The Chinese People's Volunteers and the Strategy of People's War(BARF ALERT)

Revolutionary Worker #1060 ^ | June 25, 2000 | unknown

[Sparta]

Over the years, the bourgeois press has tried to downplay the brilliance of people’s war as carried on by the Chinese People’s Volunteers in Korea. Various imperialist mouthpieces have made racist portrayals of the so-called hordes of Chinese stupidly making wave upon human wave of useless frontal attacks against a firmly entrenched enemy, accumulating losses that were unnecessary. But the real story — which has been noted by honest journalists — is that the Chinese People’s Volunteers developed a unique and effective style of fighting that took advantage of the various strengths and weaknesses of their own army and that of the enemy.

As a Chinese commander explained, "The enemy’s frontal defense is so tight and its firepower is so well-organized that a frontal attack against such a defense line won’t be effective. On the other hand, what the American troops fear most is being cut off from their communications and retreat lines. Given these strengths and weaknesses we shall try to carry to its full effect such tactics as determined and audacious penetration, close-combat battles, and night operations."1

One historian described the U.S. reaction to the CPV attack against a U.S. battalion at Unsan: "The Americans were shaken by the ferocity of the attack. The cavalrymen had never experienced anything quite like it. The enemy moved catlike in the darkness. Infiltrators made good use of cover, probing unerringly for weaknesses in the defense and exploiting each advantage with uncanny speed. It was as if the offensive had been painstakingly researched. The attackers pressed on regardless of losses, although there were few head-on assaults. All this to the blowing of bugles, whistles, and the occasional beating of gongs."2

The official U.S. Marine Corps history of the war cites the derisive comment of one marine: "How many hordes are there in a Chinese platoon?"

The Australian journalist Wilfred Burchett wrote: "The Americans explained every defeat as due to ‘overwhelming hordes,’ irresistible as the sea, but on innumerable occasions they suffered heavy defeats by tiny groups of men whose morale was high and who had boundless faith in their cause. It was painful for the Americans to have to admit defeat at all, doubly painful to admit they were defeated on equal terms and ten times as painful to admit they were defeated by inferior numbers of ‘Gooks’ and ‘Chinks,’ as they referred to Koreans and Chinese in their racial arrogance."3

A ROAD-BOUND ARMY A number of historians have commented that in the realm of supply, supposed strength was turned into weakness for the U.S. Army. They point out that the great advantage of the U.S. military forces was its awesome firepower. But great firepower means that great amounts of ammunition had to be transported to the battlefield. Also, the reliance upon heavy weapons like tanks, artillery, and tracked and wheeled vehicles, meant that the U.S. troops were tied to the roads of their Main Supply Routes. The long lines of vehicles were continually attacked from the surrounding hills of the mountainous Korean terrain. When the Main Supply Routes were cut anywhere along the line, the U.S. forces couldn’t be provided for. If the U.S. reopened the Main Supply Route at one place, the People’s Volunteers had only to cut it somewhere else to put the U.S. troops into jeopardy.

With all their tanks and trucks carrying the great assortment of wares befitting an imperialist army, the U.S. soldiers were road-bound. When the U.S. soldiers went into battle, they hated to leave the safety of their trucks and slog across the hills. Meanwhile, the Chinese People’s Volunteers continuously baffled the U.S. soldiers with their ability to advance speedily across apparently impassable ground.

The Chinese People’s Volunteers had to rely largely on their own human or animal transport to move supplies to their front line troops. They got by with fewer supplies than the U.S. soldiers, but what they did get was not solely dependent upon the roads. Rather, the Chinese could move on foot through the mountains on steep trails and through roadless valleys and emerge behind U.S. forces to set up roadblocks and cut off or surround the enemy troops.

Chroniclers of the Korean War have observed that even on foot, the CPV could achieve extremely high march rates— 18 miles a day for 18 days straight for one unit. When the Chinese army had to transport supplies by road, they mainly moved at night and without headlights. Lookouts were posted on the highest hills to spot for enemy planes and warn the truck drivers to take cover.

