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From a military point of view, the geographical environment of the DPRK can be described as quite special. For the armies of both sides, fighting on such a battlefield will encounter a series of difficulties for either side. The offensive and defensive confrontation between the two sides unfolded in such a challenging geographical space.
1. The advantages and disadvantages of the topography of the peninsula to China and the United States
As a peninsula, North Korea is surrounded by the sea on three sides and the mainland on one side.
Ridgway described it as a fat thumb sticking out of the Asian continent, and American war history portrayed it as "a dagger into the heart of Japan" and a "springboard into the Asian continent," and emphasized the special geopolitical value of the peninsula for China and the Soviet Union (Russia) – it was like a door that wanted to close it when threatened and open it when it was ready to expand.
The peninsular character of the Korean battlefield has different meanings for the Chinese and American militaries.
For the US military, which has superiority in the sea and air, it is obvious that it has a great advantage in using troops to fight on the terrain of the peninsula.
The southern tip of the Korean Peninsula is separated from Japan by only one strait, and its narrowest point is only 160 kilometers. At that time, Japan was under the military occupation of the United States, and it was the place where the U.S. military had the largest concentration of combat troops outside of the mainland, which made Korea the most accessible overseas battlefield for the U.S. heavy military group.
In Korea, the US military can also rely on Japan's fairly complete infrastructure to obtain sustained and effective rear support and comprehensive support.
U.S. planes taking off from bases in Japan can cover the entire territory of Korea with aviation firepower. Formed troops, additional troops, and logistical supplies mobilized from the continental United States and other parts of the world could be used as a transit point for Japan to be organized and reorganized here before entering the Korean battlefield.
Since the US military has absolute air and sea supremacy in the Korean battlefield, the vast sea area on both sides of the peninsula has become its exclusive third battlefield alongside the land and air battlefields.
The US Navy's aircraft carriers can sail to the coastal waters that pose the greatest threat to the opponent at will, and use carrier-based aviation to directly attack the opponent's defense lines, lines of communication, and other important targets from the flanks and rear: Battleships, cruisers, and other large surface ships can also use powerful naval guns to continuously bombard the seashore and its shallow, near, and deep targets on the shore to directly support ground forces in combat.
What is even more threatening is that the terrain of the peninsula provides an ideal battlefield for the US military to launch amphibious operations.
MacArthur said that amphibious landings "are the most powerful tools we have." This battlefield condition can enable the US military to continuously maintain a high-pressure posture of landing in the rear of the other side, and even if it does not actually launch a landing, this kind of momentum of triggering but not launching is enough to produce a great strategic containment effect.
For the volunteers, fighting on the terrain of the narrow peninsula was undoubtedly an unprecedented challenge. During the period of civil war, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) was adept at making great strides in advance and retreat on a vast space and a mobile front, and fought various forms of mobile warfare with ease.
The narrow frontage of the front and the limited battlefield capacity make it impossible for the volunteers to put their hands on the line when there are too many soldiers, and it is difficult to give full play to the numerical superiority of the ground troops, and it is also impossible to open up multiple battlefields at the same time and carry out large-scale mobile operations on a wide range of fronts, as in the civil war.
Therefore, for the Volunteer Army, being surrounded by the sea on three sides means that it is facing the enemy on three sides, and it also means that it has to continuously prepare for a three-line operation, and the more the Volunteer Army advances, the more exposed its flank and rear will be, and the heavier the rear defense task focusing on the flank and rear counter-landing.
North Korea is also a mountainous country. Ruggedness is a major feature of North Korea's landscape. The Americans, not without exaggeration, say:
"If North Korea is flattened, it will cover the whole world. ”
2. Why is it so cold in winter?
The monsoon is an important feature of North Korea's physical geography. North Korea belongs to the monsoon belt of the East China Sea on the Asian continent.
The winter monsoon starts in October and is most popular in December and January, with northerly and northwesterly winds. The summer monsoon starts in April and is at its peak in July, with southerly and southeasterly winds prevailing. Seasonal wind direction changes are the main factors affecting climate change, especially temperature and precipitation in North Korea.
Rainy and hot summers and dry, cold winters have become a typical climatic phenomenon in North Korea.
