Author: Nine Fish Pavilion
Although the Battle of Shangganling had a great impact on the international community, and the enemy and us also paid huge casualties as a result, this campaign is different from previous large-scale battles, its battlefield is only 3.7 square kilometers, and the large corps cannot be deployed in the position, so that in the attack or defense, the two sides can only "add oil and increase troops" in rows and in succession.
So, why did the US military choose the battlefield in Shangganling and have to take it one by one?
(1) Negotiations reached an impasse, and Shangganling, which was "small and good", became VanVleet's goal
For a long time, the negotiations between the Chinese and DPRK sides and the US side have been in an intermittent state, hindered by the enhancement of the strength of the volunteer army and the stability of the fronts on both sides, coupled with the increasingly fierce anti-war calls in the United States, the US side has to come to the negotiating table. However, the US side, in the face of face and dissatisfaction, once again put forward a series of unreasonable demands.
On 22 May 1952, William Harrison succeeded as coalition negotiator, focusing on the repatriation of prisoners of war. According to the Geneva Conventions, all prisoners of war should be released and repatriated after the end of the war, while the US side adheres to the principle of "voluntary repatriation", which is essentially a compulsory screening in an attempt to detain Chinese and North Korean prisoners of war.
As a result, the two sides talked and fought, and the prisoner of war issue has not been resolved. It is true that the United States was one of the most powerful countries at that time, and its military never suffered such a big loss as it did in the Korean War, showing weakness to China, which was unacceptable to the United States.
Therefore, on the one hand, the negotiations must continue, because the armistice is the trend of the times, and on the other hand, the United States is trying to find a step or save face by continuing the war, so on October 8, the United States announced that it would not suspend the meeting for an indefinite period of time.
Obviously, the US military does not accept defeat and wants to win back a game on the battlefield, only in this way can they get more initiative at the negotiating table.
In late September, U.S. President Harry S. Truman wrote a letter to Coalition Commander Clarke. In the letter, Truman hoped that the U.S. side at the negotiating table must "word the toughest, leave no room for bargaining" and, most importantly, not reduce military pressure.
At the same time, in order to put pressure on the US side and force it to agree to the terms of the negotiations, the volunteer army began to launch counterattack operations from September 18, compared with the decline in morale of the coalition forces, the morale of the volunteer army can be described as high. Within a month, the volunteers killed and wounded more than 30,000 enemies, again thwarting the coalition forces.
The US coalition forces, which had lost successive defeats on the battlefield, finally couldn't bear it, so VanVleet's "apportionment operation" was conceived. In other words, the US military urgently needs a victory to gain the initiative at the negotiating table, and at the same time, due to pressure from all sides, the US military does not want to expand the war on a large scale, so the "small and good" Shangganling has become the best target for combat.
(2) General Manager Peng returned to China and stressed to Qin Jiwei: Whoever loses the Five Holy Mountains will be responsible for history
On 5 October, Van Vleet proposed a "campaign of apportionment", which targeted Hill 598 (Height 597.9) and Sniper Ridge.
In Van Vliet's view, less than 3 miles north of Jinhua, the US 9th Army and the enemy have fortifications, the distance between the two sides is only 200 meters, triangle mountain (597.9 highland) and sniper ridge, where the enemy is stuck in our throat, our army suffered heavy losses, if the enemy can be driven out of these two highlands, the enemy will retreat 1 kilometer.
If the Americans could take these two heights, they could remove the threat of the Volunteers in this position, and in VanVleet's view, the scale of the battle would not be too large, because the two heights were small and casualties could be well controlled.
Shangganling is the front of the Five Holy Mountains, and the Five Holy Mountains are the middle road of the entire front, once the Upper Ganling Mountains are lost, the Five Holy Mountains will be in danger, and once the Five Holy Mountains are lost, the rear is a large area of open land, which is convenient for the mechanized march of the US army, which will undoubtedly change the trend of the entire war.
Qin Jiwei
Regarding this point, Before returning to China, Mr. Peng stressed to Qin Jiwei many times: "Whoever loses the Five Holy Mountains will be responsible for history." At that time, Peng Dehuai had already transferred the 15th Army to the defense of the Five Holy Mountains, and its principle was that the Five Holy Mountains must not be lost.
However, Qin Jiwei did not think that the US military would attack the Five Holy Mountains, because the mountains here were dangerous, easy to defend and difficult to attack, and the best offensive position of the US troops should be the Western Mountains, because the terrain here was gentle and more favorable to the mechanized march of the US troops.
To this end, Qin Jiwei placed the main force of the 15th Army, the 44th Division, on the Western Mountains, and the defensive 45th Division on Shangganling. Van Vliet was not confused, he certainly wanted to attack the Pingkang Valley in the Western Mountains, but once the Western Hills were attacked, the scale of the war could be expanded, and the Eighth Army did not have enough troops.
Once the U.S. army had captured the Binh Kang Valley, it would need to continue its attack northward. In this way, it will inevitably encounter a full-scale counteroffensive by the Chinese and North Korean sides, and the US military will no longer increase its troops, in other words, the US military will not be able to continue to support large-scale operations, and doing so will also have a bad impact on the negotiations.
(3) The US military's strength is limited and it does not want to launch an attack on too large scale
At that time, the US military could no longer invest more troops in the Korean war, so it was impossible for the US military to continue to launch a large-scale offensive.
At the same time, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff and coalition headquarters believe that there is no point in exchanging heavy casualties for territory, in other words, the U.S. military does not want casualties, only one victory.
In such a dilemma, it is unrealistic to want to expand the scale, it is impossible not to fight, and the US military is stationed in all parts of the world, Europe is the main strategic direction of the US military, the front line is too long, the troops are scattered, the ammunition is insufficient, and the equipment is also stretched, which makes the US military helpless.
In Van Vliet's plan, it only cost 200 people to capture Shangganling, which he never dreamed of, and 200 people became more than 20,000 people. With the strength and ammunition of the American army at that time, it was completely fine to support this small-scale battle, but they underestimated the confidence of the volunteers to hold their positions.
As the battle lengthened and the two sides invested more and more troops, the American army fell into a quagmire, and Clark and VanVleet could only continue to invest their strength for the sake of face, until they lost nothing!
(iv) Eisenhower publicly promised: As long as I become president, I will end the Korean War as soon as possible
1952 was the year of the U.S. election, and October and November were the key moments of the election. Eisenhower campaigned for himself and pushed the blame for the Korean War to Truman. Eisenhower had publicly promised that as long as he became president, he would end the Korean War as soon as possible.
The U.S. military was too attrition in the Korean War, and it mobilized one-third of the army and one-half of the navy, and although the U.S. military wanted to win the war with all its might, it was almost impossible at present.
The anti-war cries in the United States were high, and Truman's position was becoming more and more embarrassing, so Truman once again put pressure on the US military to launch a campaign, on the one hand, to win some face for himself, on the other hand, he also hoped to force the Chinese and North Korean sides to agree to the US armistice conditions as soon as possible.
Afterwards, it turned out that Truman miscalculated, and the Battle of Shangganling not only did not win him any prestige, but also made him lose his face. From this, we also come to the conclusion that negotiations are a continuation of war, and only by defeating the opponent on the battlefield can it be possible to win the initiative at the negotiating table, as has been the case throughout the ages.