LIVING HARD,FIGHTING HARD As one observer noted, when the U.S. soldier went into battle he went as part of a pampered army. "Not for them a pound or two of parched grain-meal in a cloth roll on which a Korean or a Chinese fighting man could survive with no more than water. America combat rations then ran to meats, poultry, hamburgers, vegetables, fruits, biscuits, coffee, sugar, milk, vitamins, confectionery, packaged to attract the eye of a supermarket customer. Wherever the troops passed there was a litter of empty or wasted packages."4

Further, the U.S. forces had just been having a holiday as occupying troops in Japan. They spent more time forcing themselves on Japanese women than practicing military skills. Now, they were suddenly lifted from their cushy life and dropped head-up against the Chinese People’s Volunteers.

In contrast, the long years of the Chinese Civil War had battle-hardened the People’s Volunteers. They had learned to live hard, constantly in need of adequate transportation, ammunition, food, and other supplies. Most of the time the Chinese soldiers walked into battle with little sleep and having only eaten some rice for a meal. They had to be very careful not to waste ammunition, sometimes counting their bullets before an all-out assault. The People’s Army had none of the comforts of a modern army. Learning how to fight under such conditions turned great weakness into great strength for the Chinese army fighting in Korea. They lived hard and fought hard.

Through the first few battles of the Chinese First Offensive, the enemy’s weaknesses began to show. In a pamphlet entitled Primary Conclusions of Battle Experience of Unsan, the Chinese summed up their appraisal of the fighting ability of U.S. troops: "When cut off from the rear, American soldiers abandon all their weapons, leaving them all over the place, and play opossum.... Their infantrymen are weak, afraid to die, and haven’t much courage to attack or defend. They depend on their planes, tanks and artillery. At the same time, they are afraid of our firepower. They will cringe when, if on the advance, they hear firing. They are afraid to advance farther.... They specialize in day fighting. They are not familiar with night fighting or hand-to-hand combat.... If defeated, they have no orderly formation. Without the use of their mortars, they become completely lost.... At Unsan they were surrounded for several days, yet they did nothing. They are afraid when their rear is cut off. When transportation comes to a standstill, the infantry loses the will to fight."5

LURE THE ENEMY IN DEEP The CPV had fought well during the First Offensive and mainly they were successful in battle. In addition, they seized tons of military equipment that the U.S. soldiers left while in full retreat. As the Chinese Volunteers remarked: they liked fighting the U.S. Army more than the ROK troops because when the U.S. soldiers fled, they left behind all kinds of useful equipment.

But many had escaped from the net during the first battles, so the Chinese command set to work planning a new offensive against the U.S. forces. The CPV commanders wanted the imperialists to be surprised by a sudden, massive offensive that would prove to be totally devastating. For this to happen, the U.S./UN forces would have to advance further into a trap.

The First CPV Offensive had made the U.S. more conservative in their advance. They continually stopped and probed for signs of strong resistance. The Chinese command had to devise a plan to lure the U.S./UN forces in more deeply, and more quickly. For as time went on, there would be more opportunity for the U.S. to discover exactly how many Chinese troops were actually in Korea. But the element of surprise was still very much in their favor. Although there was now certain evidence of the People’s Volunteers in Korea, the U.S. refused to believe that there was much of a Chinese force at all.

The CPV tricked the U.S. by releasing prisoners and withdrawing from the battlefield, giving the illusion that the Chinese were far fewer in numbers and that the U.S. Eighth Army was mainly fighting against the North Koreans who were demoralized by the reverses in the war. The many bourgeois accounts of the war confirm that the U.S. commanders were thoroughly confused. First, a ruthless attack, followed by stillness on the battlefield. It was most puzzling...as if their adversary had disappeared into thin air!

