“the war is very definitely”: Schnabel, The First Year, 216.
We now know that by this point, Peng Dehuai: Peng Dehuai, Memoirs of a Chinese Marshal: The Autobiographical Notes of Peng Dehuai (Foreign Languages Press, 1984), 474.
“if successful, . . . for all practical purposes”: Lynn Montross and Nicholas Canzona, U.S. Marine Operations in Korea, 1950–53, vol. 3, The Chosin Reservoir Campaign (U.S. Marine Corps, 1957), 144.
a sizable “reconnaissance in force”: For an example of the “reconnaissance in force” argument, see Willoughby and Chamberlain, MacArthur 1941–1951, 388. For a discussion of the Joint Chiefs’ directive, see Schnabel, The First Year, 218.
“the final destruction”: Schnabel, The First Year, 282.
“For the first time in military history”: Blair, Forgotten War, 394.
“any program short of this”: “The Commander in Chief, Far East [MacArthur] to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Top Secret / Emergency, Tokyo, November 9, 1950,” FRUS 1950, vol. 7, 1108.
“immoral . . . proposition” . . . “in recent times”: FRUS 1950, vol. 7, 1109.
addressed him as “son”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith, USMC,” interviews by D. Clayton James, August 25, 1971, U.S. Marine Corps University Library Archives, Quantico, VA, 200.
“the worst working relationship”: Shelby Stanton, America’s Tenth Legion: X Corps in Korea, 1950 (Presidio, 1989), 52.
“the disposition of those troops”: Schnabel, The First Year, 278.
“absolute falsehood”: Ridgway, interviews by John Blair, USAMHI, 74.
“the Eighth Army”: Schnabel, The First Year, 278.
“I don’t have pneumonia” . . . “You tell General Walker”: S. L. A. Marshall, Bringing Up the Rear (Presidio, 1979), 181–83.
“I can only brace myself”: Marshall, Bringing Up the Rear, 188.
One of his first orders: Julian Burns Jr., “The Education of Matthew Ridgway in Generalship,” U.S. Army War College, 1989, 31.
10. ARMY GENERALS FAIL AT CHOSIN
The Marines were on the west: S. L. A. Marshall, “A Study Based on the Operations of the 1st Marine Division in the Koto-ri, Hagaru-ri, Yudamn-ni Area, 20 November–10 December 1950,” 23; part 2 of “CCF in the Attack,” staff memorandum, January 27, 1951, on file at USAMHI. Also reprinted as an appendix to William Hopkins, One Bugle No Drums: The Marines at Chosin Reservoir (Avon, 1988).
Col. Gregon Williams: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 254.
“I can still see the icicles”: Martin Russ, Breakout: The Chosin Reservoir Campaign, Korea 1950 (Fromm, 1999), 321.
one peculiarity of Chosin: Goulden, Korea, 365.
The cold was a lethal curse: Charles Holloway Jr., Escape from Hell: A Navy Surgeon Remembers Pusan, Inchon, and Chosin, unpublished manuscript on file at Learning Resource Center, Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, MD, 95–96, 102.
“I was in the Bulge”: Roy Appleman, East of Chosin: Entrapment and Breakout in Korea, 1950 (Texas A&M, 1987), 328–29.
When Lt. Col. Don Faith Jr.’s 1st Battalion: Appleman, East of Chosin, 31.
“Now, look, don’t go out on a limb”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 219.
Brig. Gen. “Hammerin’ Hank” Hodes: Paul Berquist, “Organizational Leadership in Crisis: The 31st Regimental Combat Team at Chosin Reservoir, Korea, 24 November–2 December 1950,” U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 2007, 34–35.
he had set the stage for a defeat: In his own history of the Korean War, Gen. Ridgway twice compares MacArthur’s handling of Chosin to Custer’s Last Stand. Matthew Ridgway, The Korean War (Da Capo, 1967), 63, 76.
The 31st was commanded: Blair, Forgotten War, 389; Edwin Simmons, Frozen Chosin: U.S. Marines at the Changjin Reservoir (U.S. Marine Corps Historical Center, 2002), 49.
“The sum total of the 1/32 IN”: Berquist, “Organizational Leadership in Crisis,” 19.
The first ominous sign: Russ, Breakout, 106.
“were going to take back” . . . “couldn’t take it from us”: “Interview with Captain Edward P. Stamford, Former Air Controller (ANGLICO Team) Attached to 1st Battalion, 32nd Infantry Regiment, 7th Infantry Division, USA,” March 16, 1951, Historical Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 71.
