance had come to a halt, and the entire ROK Corps was forced to retreat 875 miles to the Cheongchon River.

North of Cheongcheon on the Western Front to the Unsan area, the Korean 1st Division also encountered the Chinese on October 10.The South Korean troops advanced several miles without incident that morning before they encountered roadblocks and came under heavy mortar fire.Korean tanks fired heavily and broke through the barricade.A prisoner was also taken that afternoon.The man was wearing a North Korean military uniform, but upon interrogation his true identity was revealed: Chong San, 25, a private in the Chinese Communist Army.He stated the following:

Shen's unit, numbering about 2 men, left Tangshan, "Manchuria," 000 miles north of the border, on 10 October and arrived by train at Andong on the Yalu River.They were distributed North Korean military uniforms and ordered to remain silent while captured, with the exception of those who could speak Korean.They then crossed the Yalu River via a newly erected wooden bridge and into the mountains.The military officer told them that the United States has 19 people in North Korea, and China will send "18 people to defeat the United States."

At first glance, Shen's unit does not appear to be a dangerous opponent.Except for machine guns and light mortars, they have no other heavier weapons; 300 of them are not equipped with any weapons; the training of the troops is poor; Shen also said that due to the air strikes of the UN army and the old weapons carried by the Chinese army, many of them are unusable. , so the morale of the troops was low.

Some of Shen's estimates of China's military strength are troubling.He said there were 1 CCP troops in the mountains around Unsan, and another 1 troops were moving towards Xichuan in the east.

The next day, October 10, more Chinese prisoners were brought to Pyongyang for interrogation.Their nationality is beyond doubt.As one interrogation report put it, they "looked like Chinese, spoke Chinese and knew neither Korean nor Japanese."Reports quickly spread throughout the front.Unit after unit reported that they had encountered what proved to be Chinese units, up to the division level.Eighth Army intelligence officials collected these reports and reported them to Tokyo, warning that a new opponent had definitely entered the fray.Tokyo doesn't believe it at all.

MacArthur's command frivolously denied these reports because the intelligence about the presence of the Chinese came from interrogations of prisoners of war and therefore it was "unsubstantiated and cannot be accepted."The next day, more Chinese were captured, but General Charles Willoughby, in a supplementary analysis of his, still said Chinese intervention was "potential" and not real.Even if the Chinese are already in North Korea, there is no need to be surprised.He wrote:

It should be recognized that most of the Chinese military has no significant experience in actual combat with a major military power.In addition, their training, like the original North Korean army, was hampered by a lack of uniform equipment and an insecure supply of ammunition.

Willoughby concludes:
From a tactical point of view, with the victorious American divisions fully engaged, the golden opportunity for intervention was clearly long past.If there is such a plan, it is hard to believe that it will be postponed until the remnants of the North Korean army are exhausted.

Signs of Chinese involvement grow
In the days that followed, the signs of Chinese intervention grew and became so numerous that they could no longer be taken lightly.MacArthur issued a statement on this, to the effect that the Chinese took away his easy victory, which is not fair and just.He blamed the "communists" for sending "communist troops from other countries" across the Yalu River and mustering possible reinforcements in "privileged sanctuaries" north of the "Manchurian" border , they ordered him to keep the war outside of China).He went on to say:
While the North Korean army with which we were initially engaged has been destroyed or incapacitated...we are now faced with a new and scrappy army, possibly backed by substantial foreign reserves and adequate supplies, these It is within easy reach of the enemy, but outside the range of our current military operations.

On October 10, an entire regiment of the South Korean army was completely defeated on the battlefield, and its opponent was three entire armies of the Chinese Communist Field Army.At this moment, all Willoughby admitted was:

It appears possible that an unknown number of Chinese joined ... North Korean troops to assist in the defense of the border area.However, at this time no further conclusions can be drawn due to the fact that only a few captives have been taken and the statements are contradictory.There has been no sign yet that the Chinese Communist Party's military is intervening overtly.

On October 10, Willoughby began to backtrack.In a long "commentary" in the Daily Intelligence Roundup, he cites a carefully selected set of early warnings he had made about reports of Chinese involvement (maybe here: at the time he didn't take these reports, considered them unreliable or unverifiable), and said that the current reports were "probably overstated."In any case, this is the first time he has said that "more credence must be given" to reports that the Chinese have reached North Korea.

On the front lines, Chinese communist forces cut South Korean and American supply lines at will, and they launched surprise attacks from the rear, cutting off one unit after another.Thanks to an emergency airdrop of 10 C-119 aircraft, the Korean 1st Division was saved and two tank companies were saved from destruction.When South Korean troops tried to counterattack, they found that the Chinese had dug in and defended, cleverly concealed and difficult to detect.

For several days, General Walton Walker shared Tokyo's suspicions of Chinese involvement.The first batch of captured Chinese were infantrymen, and it was impossible to know the high-level strategic plan, but Major General Bai Shanye, the commander of the South Korean 1st Division, was convinced.He had fought with the Japanese army in "Manchuria" and knew the situation of the Chinese well.After looking at the dead bodies in front of his troops' positions on the battlefield, he said they were "all Chinese".He told I Corps commander Major General Frank Milburn that there were "many, many Chinese" and at least one division of 1 men.By October 1, Walker sensed that something was wrong, and he brought the 10st Cavalry Division, which was in reserve in Pyongyang, into action.