But the U.S. imperialists, forever arrogant and deluded into thinking that all was clear, continued their push to the Yalu and played right into the hands of the Chinese command. On Nov. 25, with great fanfare, the U.S. launched its "Home by Christmas Offensive." The U.S. forces moved northward against light resistance, driving toward the China-Korea border. They hoped to catch the "retreating" Chinese and Korean troops between two prongs of a great pincers between the Eighth Army and the X Corps against the Yalu River. Prior to moving out, the U.S. airforce unleashed a massive bombing campaign to destroy the bridges across the Yalu from China. The U.S. hoped that by destroying the bridges, it would cripple any attempts at reinforcement from the People’s Republic of China. But despite the tremendous tonnage of bombs dropped, only four of the twelve bridges were destroyed.

Meanwhile, Chinese People’s Volunteers had concentrated their forces to hit the imperialists hard. Six field armies numbering about 180,000 were thrown against the U.S. Eighth Army. Three of those armies blocked the advance of three U.S. divisions driving toward the Yalu. The plan was to allow these divisions to advance but hit them before they could consolidate their new positions. The Chinese masterfully chose the terrain on which to fight. About 15 miles north of the Chongchon River, from which the U.S. launched their offensive, the ground rises sharply into rough mountainous terrain with narrow valleys extending northward to the Yalu. It was in the hills overlooking these valleys that the CPV secretly amassed...just waiting for their enemy to approach. The U.S. forces were not at all prepared for the CPV onslaught, which sent them into headlong retreat back across the Chongchon River. If the spiriting of the Chinese People’s Volunteers into Korea was one of the greatest examples of deception in military history, then this second offensive ranked right alongside their previous feat.

The other three CPV armies attacked the main U.S. positions on the Chongchon somewhat inland from where the first three U.S. divisions were attacked. The success of this phase of the offensive depended on a strong frontal attack against the U.S. positions. This frontal assault was designed to hold the attention of U.S. units on the threat in front of them. But the major blow actually fell on the ROK II Corps which was supposed to protect the right flank of the whole Eighth Army. Again, the ROK units were the weakest link in the U.S. chain and the CPV broke it. When the ROK elements crumbled, this left the door open for the Volunteers to hit the exposed eastern flank of the U.S. Eighth Army and allowed the CPV to roll up the enemy from east to west. Consequently, the U.S. 2nd Division caught the full force of this attack on the front, rear, and flanks just outside of the town of Kunu-ri. All U.S. units were ordered to retreat. The Chinese units were now concentrating and moving in broad daylight in pursuit of the retreating U.S. troops.

But more was to come. The Chinese command planned a major ambush for the fleeing U.S. 2nd Division. While other U.S. troops had escaped along a road running west of Kunu-ri, the Chinese command hoped that the 2nd Division would try to escape south down the Kunu-ri/Sunchon Road. In the great confusion of retreat, the U.S. 2nd Division commanders sought exactly this alternative as they thought it to be the shortest and safest route to the rear. Also, there were rumors that the Chinese had set up roadblocks to the west of Kunu-ri. While the U.S. commanders knew that CPV units had been working their way behind the Division, they thought that the Chinese troops were not in any significant numbers. In reality, though, the CPV had already dug in on the high ridges overlooking the road. Further, the Chinese baited the hook for the U.S./UN force by letting a platoon of Sherman M-4 tanks make an unchallenged run down the threatened road. They were after bigger fish!

