35th INFANTRY REGIMENT
KOREA
August 1950
The 27th and 35th Regiments of the 25th Division had received their third battalions early in August with the transfer to them of the two battalions of the 29th Infantry.
A Red force had swept virtually unopposed down the west coast, the entire length of the Korean Peninsula, and was dashing madly across the southern tip in a race for Pusan. The "Tropic Lightning" Division was again called upon to stop this onslaught. On 2 August, the entire 25th Division was shifted approximately one hundred and fifty (150) miles to the south in a matter of hours. The men and equipment were transported from the northeastern flank of the Pusan line to the southwestern flank.
Every means available was used for this veritably miraculous move, which ultimately saved Pusan from inevitable capture. The main party of the 25th Division command post arrived at Masan at 2115, 2 August, after an all-day ride. Of the combat units, the 35th Infantry moved first, closing at Masan at 1000, 3 August. The 24th Infantry arrived at 1930 that evening. General Kean reached Masan during the day and assumed command of all the U.N. troops south of the Naktong River. The 25th Division completed the 150-mile move by foot, motor, and rail within a 36-hour period. General Walker said that this "history making maneuver" saved Pusan.
The new scene of operations for the Division was the Chinju-Masan corridor.
The North Koreans had four possible avenues of advance leading to Pusan that could result in the defeat of U.S. and ROK forces, and in August they tried them all simultaneously. These approaches went through Masan south of the confluence of the Nam and Naktong Rivers, through the Naktong Bulge to the rail and road lines at Miryang, through Kyongju and down the east coast corridor, and through Taegu.
During the first week of August General Walker decided to launch the first American counterattack of the war in the Chinju-Masan corridor. One of his purposes was to break up a suspected massing of enemy troops near the Taegu area by forcing the diversion of some North Korean units southward.
In recognizing the critical nature of the situation in the southwest and in acting with great energy and decisiveness to meet it, General Walker and his staff conceived and executed one of the most important command decisions of the Korean War.
Map - Task Force Kean |
On 6 August Eighth Army issued the operational directive for the attack, naming Task Force Kean as the attack force and giving the hour of attack as 0630 the next day. The task force was named for its commander, Maj. Gen. William B. Kean, Commanding General of the 25th Division. Altogether, General Kean had about 20,000 men under his command at the beginning of the attack. Task Force Kean was composed of the 25th Infantry Division, with the 24th and 35th Infantry Regiments. The 5th Regimental Combat Team and the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade were attached to the 25th. It included two medium tank battalions, the 89th (M4A3) and the fist Marine (M26 Pershings). With the addition of the 29th Infantry Regiment, the 25th Division now had three infantry battalions in each of its regiments, although all |
were understrength. The 27th Infantry Regiment and the 8th Field Artillery Battalion were in Eighth Army reserve after their relief at the front on 7 August.
The Chinju-Masan corridor is limited on the south by the Korean Strait, on the north by the Nam River from Chinju to its confluence with the Naktong, fifteen miles northwest of Masan. Masan, at the head of Masan Bay, is at the eastern end of the corridor; Chinju, at the western end of the corridor, is 27 air miles from Masan. The shortest road distance between the two places is more than 40 miles. The corridor averages about 20 miles in width.
The topography of the corridor consists mostly of low hills interspersed with paddy ground along the streams. South of the Nam, the streams run generally in a north-south direction; all are small and fordable in dry weather. In two places mountain barriers cross the corridor. One is just east of Chinju; the main passage through it is the Chinju pass. The second and more dominant barrier is Sobuk-san, about eight miles west of Masan.
The early summer of 1950 in Korea was one of drought, and as such was unusual. Normally there are heavy monsoon rains in July and August with an average of twenty inches of rain; but in 1950 there was only about one-fourth this amount. The cloudless skies over the southern tip of the peninsula brought scorching heat which often reached 105° and sometimes 120°.
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The army plan for the attack required Task Force Kean to attack west along three roads, seize the Chinju pass (Line Z in the plan), and secure the line of the Nam River. Three regiments would make the attack: the 35th Infantry along the northernmost and main inland road, the 5th Regimental Combat Team along the secondary inland road to the Much'on-ni road juncture, and the 5th Marines along the southern coastal road. This placed the marines on the left flank, the 5th Regimental Combat Team in the middle, and the 35th Infantry on the right flank. The 5th Regimental Combat Team was to lead the attack in the south, seize the road junction five miles west of Chindong-ni, and continue along the right-hand fork. The marines would then follow the 5th Regimental Combat Team to the road junction, take the left-hand fork, and attack along the coastal road. This plan called for the 5th Regimental Combat Team to make a juncture with the 35th Infantry at Much'on-ni, whence they |
A light machine gun squad of the 35th Inf moves in on target to provide support for advancing riflemen. |
would drive on together to the Chinju pass, while the marines swung southward along the coast through Kosong and Sach'on to Chinju.
The 5th Regimental Combat Team and the 5th Marines, on the night of 6-7 August, were to relieve the 27th Infantry in its front-line defensive positions west of Chindong-ni. The 27th Infantry would then revert to army reserve in an assembly area at Masan.
While Task Force Kean attacked west, the 24th Infantry Regiment was to clean out the enemy from the rear area, giving particular attention to the rough, mountainous ground of Sobuk-san between the 35th and 5th Regiments. It also was to secure the lateral north-south road running from Komam-ni through Haman to Chindong-ni. Task Force Min, a regiment-sized ROK force, was attached to the 24th Infantry to assist in this mission.