“I already know all this” . . . “Chinamen in those mountains”: Russ, Breakout, 108.
“the G-2 of 1st Marine Division”: Edward Almond, “Reflections on the Hungnam Evacuation, Korea, December 1950,” Edward Almond Papers, box 70, USAMHI, 108.
the record is clear that the Marines: Marshall, “CCF in the Attack, Part II,” staff memorandum, January 27, 1951, on file at USAMHI.
“Those aren’t Chinese soldiers” . . . “That’s a Marine lie”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 3.
By 1951, Willoughby had served MacArthur: James, Years of MacArthur, vol. 2, 80.
He persisted in this even after Omar Bradley: Omar Bradley to Charles Willoughby, May 21, 1948, Charles Willoughby Papers, box 6, Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, PA.
The same year, Robert McCormick: McCormick to Willoughby, July 30, 1948, Willoughby Papers, box 8, Gettysburg College.
“to congratulate you and the able GOP” . . . “Far Eastern policy”: Willoughby to Brewster, November 21, 1950, Willoughby Papers, box 6, Gettysburg College.
“a lone voice”: Willoughby to McCarthy, January 28, 1951, Willoughby Papers, box 8, Gettysburg College.
“to the second greatest military genius”: Willoughby to Francisco del Castillo, Spanish ambassador to Japan, March 9, 1951, Willoughby Papers, box 6, Gettysburg College.
“my pet fascist”: Andrew Gordon, A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present (Oxford, 2009), 237.
“One minute we were planning”: Appleman, East of Chosin, 71.
In the middle of the night: “Interview with Captain Edward P. Stamford,” 74.
“We’re still attacking”: “Chosin Reservoir,” chap. 6 in Russell Gugeler, ed., Combat Actions in Korea, rev. ed. (U.S. Army, 1970).
“there weren’t two Chinese divisions”: Berquist, “Organizational Leadership in Crisis,” 46.
The only opposition Faith was facing: Appleman, East of Chosin, 71.
Almond also told Faith: Almond to Appleman, May 22, 1978, “Military Correspondence, 1960–1977,” Edward Almond Papers, box 129, USAMHI.
“After the helicopter carrying General Almond”: Donald Knox, The Korean War, Pusan to Chosin: An Oral History (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1985), 549.
“While geographically his elements”: “The Commander in Chief, United Nations Command (MacArthur) to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Top Secret/Flash, Tokyo, 30 November 1950,” FRUS 1950, vol. 7, 1260.
“The situation was much more serious”: Maj. Gen. David Barr, lecture at Army War College, February 21, 1951, in “Lectures, AY 1950–51,” USAMHI.
“that MG Barr did not coordinate”: Berquist, “Organizational Leadership in Crisis,” 70.
“Nothing was working out”: Knox, The Korean War, 551.
“They had been fighting”: Berquist, “Organizational Leadership in Crisis,” 66.
The dead performed a final posthumous service: Appleman, East of Chosin, 194.
“We had proceeded only a short way”: Appleman, East of Chosin, 208.
“Looking back up I could see”: Appleman, East of Chosin, 212.
“It was terrible”: Knox, The Korean War, 552.
“by yelling, shouting”: Appleman, East of Chosin, 253.
“It was a sad and outrageous”: Russ, Breakout, 279. Faith’s killing of the South Korean soldiers is also discussed in Appleman, East of Chosin, 379.
“After Colonel Faith was killed
”: Knox, The Korean War, 553.
“Wounded men inside were spilled”: Chap. 6 in Gugeler, Combat Actions in Korea, accessed online.
That was the end of the convoy: Appleman, East of Chosin, 274.
A Marine pilot who flew low: Stanton, America’s Tenth Legion, 243.
“some of these men were dragging”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 220.
Marine Lt. Col. Olin Beall, the crusty commander: Details of Beall’s background are from Appleman Papers, box 7, USAMHI, and from Simmons, Frozen Chosin, 78. Details of the rescue are from Hopkins, One Bugle No Drums, 138, 253.
The Marines fed the survivors hot soup: Appleman, East of Chosin, 285.
11. O. P. SMITH SUCCEEDS AT CHOSIN
“was a MacArthur man”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 215.