The only problem for the Chinese forces was how to stop the fleeing U.S. convoy on the road. Once the retreat order was given, the U.S./UN units lost any cohesion as a fighting force and disintegrated into groups of individuals just trying to save their own asses. As a tremendous barrage of firepower rained down onto the seven-mile-long column and fierce fighting erupted amidst napalm attacks by U.S. planes, a small volunteer unit armed with satchel charges crawled up to the front-most tanks and wrecked them, blocking the way. The Kunu-ri/Sunchon road became a gauntlet of death for the U.S. 2nd Division. Finally, the U.S. engineers were able to remove the debris obstructing the road and the remaining units ran for the rear. One bourgeois historian commented on the U.S. losses, "The retreat to Sunchon cost the Americans more than 3,000 casualties, half their guns, and much of their transportation. This was no worse than Washington’s losses at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777. But the U.S. 2nd Division suffered most of them in a single afternoon."6

A NIGHTMAREFOR U.S. IMPERIALISM While the Chinese People’s Volunteers attacked the U.S. Eighth Army in the west, they also launched an offensive in the east against the Marine X Corps in the vicinity of the Chosin Reservoir. A series of bloody battles were fought among the surrounding hills in sub-freezing weather against the Marines attempting to take the advantage of the high ground away from the CPV who had cut the imperialist’s main supply route. The U.S. Marines were forced to fight their way out through a gauntlet of narrow passes suffering heavy losses. They finally succeeded in making it to the port at Hungnam where they loaded onto ships and escaped. The evacuation of the Marines occurred on Dec. 24, the day before Christmas, thus ending the U.S. "Home By Christmas Offensive."

In the eastern theater of operations in Korea, the U.S. X Corps took to the seas in retreat. In the west the U.S. Eighth Army finally stopped their headlong retreat and drew up defensive lines across the midsection of the Korean peninsula. The war dragged on until negotiations ended the fighting in 1953. Although the Chinese People’s Volunteers were not able to totally annihilate the U.S. forces, the defeat of the U.S. had great international significance. The Chinese forces, together with their Korean allies, had won a victory—at least in the sense of fighting the mighty U.S. forces to a standstill and winning an outcome much more in line with the strategic objectives of the revolutionary forces than those of the imperialists.

At the same time, this was an important learning experience for the Chinese revolutionary army. Throughout the war, and in its aftermath, they carefully studied the strengths and weaknesses of each side, as revealed in the conflict. While it is beyond the scope of this article to sum up all of this, a few further points can be noted. For example, some have commented that while the U.S. "heavy tail" of logistics and supply was a vulnerability, as summed up above, the relatively undeveloped logistics and communication on the Chinese side made for difficulties in sustaining and pursuing an offensive over long distances (different from their strengths in local offensives), in particular up against the firepower and air strength of U.S. imperialism. All this was and is important experience to learn from. As Sun Tzu (an ancient theorist on war, often quoted by Mao) put it, "Know yourself and know your enemy and you can win a thousand battles."

To this day, the memory of the Korean War is a nightmare for the U.S. imperialists. Following their defeat in Korea, the U.S. imperialists were again defeated in Vietnam. In Korea, as Mao said, the Chinese fought the U.S. imperialist forces directly and took their measure—gaining a deeper and concrete sense of their strengths and their weaknesses, and learning ways to combat them. While many particular features of the U.S. armed forces have changed since the time of Korea, some basic, underlying strategic weaknesses were revealed there. In the context of the revolutionary wars of today — and tomorrow — the experience and lessons of "taking the measure" of U.S. imperialism in Korea remains important to the people of the world.ld.

[redbaiter]

I recommend Breakout by Martin Russ. The story, told largely from the point of view of the Marines, of the X corp (meaning largely, the Marines') breakout from the Chosin reservior. I think the Marines would substantially agree with the Revolutionary Worker's assessment insofar as it applies to Walker's army. The book paints Walker's Eighth army in a very bad light, and is also very harsh in describing the US Army troops the Marines fought alongside in Chosin.

[ABrit]

Wilfrid Burchett KGB agent!


http://www.jbs.org/vietnam/below/burchett1.htm

[Quix]

I wouldn't doubt that the exaggerations and lies were extensive.

But what would disturb me more, is the likely number of truths in the article.