At first glance, the captured captives appeared to be a poorly trained ragtag.None had any official markings, although several had their names and unit numbers written in ink on the inside of their tunics.Their uniforms are filled with thick cotton and are usually dark yellow, which is quite in harmony with the barren mountains and ridges of North Korea.Officers' uniforms differ only in red piping at the trouser line, on the left side of the jacket, around the neckline and at the cuffs.Cotton military uniforms are warm in dry weather, but do not dry out when soaked in water.Inside the cotton suits, the Chinese wore summer military uniforms and whatever clothes they happened to have.Cloth shoes have no laces and the soles are made of rubber.

Most of the infantry were armed with Japanese rifles, apparently captured in "Manchuria" at the end of WWII.The mortars and light machine guns, however, were American-made, spoils of war captured from the Chinese Nationalists.At least 70% of the captives were taken from one division, the 124th, and they all said they had fought for Chiang Kai-shek.Due to the mountainous relationship, the Chinese Communist army is not equipped with cannons.

This new opponent was so capable that by November 11 the Americans and Koreans were on the defensive along the entire Eastern Front.The main targets of the Chinese attack were South Korean troops guarding the three roads leading south from the Yalu River.Major John Millikin Jr., a battalion commander of the 1th Cavalry, who saw the Chinese weaving through a demoralized ROK force, later commented: At that moment, the whole hillside seemed to come alive."

Refugees brought news that large numbers of Chinese troops were heading south, further frightening the battered South Korean soldiers.Colonel Harold Johnson, commander of the 5th Cavalry, was trying to establish a defensive position when he spotted the retreating ROK II Corps. “They were a great mass of dead soldiers walking on the road—ignoring the passing traffic, ignoring everything around them. They were a ragtag mob that was completely defeated. . . . ” Johnson thought of the Philippines, where he had been in the early days of World War II. serve there.He felt that the expressions and expressions of the dejected South Koreans were just like what he saw on the eve of the surrender of the Americans in Bataan.

What is strange is that on the left, the United Nations forces are still advancing rapidly, and its opponent is still the North Korean People's Army, and no Chinese have been found.

At noon on November 11, a battalion of the 1th Infantry Division arrived at the outskirts of Quangudong, 24 kilometers south of the Yalu River.The battalion prepared defense in depth and at 18:3 p.m. fought an estimated 500 enemy infantry supported by 7 tanks.The fierce battle lasted for half an hour.The North Korean People's Army lost all its tanks, 2 American tanks were slightly injured, and 100 North Koreans were killed.The American commander was Lieutenant Colonel Charles Smith, the same officer who had commanded Task Force Smith in the first American battle at Osan about four months earlier.At Quangok-dong, the 4th Army halted its advance - the most northern battle fought by units of the 8th Army during the Korean War (the infiltration of the Yalu River a few days ago was done by South Korean troops, and the only Americans present were a military advisor).

General Walton Walker, however, recognized that his forces had advanced beyond the limits of safety.The ROK 2nd Army disintegrated in the area around Unsan, leaving the right (east) flank of the US 1st Army completely unprotected.Walker began to withdraw the 24th Division to the south in order to prevent the entire 8th Army from being trapped.

When Walker studied the combat map, he found that the intention of the Chinese seemed very clear.The Chinese wanted to capture Unsan, and then use it to attack westward to the shore of the Yellow Sea, cutting off all the United Nations troops in Northwest Korea.The Chinese had hundreds of thousands of reserves in "Manchuria" ready to swarm across the border should the UN troops be isolated.The Chinese appeared to be preparing for the traditional "hammer and anvil" operation that MacArthur envisioned at Incheon: the Chinese moving south would prevent the United Nations from escaping; military.

Falling into the Chinese trap
When the Chinese started to move towards Yunshan, they set dozens of fires in the mountains extending southward from the Yalu River, and then used the cover of smoke clouds to advance forward to avoid being detected by aerial reconnaissance. On November 11, civilians and other observers reported that tens of thousands of soldiers were marching in a column southwest of Unsan, supposedly tasked with blocking roads south of the city.The Chinese march forward with tenacity. On the afternoon of November 1, Maj. Gen. Hobart Gay, commander of the 11st Cavalry Division, and Brigadier General Charles Palmer, the division's artillery commander, were sitting in a command post listening to a radio station when they heard a reconnaissance plane The driver said: "This is the strangest situation I have ever seen. There are two long columns of enemy infantry advancing along the path to the southeast. . . . Our shells fell directly in their ranks, but they Still advancing." By nightfall, the Chinese had surrounded Yunshan and surrounded the 1th Cavalry Regiment from south, north, and west.The only area the Chinese did not control was the positions of the Korean 1th Regiment to the east.

At around 4:82 p.m., a large number of Chinese people moved in the northern part of Yunshan, this time with unprecedented weapons-four 15mm rocket launchers mounted on trucks that fired simultaneously.The oversized brass bugles sounded distraughtly and frightfully, and the whistles shrieked as the Chinese began to attack.The nervous American GIs huddled in long trenches and hiding behind trees could not hear anything, clearly sending a signal to the Chinese troops.No one in the Far Eastern Forces, general or private, could any longer deny the fact of massive Chinese involvement.As night fell, the Chinese stepped up their offensive.By midnight, the Korean [-]th Regiment was completely wiped out, with most of its soldiers killed or captured.

美军第8骑兵团第3营接着又成为中国人的牺牲品。11月2日清晨，当中共军队切断它在云山东南面的退路时，该营陷入重围。该团的另外两个营——第1营和第2营——竭尽全力突破路障，尽管损失惨重。然而第3营却没有这样的运气。

(End of this chapter)