“Colonel Marshall was pretty definite”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 41–47. Marines seemed to like Marshall. At about the same time Smith was a student at Fort Benning, Maj. Gen. John Lejeune, the retired Marine commandant, offered Marshall the position of commandant at Virginia Military Institute. Lejeune to Marshall, November 20, 1932 (referred to in Marshall letter of response, November 24, 1932), box 3, folder 32, in Marshall-Winn Papers, Marshall Library.
“But when you run down”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 52.
As a general, the quiet, pipe-smoking: Biographical data, “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith.”
Peleliu proved to be a bloodbath: James, Years of MacArthur, vol. 2, 491.
“Hagaru-ri had to be held”: Gail Shisler, For Country and Corps: The Life of General Oliver P. Smith (Naval Institute Press, 2009), 197.
“Infantry literally dissolved”: Pogue, Marshall, vol. 3, 538.
“unsatisfactory,” Almond blamed: Elliott Converse et al., The Exclusion of Black Soldiers from the Medal of Honor in World War II: The Study Commissioned by the United States Army to Investigate Racial Bias in the Awarding of the Nation’s Highest Military Decoration (McFarland, 1997), 126.
“People think that being from the South”: Atkinson, Day of Battle, 383.
“a slave unit for white masters”: Converse et al., The Exclusion, 96–98.
Almond manned his corps headquarters: Stanton, America’s Tenth Legion, 51.
“there was nothing wrong with him”: D. Clayton James with Anne Sharp Wells, Refighting the Last War: Command and Crisis in Korea, 1950–1953 (Free Press, 1993), 77.
“when it pays to be aggressive”: Spiller, American Military Leaders, 6.
“We’ve got to go barreling” . . . “the airfield built”: Russ, Breakout, 71.
“Our left flank is wide open”: Russ, Breakout, 72.
At one point in mid-November 1950: Stanton, America’s Tenth Legion, 194.
“We went cautiously”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 4.
“In effect, 1st Mar Div stood” . . . “the upper hand”: Marshall, “A Study Based on the Operations of the 1st Marine Division in the Koto-ri, Hagaru-ri, Yudamn-ni Area, 20 November–10 December 1950,” 6–7.
“Instead of going to positions”: Marshall, “A Study Based on the Operations,” 254.
“The airstrip was ‘ordered prepared’”: Almond to Roy Appleman, October 29, 1975, Edward Almond Papers, box 100, USAMHI.
“Almond seems to have remained optimistic”: Matthew Ridgway, The Korean War, Issues and Policies, June 1950 to June 1951, undated manuscript filed in 1963 with Office of the Chief of Military History, U.S. Army Center of Military History, Fort McNair, Washington, DC, 324.
Smith, in a letter: Shisler, For Country and Corps, 184.
when Smith asked for the help: Clifton La Bree, The Gentle Warrior: General Oliver Prince Smith, USMC (Kent State University Press, 2001), 142.
“The [X] corps at the time”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 226.
“I talked to him and said, ‘O. P.’”: Oral history of Gen. Lemuel Shepherd, Marine Corps Historical Center, Quantico, VA, accessed online.
“Having been a schoolmate”: Oral history of Shepherd.
But Smith saw mounting reasons: Russ, Breakout, 104.
When Smith learned that the Chinese: Shisler, For Country and Corps, 185.
“We will employ a strategy”: Shu Guang Zhang, Mao’s Military Romanticism: Chinese and the Korean War, 1950–1953 (University Press of Kansas, 1995), 109. Smith most likely was aided by the expertise of his division G-2, or intelligence chief, Col. Bankson Holcomb, who had grown up in Beijing, served in China and Japan, and even led Chinese guerrillas during World War II. Millett, The War for Korea, 302.
“encircle and exterminate”: Russell Spurr, Enter the Dragon: China’s Undeclared War Against the U.S. in Korea, 1950–51 (Newmarket, 1988), 169.
“was to slow down the advance”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 210.
“We spent the night shooting”: Russ, Breakout, 181.
“Their buglers sounding some kind of battle call”: “General Raymond G. Davis, Oral History Transcript,” interview by Benis Frank, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, 1978, 162.
When Smith asked Col. Lewis “Chesty” Puller: Hopkins, One Bugle No Drums, 140–41.
“The Army figured we were finished”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 7.
Unlike Faith and those around him: Russ, Breakout, 122, 134, 148.
“Word had been passed to kill”: Knox, The Korean War, 514.
recalled another member of the company, PFC Robert Ezell: Knox, The Korean War, 474.
Another Marine, Cpl. Robert Kelly: Knox, The Korean War, 607.
“we had to climb on our hands and knees”: Davis, “Oral History,” 166.