When the cold winter winds blow, the northern part of North Korea becomes a world-famous low temperature zone, and the winter temperature in North Korea is much lower than that of other places on earth at the same latitude. January is the coldest month of the year, with an average temperature of around -13°C. The average temperature in the area around Nagjinhu Lake in the northeast is below -20°C, and the Gaima Plateau may even be as low as -40°C, making it the coldest place in North Korea.
In the summer, warm Pacific winds blow across the peninsula, causing temperatures to rise rapidly, especially in the rice fields of the south, where the heat can be unbearable.
The monsoon causes drastic changes in winter and summer on the Korean Peninsula. The temperature difference between winter and summer in northern North Korea is more than 30°C, and in mountainous areas it is more than 40°C. The extreme maximum temperature in the Zhongjiang area of Cijiang Province once reached 38 °C, and the extreme minimum temperature reached -43.6 °C, which was the most disparity.
In normal years, the monsoon brings abundant precipitation to the Korean Peninsula, with most areas receiving more than 1,000 mm of precipitation per year. The heaviest precipitation was in the Cheongcheon River basin and near Wonsan, with 1,300 mm.
However, precipitation fluctuates greatly over the years, with precipitation in rainy years reaching twice the average, and precipitation in low-rainy years being less than half of the average. Usually there will be one rainy year and two less rainy years in three years. The rainfall is concentrated in the summer, roughly entering the rainy season in July, at this time, the heavy rain pours, continuous days, the daily precipitation is up to more than 200 mm, often causing flash floods, the river water rises sharply, and has a great impact on the army's movements.
In 1950, North Korea experienced a severe drought, and the amount of precipitation was only a quarter of the normal year, resulting in a continuous high temperature in summer, with a maximum temperature of 48.8°C.
The official U.S. war history records: "During the summer operation, the 'United Nations forces' suffered more attrition due to the heat than the enemy suffered casualties at gunpoint." ”
In winter, snowfall becomes a major feature of North Korea. Snow begins in November in the north, and a third of the days in January and February are snowy.
The snow thickness on the ground is 20~80 mm, and the snow thickness on the shady area of the mountain is more than 1 meter. The continuous snowfall and the raging north winds further reduced the cold winter temperatures, which was a major test for both warring parties, especially for the volunteers who were seriously lacking in warm equipment, and often caused large-scale frostbite attrition.
The ground begins to thaw in March and lasts for about three weeks. During this time, the road was muddy and muddy, not to mention the driving of vehicles, even on foot was quite difficult.
In the harsh winter season, the US warships operating along the northern coast of North Korea are covered with thick ice, and you can imagine how cold the winter here is.
Before the Chinese Volunteers entered Korea, they conducted a comprehensive study of the terrain conditions on the Korean battlefield, and their basic judgment was that these topographical conditions "greatly restricted both sides," and that the Volunteer Army, as the "attackers," had more disadvantages.
The main performance is as follows:
At the same time, "because the enemy is surrounded by the sea on three sides and has superiority in the sea and air, it is very likely that we will choose our weak point to land behind our flank, so as to reap the advantage of fighting on the outer front, and in the event of a bad situation, the enemy may retreat by sea and air and cannot annihilate him."
Second, due to obstacles such as mountains, rivers, and rice fields, the encirclement, detour, and cutting off operations of the Volunteers in combat are limited to a certain extent, and "the main frontal attack alone is easy to turn into a war of attrition and a war of defeat." The enemy, on the other hand, can resist stubbornly and retreat according to the danger, and can not only give full play to its superior firepower, but also save troops."
Third, "the enemy has the cooperation of the sea and air, the equipment is heavy, and there are many vehicles, so it must be advanced by railways and highways or dispatched by the sea, and the difficulty of movement can be reduced." In order to annihilate the enemy, to carry out extensive maneuvers, this terrain will be difficult for me to move, especially for the artillery units, especially at night".
Judging from this analysis, the countermeasures proposed by the Chinese Volunteers are to "pay more attention to the education of mountain warfare," strengthen the equipment with light firearms, and the artillery below the division level should be mainly carried on a load, and at the same time strengthen the engineering troops. The troops should have a high degree of enthusiasm, bravery, and the spirit of enduring hardships and standing hard work, ensure provisions, and enhance the physical strength of officers and men. In the use of troops, echelons and in-depth deployment should be strengthened to overcome the limitations caused by the terrain, not only tactically, but also "in the deployment of campaigns."