[DarthRaven]

As a former "Devil Dog" I say "freakin' A!" The PRC's so called "Chinese People's Volunteers" and the NKPA still fear the USMC! I say we go back & fight them commie bastards! "Frozen Chosin 2!" I don't know who this commie twinkle toe SOB thinks he/she/it is but revising history to fit their way of life won't win over "comrades" to their cause. I believe this commie crapola would appeal only to "traitors of freedom" (left wing liars, cowards and criminals). "Semper Fi, Do or Die!"

[DarthRaven]

The Marines definately have a different version, especially at the "Frozen Chosin."

[dcwusmc]

And a good friend of mine was there at the reservoir... one of the Chosin Few...

BTW, why is this coming out now? Are the ChiComs gearing up for something? I know they were producing a lot of anti-American propaganda in the days following 9-11, most of which, I presume, was geared to the Afghans and Pakis... with a lot of success (NOT)....

[SAMWolf]

The U.S. Forces that went into Korea were unprepared in both equipment and temperment for that war. But they still managed to stop the invaaasion of the south, overun almost all of North Korea and stop a massive Chinese intervention.

Not bad for a "bunch of Imperialist weaklings"

[DarthRaven]

Well let's examine our relationship with the ChiComs shall we? We buy cheap clothing, shoes, toys, tools, kitchen stuff, gadgets, and even guns & ammo from them (just too many imported items to list). However, they have KFC, McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Burger King, and other fast food restuarants to make them fat & happy (for those ChiComs that can afford to eat regulary at such eating establishments). Now they are experiencing health problems such as obesity, diabetes, heart disease, etc. Isn't it wonderful to do business with our enemy the ChiComs?

[Sparta]

Chicom revisionist crap ping!!

[Eternal_Bear]

In the first part of the Chinese intervention, the Chicoms did employ lot of infiltration. They also resorted to human wave attacks when infiltration didn't work. Ridgeway knew how to employ massive firepower without leaving the Chicoms an opening.

Don't sell the Chicoms short. Carlson, a US marine officer was sent over to study Chicom battle tactics in the 30's. Not only did he come back with some techniques which were incorporated in Marine Raider units but also the battle cry of "Gung Ho" which means "let's pull together" in Chinese.

The Chicoms are going to come after us soon. Don't belittle them. They are prepared and seeking vengeance. It's going to be a hell of a war and some of it is going to be on our own soil. They are still masters of infiltration. They follow the admonition of Sun Tzu "when we are near; make the enemy think we are far away....". They are not that far away. (Think South of the Border)

[Lobster 6]

"This Kind of War" by Fehrenback describes in detail US lack of preparation for war in Korea,1950. The price of being unprepared was high. In the end, US & Allied forces destroyed the North Korean Army (NKPA)and killed several hundred thousand Chinese PLA (CCF) soldiers and forced an end to the war in Korea. Being unprepared for war carries imposes a very high cost. Those who think the US unable to take casualties should remember the beating we gave the Communits in Korea. Matter of fact, you may wish to consider recall the courage and sacrifice of US Forces in Vietnam. We destroyed the Viet Cong and beat the NVA in the field. Sadly, our courage & sacrifice was betrayed by leftist politicians Washington so-called "impartial" left wing journalists. Note: The same gang that underminned our effort in Korea and Vietnam recently crawled from under their rocks to support Saddam.

[The Pheonix]

This article was dated in the year 2000, one year before 9-11

It seems like a hangover from the Mao era--ie writen quite sometime ago. I can't imagine anyone today wriying this type of article

[Jeff Head]

Actually, in Korea, we stopped the N. Korean invasion by sucking them far to the south and outflanking them and then defeating them and occupying the North.

The Chinese invaded in massive numbers and pushed us back until we ultimately stopped them and an armistice was put in place ... never a peace or surrender ... which holds to this day. We cannot underestimate the Chicomms or their numbers and willingness to use them like they did at Chosin.

If Truman had allowed McArthur to defeat the Red Chinese before they invaded, there would be only one united Korea today, I do not believe Vietnam would have ever happened and China may well have thrown off its communist dictator and been a free nation to balance against the Soviets all of those years.