“we could smell the garlic”: Charles McKellar, interview by J. D. Eanett, March 2, 2006, Archives of Virginia Military Institute, 7.
“probably twenty feet high” . . . “burned into my brain”: McKellar interview, 8.
All of Fox’s survivors: T. R. Fehrenbach, This Kind of War (Bantam, 1991), 350.
A total of fourteen Marines: Stanton, America’s Tenth Legion, 299.
Over four days and three nights: Fehrenbach, This Kind of War, 352.
“The dead were stacked in trucks”: Knox, The Korean War, 532.
“No one ever doubted the troops”: Roe, The Dragon Strikes, 343.
“singing in the midst of this” . . . “We’ve got it made”: “Oral History Transcript: Lieutenant General Alpha L. Bowser, U.S. Marine Corps (Retired),” Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, Washington, DC, 1970, 243.
“We had so many patients lying”: Holloway, Escape from Hell, 107.
The aerial supply and evacuation: La Bree, The Gentle Warrior, 170.
“I considered that the critical part”: O. P. Smith, “Letter of 17 December 1950 from the Commanding General, 1st Marine Division, to the Commandant of the Marine Corps,” O. P. Smith Collection, box 57, Marine Corps Historical Center, Quantico, VA, 6.
“dig in and be prepared”: Appendix A-1 in Paul McCloskey Jr., The Taking of Hill 610 (Eaglet Books, 1992).
“This was a very powerful force”: O. P. Smith, “Looking Back at Chosin,” Marine Corps Gazette, November 2000 (reprinted from December 1960 issue), 63.
Gen. Almond flew over the convoy: Stanton, America’s Tenth Legion, 282.
“Found most of them”: Knox, The Korean War, 580.
“The tracers were weird streaks”: Joseph Owen, Colder Than Hell: A Marine Rifle Company at Chosin Reservoir (Naval Institute Press, 1996), 222.
Chinese soldiers, ill-clad: Roe, The Dragon Strikes, 389.
“like gravel being thrown”: Holloway, Escape from Hell, 122.
“To leave th
em was unthinkable”: Knox, The Korean War, 593.
“He was kind of a grouchy guy” . . . “I’ll get you a bridge”: “Oral Reminiscences of General Oliver P. Smith,” 250.
An officer in his 1st Battalion: Russ, Breakout, 157.
“Is that you, Pearl?”: Russ, Breakout, 419.
“five or six of these great large Tootsie Rolls”: Davis, “Oral History,” 182.
One of Davis’s Marines, Charles McKellar: McKellar interview, 10.
had mauled the Chinese divisions: Simmons, Frozen Chosin, 122.
“came down off the mountain”: “Personal-Confidential,” O. P. Smith to Clifton Cates, December 17, 1950, O. P. Smith Collection, box 57, Marine Corps Archives, Quantico, VA.
the Chinese commander in Korea, Marshal Peng Dehuai: Spurr, Enter the Dragon, 266.
Twenty-three years later: Spurr, Enter the Dragon, 315.
The Chinese divisions that attacked: Eliot Cohen and John Gooch, Military Misfortunes: The Anatomy of Failure in War (Vintage, 1990), 186.
the campaign was a strategic victory: F. M. Berger et al., CSI Battlebook: Chosin Reservoir (Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, KS, 1983), 79.
“Communist China—until then considered”: Roe, The Dragon Strikes, 412.
“If it wasn’t for his tremendous leadership”: General Matthew B. Ridgway, interview by Maj. Matthew Caulfield and Lt. Col. Robert Elton, August 26, 1969, in box 88, Matthew Ridgway Papers, USAMHI, 26.
“perhaps the most brilliant divisional feat”: Shisler, For Country and Corps, 232.
Smith is not much remembered . . . “Regimental commanders spoke”: This omission and its causes are discussed in Shisler, For Country and Corps, 263.
The exhibit on the Chosin campaign: Author visit, February 3, 2012.
“Marine commanders at Chosin”: Faris Kirkland, “Soldiers and Marines at Chosin Reservoir: Criteria for Assignment to Combat Command,” Armed Forces & Society 22, no. 2 (Winter 1995–96), 264.
“On the battlefield, Faith was a clone”: Blair, Forgotten War, 292.
“[He] had not mastered the fundamentals”: Kirkland, “Soldiers and Marines at Chosin,” 266.
“There is no evidence that any effort”: Appleman, East of Chosin, 178.
The Generals Page 49