It should be said that these analyses and countermeasures are still very targeted, and many of them have been verified in later operations. The shortcomings lie in the fact that the impact of the severe cold conditions in the DPRK on combat operations is still insufficient, and the troops entering the DPRK, especially the second batch of troops entering the DPRK, lack the necessary measures to protect against cold and frost, thus causing serious losses.
3. Comparison of soldiers
The first batch of volunteers to enter the DPRK consisted of 4 corps, 199,000 troops, plus 3 artillery divisions and some engineering and antiaircraft artillery units, totaling 212,000 troops.
After the first battle began, two more armies, the 66th Army and the 50th Army, urgently entered the Korean War, bringing the total strength to 6 armies and 290,000 people.
The number of soldiers in these six corps is as follows:
38th Army: 44,521 men, 39th Army: 52,946 men, 40th Army: 48,857 men, 42nd Army: 53,219 men, 50th Army: 36,688 men, 66th Army: 41,246 men.
As for the composition of the volunteers, "liberation fighters" accounted for a considerable proportion of the composition of the troops at that time.
The so-called "liberation fighters" refer to "former Kuomintang soldiers who were captured by the People's Liberation Army and liberated from the reactionary Kuomintang army, educated, and joined the People's Liberation Army."
The mass production of liberation fighters mainly occurred in the later stages of the Liberation War. There are no very accurate statistics on the proportion of these personnel in the PLA.
In August 1948, Zhu De pointed out at a war situation report meeting of the Operations Bureau of the Central Military Commission:
"Now sixty or seventy percent of our army are liberation fighters. ”
In April 1949, Zhou En said:
"A large part of our fighters are prisoners, called liberation fighters, and in some units, liberation fighters account for 80 percent, and a small number of them account for 50 to 60 percent, with an average of about 65 to 70 percent. ”
In June 1950, Zhou Enlai said:
"In terms of the composition of the army, liberation fighters make up 70 to 80 percent. ”
A large number of liberation fighters joined the army and participated in the war, which became an important reason why the PLA became bigger and bigger.
In the later period of the Liberation War, the capture of prisoners by the Kuomintang army became an important way, or even the main way, to replenish the front-line combat units of the People's Liberation Army.
Zhou En said that at that time, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) adopted the method of "taking prisoners, investigating prisoners, replenishing prisoners, training prisoners, and fighting prisoners on the battlefield." The situation even developed to the point that "prisoners in the morning participated in operations in the afternoon." At that time, many of the liberation fighters have now become platoon commanders and company commanders. This situation is rare in the history of world warfare".
It can be seen from this that the number of liberation fighters in the volunteer army is naturally not a small number. The proportion of such personnel is usually higher in field units than in local units, and front-line combat units are higher than in organs and logistics departments.
Among the first six armies of the Volunteer Army to enter the DPRK, there is also a complete army that was adapted from the uprising of the former Kuomintang Yunnan Army, that is, the 50th Army under which Zeng Zesheng was the commander.
Generally speaking, the Kuomintang army's prisoners have undergone "three inspections and three rectifications," and the officers and men of the insurrectionary units have withstood the test of the revolutionary war through the transformation of "rebirth," and most of them have become staunch people's fighters.
When the Chinese People's Volunteers entered the DPRK, the Korean People's Army, which had suffered heavy losses, was retreating to the northern border area, and there were still 3 corps, 9 divisions, 1 brigade, and 1 independent regiment, as well as 1 tank division, 1 tank brigade, and 1 tank regiment, totaling about 90,000 people.
Most of these units were not the main backbone at the beginning of the war, but new units hastily formed to supplement the war attrition.
The KPA Supreme Command was able to control and still fight only a little more than three divisions. When the Chinese People's Volunteers entered the DPRK, the People's Army had no large-scale and organized combat operations, except in some places along the coast and in the mountainous areas.
At this time, the total strength of the "United Nations Army" led by the US military had reached 440,000. Its ground forces include one group army, three corps, six divisions, and one airborne regiment of the US army, one brigade each from Britain and Turkey, and one battalion each from Australia and the Philippines. In addition, there are 3 corps and 11 divisions of the ROK Army, which are under the command of the "United Nations Army".
In this way, the total strength of the ground forces of the United Nations Army, led by the US military and including the ROK army, reached 349331 man.
Judging from the number of ground troops alone, the 290,000 volunteers fought against the "United Nations Army" with 349,000 troops, and the strength of the volunteers was less than that of the "United Nations Army," with a difference of nearly 60,000.