On the eve of the attack, Eighth Army intelligence estimated that the N.K. 6th Division, standing in front of Task Force Kean, numbered approximately 7,500 effectives. Actually, the 6th Division numbered about 6,000 men at this time. But the 83d Motorized Regiment of the 105th Armored Division had joined the 6th Division west of Masan, unknown to Eighth Army, and its strength brought the enemy force to about 7,500 men, the Eighth Army estimate. Army intelligence estimated that the 6th Division would be supported by eighteen (18) 76-mm guns, eighteen (18) 122-mm guns, and an estimated twenty-five (25) tanks.
On the right flank of Task Force Kean, the 2d Battalion of the 35th Infantry led the attack west on 7 August. Only the day before, an enemy attack had driven one company of this battalion from its position, but a counterattack had regained the lost ground. Now, as it crossed the line of departure at the Notch three miles west of Chungam-ni, the battalion encountered about 500 enemy troops supported by several self-propelled guns. The two forces joined battle at once, a contest that lasted five hours before the 2d Battalion, with the help of an air strike, secured the pass and the high ground northward.
After this fight, the 35th Infantry advanced rapidly westward and by evening stood near the Much'on-ni road fork, the regiment's initial objective. In this advance, the 35th Infantry inflicted about 350 casualties on the enemy, destroyed 2 tanks, 1 76mm self-propelled gun, 5 antitank guns, and captured 4 truckloads of weapons and ammunition, several brief cases of documents, and 3 prisoners. Near Pansong, Colonel Fisher's men overran what they thought had been the N.K. 6th Division command post, because they found there several big Russian-built radios and other headquarters equipment. For the 35th Regiment, the attack had gone according to plan.
The next day, 8 August, the regiment advanced to the high ground just short of the Much'on-ni road fork. There Fisher received orders from General Kean to dig in and wait until the 5th Regimental Combat Team could come up on his left and join him at Much'on-ni. While waiting, Fisher's men beat off a few enemy attacks and sent out strong combat patrols that probed enemy positions as far as the Nam River.
An M-4 Tank returns to its hillside bunker position
The 3d Battalion of the 5th Regimental Combat Team, rolling westward from Pongam-ni on the morning of 1l August, had joined the 35th Infantry where the latter waited at the Much'on-ni crossroads. From there the two forces moved on to the Chinju pass. They now looked down on Chinju. But only their patrols went farther.
The ground gained in the offensive was not retained as the Division was ordered by Eighth Army to fall back to a defensive line. The Reds had shifted the greater pressure of their attack to the north. The attachments were pulled away to reinforce the now more heavily embattled units to the north and east across the Eighth Army front.
On 13 August, preparations were begun for the assumption of a defensive mission. The most readily defensible feature was the mountainous area from Chindong-ni on the coast, north to the point of the confluence of the Nam and Naktong Rivers. This was an over-extended front of approximately twenty-five (25) miles. The southern portion of the "Pusan Perimeter" would be firmly guarded, and thus, would withstand further onslaught by the Red assailants.
On 14 August, after a week of fighting, Task Force Kean was back approximately in the positions from which it had started its attack. The 35th Regiment held the northern part of the 25th Division line west of Masan, the 24th Regiment the center, and the 5th Regimental Combat Team the southern part. The Marine brigade was on its way to another part of the Eighth Army line. In the week of constant fighting in the Chinju corridor, from 7 to 13 August, the units of Task Force Kean learned that the front was the four points of the compass, and that it was necessary to climb, climb, climb. The saffron-colored hills were beautiful to gaze upon at dusk, but they were brutal to the legs climbing them, and out of them at night came the enemy.
Also, on the 14th, a reinforced company of the 35th Infantry, 25th Division, took up a defensive position south of the Naktong River at Namji-ri bridge, relieving units of the 27th Infantry there. Responsibility for protecting the bridge passed from the 24th to the 25th Division.
At 1550, 16 August, in a radio message to General Kean, Eighth Army dissolved Task Force Kean. The task force had not accomplished what Eighth Army had believed to be easily possible-the winning and holding of the Chinju pass line. Throughout Task Force Kean's attack, well organized enemy forces controlled the Sobuk-san area and from there struck at its rear and cut its lines of communications. The North Korean High Command did not move a single squad from the northern to the southern front during the action. The N.K. 6th Division took heavy losses in some of the fighting, but so did Task Force Kean.
Even though Task Force Kean's attack did not accomplish what Eighth Army had hoped for and expected, it nevertheless did provide certain beneficial results. It chanced to meet head-on the N.K. 6th Division attack against the Masan position, and first stopped it, then hurled it back. Secondly, it gave the 25th Division the much needed psychological experience of going on the offensive and nearly reaching an assigned objective. From this time on, with the exception of the 24th Infantry, the division troops fought well and displayed a battle worthiness that paid off handsomely and sometimes spectacularly in the oncoming Perimeter battles. By disorganizing the offensive operations of the N.K. 6th Division at the middle of August, Task Force Kean also gained the time needed to organize and wire in the defenses that were to hold the enemy out of Masan during the critical period ahead.
Korean Presidential Unit Citation
Syngman Rhee, the President of the Republic of South Korea, later cited the 25th Division for outstanding and heroic performance of duty on the field of battle during the first days of the month of August 1950. The Division was awarded the Republic of Korea Presidential Unit Citation for the unprecedented shift on the night of 1-2 August, from the Army’s right to left flank; for its rapid organization of the defense of the Masan area; and for its counterattack against three (3) North Korean Divisions in the Chinju area.