"US Army veteran recalls almost being annihilated by" Topic

…Chinese Army 70 years ago

"Charles Shuemate had enjoyed a Thanksgiving meal before turning in for the night somewhere between the Yalu and Ch'ongch'on rivers, where his 2nd Infantry Division was bivouacked in the winter of 1950.

An infantryman, Shuemate sealed himself in a sleeping bag as Siberian winds howled down snow-covered mountains in North Korea, plunging temperatures to 36 degrees below zero. A large and mostly undetected Chinese army waited in those mountains, intending to annihilate the Americans — a goal they would almost achieve.

"We were laying out in a field in our sleeping bags when they came through, believe it or not, and I had a heck of a time getting out of my sleeping bag," the now retired San Antonio accountant recalled…"
Main page
link

Amicalement
Armand

Yes, US intel kept saying that they were only a handful of PRC volunteers who we infiltrating across the Yalu. They were very wrong. The reports sent to Higher HQ showed that there were many Chinese troops being engaged, killed and captured, US forces. But it didn't fit the US belief that the war would be over by Christmas. Had the PRC not chose to get involved in huge numbers that may have been true. But once the PRC infiltrated enough troops into the North. They then struck with their huge numbers. And the war lasted another two years. Cost the US/UN forces aa number of losses. However, the North and PRC took many, many more losses, in very large numbers.

But the War ended in a truce and the lines have not changed since '53.

It seems like intel is always politicized with the high up military and politicians not wanting to hear bad news. It happened to the Israeli's in the Yom Kippur war, NVA buildups including Tet, Stalin didn't believe intel reports in June 1941 even when he was being attacked.

Marine 3rd Force Recon showed reports of roads being built by the NVA for trucks in the DMZ and I Corps that the Army resused to believe until a Recon Team called in an airstrike on a truck column and dropped the differental of a destroyed Russian made truck on the Army Corps commander's desk. It will never change.

Wolfhag

Agree!….

Amicalement
Armand

Facts are stubborn things

However upper level unwillingness to believe reporting contrary to the plan is even more stubborn

Yes, that has happened more than once in US history …