However, there are two other factors that should be taken into account when making this comparison:
First, all the strength of the Chinese People's Volunteers can be put into front-line combat, while the "United Nations Army" has to allocate a considerable part of its forces to the rear to annihilate the scattered KPA units and guerrillas, and this alone has dragged down five divisions of the ROK Army; second, although the Korean People's Army has been unable to support the big situation, its units that can still persist in fighting can still play a certain role in local battlefields, and this role should also be added to the side of the Chinese People's Volunteers.
Therefore, as far as the ground forces are concerned, the strength of the Volunteer Army in the early days of its entry into Korea was not much different from that of the "United Nations Army." In all previous battles, the Volunteers faced off against the "United Nations Army" and were able to achieve a certain superiority in the number of troops in almost every battle, and this was the result of the subjective initiative of war guidance being brought into play, and to a certain extent, it was also caused by the opponent's improper use of troops.
4. The "generation gap" of weapons and equipment
In terms of weapons and equipment, there is a considerable gap between the Volunteer Army and the US Army.
Deng Hua commented on the US military's ground combat capability, believing that its strongest point lies in its firepower, including artillery firepower, infantry automatic weapon firepower, and tank artillery fire.
When China's leaders initially discussed whether to send troops to North Korea to fight the U.S. military, one of the biggest concerns was that there was a big gap in firepower compared to the U.S. military.
In the early days of the DPRK, each army of the 13th Corps usually had one field artillery battalion (the 39th Army also had one rocket artillery battalion) equipped with 18 Type 38 field guns; the division had one mountain artillery battalion equipped with 12 Type 94 mountain guns; the regiment had two artillery companies equipped with Type 92 70-mm infantry guns and 10 106-mm heavy mortars; the infantry battalion had two 81-mm mortars; and the infantry company had three 60-mm mortars. According to the above number, an army has a total of 360 artillery pieces of various types, of which 198 are artillery pieces of 70 mm caliber or above, which is less than a division of the US army.
The 50th and 66th armies had fewer artillery. In terms of quality, most of the artillery of the Volunteer Army was American goods captured from the Kuomintang army, and there were also Japanese captured during the Anti-Japanese War.
In many battles after the Chinese Volunteers entered Korea, although they often formed a good situation, it was still difficult to achieve the effect of destroying the enemy in the end, and an important reason was the lack of firepower.
Among all kinds of artillery, the Volunteer Army only has "curved artillery", that is, the number of mortars is more than that of the US Army, but most of these guns of the Volunteer Army are small guns with a caliber of 60 mm, and their power is not great. If both sides do not count this kind of light small artillery, then the comparison of the number of various guns in the establishment of the US infantry division and the infantry corps of the Volunteer Army is 867: (184~208), about 4 times the difference - the artillery of 1 division of the US Army is equivalent to the total artillery of the 4 armies of the Volunteer Army!
The firepower of the volunteers is not only not comparable with that of the US army, but also compared with the Korean People's Army. Before the outbreak of the Korean War, all KPA units were equipped with Soviet-style weapons, and the six infantry divisions responsible for front-line offensive tasks all adopted Soviet-style formations, and each division had one artillery regiment and four artillery battalions, equipped with 12 122 mm howitzers, 24 76 mm cannons and 12 CY-76 self-propelled guns.
The Volunteer Army has only one mountain artillery battalion per division, which is obviously a cut behind. The People's Army also had about 150 tanks, all of which were the T-34 with the best performance in the world at that time, while the entire Volunteer Army did not even have a single tank.
It is no wonder that when the remnants of the People's Army retreating from the front line met the volunteers who were advancing across the Yalu River, they shook their heads and sighed vigorously when they saw the weapons and equipment of this unit.
Another strong point of the US ground forces is the speed of movement.
In this regard, Deng Hua has the following description:
The enemy has many communication tools and is flexible in communication. There were telegraphs, vans and radios, telephones, and even a radiophone and a wired telephone in each platoon, and intelligence orders were conveyed quickly. As far as we know, the enemy's troop has five small and medium-sized vehicles in the infantry company, 20 in the battalion and 20 in the firearms company, 20 in the mortar company, 50 in the regimental company, and 10 in the service company. The automobile unit of the military division is unknown, and it may be equipped with a unit for back and forth transportation when the enemy moves. Therefore, the advance and retreat are fast, and the road construction is also very fast, and a 24-mile automobile road was built in the Yongbyon area in one day and one night.