But Truman turned internationalist (globalist) on us and fired McArthur and replaced him with someone who would follow his orders to allow the overwhelming numbers of Chicomms to continue to build and attack when we could have (and IMHO should have) preempted it. That, IMHO, is where we made the mistake in Korea and it has established a pattern, legacy and image of us in the minds of other nations ever since.

DRAGON'S FURY

[Tallguy]

The U.S. Forces that went into Korea were unprepared in both equipment and temperment for that war.

I understand that many of the occupation divisions that were brought over from Japan only had 2 of their full complement of 3 Regimental Combat Teams.

[Tallguy]

Infiltrators made good use of cover, probing unerringly for weaknesses in the defense and exploiting each advantage with uncanny speed.

Much the same way that the Imperial German Army did in their Spring Offensive in 1918. And the ultimate results were the same: after punching a deep hole in the enemy lines the German (and later the PRC) offensives petered out as their light infantry forces grew exhausted and overextended.

During the inter war years, the Germans sought to mate their WWI infiltration tactics with Allied mechanization in the hopes that offensive momentum could be sustained. The result was later termed Blitzkreig. The PLA has yet to demonstrate mastery of modern mechanized warfare.

[The Pheonix]

Yes, absolutely true, the US troops that went were unprepared and under-equiped

Similarly, the Chinese troops were foot-soldiers, and had no trucks or carriers to ferry them around. They rely on forced marches.

The Chinese also had no communication equipment like radio or walkie-talkies, and relied on bugles to sound attack or retreat.

They relied on mules to ferry their supplies.

The USAF had complete air-superiority

The Chinese were illiterate peasants, they never went to schools, colleges or Westpoint Military Academy.

Some of our own American Generals, had said , after the war was over, that, under the circumstances and situation that they were in, (and according to military science,), the Chinese Commanders were tactically correct to use the human-wave tactics.

But the Chinese did treat our boys who were captured and became POWs much much better, and 100 times more humane than the way the North Koreans treated our POWs. Americans prefered to be captured by Chinese rather than N.Koreans.

This humane treatment of POWs is very Sun Tzu who wrote, "Always treat your captured enemy troops well. When, after capturing a city, do not destroy it, and treat the people well...."

[JasonC]

Some serious history of the war is available on the web here -

http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/online/Bookshelves/KW.htm

It is not remotely true that "the horde attack was all they had". Several items in the article are all too true. When they intervened in strength late in 1950, the Chinese achieved strategic surprise. US and ROK forces were unprepared and poorly disposed to meet them. In forces directly engaged, the Chinese did not have any great numbers edge at that time - they did have large reserves in Manchuria, but could not supply them and so held them out of the battle at first. They nevertheless took the initiative and handed us very serious defeats, some of the worst in US military history.

The means used to accomplish this are pretty fairly explained in the article, despite the hyperbole. Our forces were too road-bound, a fault they had from the very begining of the war, which even the much less effective NK army had been able to exploit the previous summer in the push south to Pusan. The Chinese strength lay in what we would call "mountain infantry", which was effectively the "mobile" arm in the difficult terrain of Northern Korea. They were able to repeated achieve large scale infiltrations and attack us from all sides, simply because our own lines through the highest, most difficult country were non-existent. We regarded terrain as impassible that they used regularly. US physical conditioning was, in general and at that particular time, inadequate to compete in mountain fighting.

Moreover, the initial reverses create command paralysis, shock, and a serious morale problem at all ranks. MacArthur lost control of the battle in Korea, and spent his energies on fruitless fights with his superiors, seeking escalation, instead of on pulling his existing force together or learning to master the new enemy. This led to his recall. Matt Ridgeway proved the command vaccum existing in Korea when he arrived to take over the 8th army, was shocked at what he found, and was rapidly able to restore the army to fighting shape. Within a couple of months, he had the Chinese army's number. But the interim had not been pretty, and deserves serious and objective study by our own military.

Ridgeway learned first that we had to get out of the trucks and off the roads and up into the high ground. That we needed continuous fortified fronts backed by massed and centrally directed artillery and air. These alone did not, however, remedy the situation. The Chinese remained extremely dangerous, funneling down endless streams of reserves from Manchuria, massing them and ammunition for enourmous offensives. The early hill fighting of this period was a bloody affair of exchanges we could not afford to keep up, while they could.

Ridgeway discovered their Achilles heel, alluded to toward the end of the article, once they were a fair ways down the penisula and their supply lines were thus relatively stretched. Their logistics system was extremely primitive. Their force was all "teeth" and little "tail". This did not prevent them from fielding large forces and executing major offensives, despite US air power hitting their supply lines. But it did prevent them from *sustaining* a high combat tempo for long periods. They had to operate in a definite alternating tempo of flurry and lull, rebuilding in the quieter periods the supplies and replacements expended in the hot ones.

By comparison, the robust US logistics system could and did deliver the mountains of artillery ammunition needed to sustain "flurry" levels of fighting for extended periods. And Ridgeway found the way to exploit this edge. He adopted a flexible, counter-punching defense, which avoided the Chinese when their supplies were flush by short withdrawls, and then counterattacked when their supplies were low. He timed successive operations unpredictably. Their dumps were in the wrong places, eliminated by capture after successful counterattacks, etc. Ridgeway combined this with a focus on avoiding unnecessary losses on our side, substituting massive logistics-driven firepower (artillery and air) for infantry blood.

By doing so, Ridgeway was able to restore a colonial-era casualty ratio of 10-20 to 1 against the Chinese. During the long period of fighting between mid 1951 and the eventual armistice, we were in full control of the situation. Driving up the penisula was not worth the cost, because Ridgeway's solution depended on keeping Chinese supply lines stretched, and were most effective in defensive fighting. Of -that- period, it may fairly be said the Chinese were reduced to failed horde attacks. But not of the prior period, around the intervention, and before Ridgeway's new system was developed.

Among the lessons of the whole affair for us, are the following -

1. Underestimating the enemy is always costly. Empty bragging helps nothing and in fact gets men killed. Plan for what a smart and capable enemy could do with the capabilities he has.

2. Laziness in vehicle bound forces is a serious threat. Physical conditioning is a life or death matter. Both continuous lines and perimeter defenses are necessary. Supposedly impassible terrain is not impassible if organized, fit men chose to cross it.

3. Issues of logistics, teeth-to-tail, combat tempo, defensive and offensive stance, cannot be set in concrete in manuals. Commanders must manipulate these elements according to the strengths and weaknesses of own side and enemy forces. They must foresee the enemy's problems with such matters, not merely the constraints they represent to their own side.

4. The commander must always remain fully in touch with the essential elements of the battle. He must be on the spot, not out of country in a distant command post running the war by report. Morale and command shock are very real, and can hit even the best armies and leaders. Sentiment cannot enter assessments of such matters. Any officer, regardless of rank, who falls out of touch with or becomes overwhelmed by events must be relieved immediately.

If the Chinese have only learned the things discussed in this article from the experience, then we have little to worry about, because there is precious little sign here they learned anything. Probably, this is just the public propaganda spin. The subjects alluded to toward the end of the article are where they got their heads handed to them - after the intervention, in the spring and summer of 1951. They probably know this, but they don't talk about it for public propaganda purposes. Their loss - open and objective assessment of lessons makes one stronger, not weaker.

[American Soldier]

Frankly, we would've have never had to worry about China again either (EVER) nor a Russian presence in the Far East. In retrospect, it would've been a convenient time to cut MacArthur's leash.

[American Soldier]

South of the border? Try Manhattan and San Francisco. Many of people you meet there are more pro-Beijing than anyone I've met from Beijing! Plenty of soil in those places for planting an underground movement.

[HighRoadToChina]

Totally agree.