The communications and mobility capabilities of the US military are really unattainable for the volunteers who have no more than a few dozen radio communication equipment and rely on two legs for their movements.
According to relevant historical records, when the 50th Army entered Korea, there were only 11 walkie-talkies and 16 walkie-talkies, and the military headquarters of the 66th Army and its three divisions had only five radio stations in total, and the military headquarters had only 12 telephone operators. When the telephone company of the Volunteer Army Headquarters entered the DPRK, two telephone platoons were added, all of which were recruits who had never even seen wires, let alone overhead wiring.
As for the means of sport, the US military units have all been motorized and mechanized. In addition to tanks and armored vehicles, one of its infantry divisions also has more than 3,800 vehicles of various types, including more than 1,300 transport vehicles.
However, each army of the Volunteers had only more than 100 vehicles, and when the Volunteers entered Korea, there were only a total of more than 1,000 transport vehicles of the six armies, which was not as many as the transport vehicles of a division of the US army.
The equipment of the British, Canadian, and Australian troops is not much different from that of the American army, and the equipment of the Turkish army is relatively poor. There is a big gap between the ROK army's weaponry and that of the US and British armies, and its infantry division is not equipped with tanks, but it has 392 artillery pieces of various kinds, and its firepower is not weak when it receives US artillery fire and air support during the operation.
In terms of naval and air force equipment and combat capability, the US military has an absolute and monopolistic advantage. By the time the Volunteers entered the DPRK, the United States had 36,677 air force troops, 59,438 naval forces, more than 1,100 aircraft of various types, and more than 200 warships of various types.
U.S. air power includes air and naval carrier-based aviation, as well as Marine Corps aviation, and a small number of aircraft from the United Kingdom, Australia, and South Africa also participate in the war.
The strategic bomber group under the US Far East Air Force is equipped with B-29 "Flying Fortress" long-range bombers and B-26 "Marauder" light bombers, which are respectively used to bomb strategic targets in the rear and carry out political strikes on railway and highway transport vehicles; the fighter-bomber group is equipped with the F-51 "Mustang" nicknamed "Black Widow," the F-80C "Meteor" nicknamed "Oil Pick," and the F5-U "Corsair" and 9-F "Panther" fighters, which are mainly used to directly support ground forces in combat.
In addition, there are interceptor (i.e., fighter planes) equipped with the most advanced jet fighter in the United States, the F-86A Sabre, as well as F-82 "Double Mustang", F-84E "Thunderbolt" and other fighters, which are mainly used for air combat.
The U.S. Naval Air Force has three fighter groups on aircraft carriers, mainly equipped with F-9F, F-4U fighters and AD "Sky Bandit" dive bombers.
The U.S. Navy has long amassed a large number of ships in the waters off the Korean Peninsula. When the Volunteers entered the war, the United States, Britain and other countries used about 270 ships of various kinds in Korea.
During the retreat from Hungnam in December 1950 alone, the US Far East Navy dispatched 245 ships of various types, including 2 battleships, 11 cruisers, 7 aircraft carriers and frigates, 62 destroyers, 47 landing ships, 5 minesweepers, 83 transport ships, and 26 other ships.
As for the Volunteer Army, neither the Navy participated in the war, and the Air Force was only preparing for war at the beginning, and only a few aircraft participated in actual combat exercises under the leadership of the Soviet Air Force in December 1950. At that time, the Soviet Air Force dispatched 2 aviation divisions to take up air defense tasks along the Yalu River. Until the end of the war, the ground forces of the Volunteer Army did not receive direct air support from the Soviet Air Force.
In short, the weapons and equipment of the Chinese Volunteers are very backward, but their opponents are the most modern ground combat forces in the world and the most powerful naval and air combat forces in the world.
Some experts in war history say that the Volunteer Army is "one army against three services" on the battlefield, that is, the Volunteer Army only uses a single army to confront the combined combat forces of the army, navy, and air force of the United States and its allies; in fact, the Volunteer Army in the early days of the DPRK was not even qualified for the army in the modern sense, because it did not possess the combined combat capability of all arms of the armed forces that the modern army should have, and it was not a composite army, with no motorized infantry, no armored troops, no air defense units, no chemical defense troops, and still less army aviation units, but only a small number of artillery and engineering troops.
As far as the main body of the volunteer army is concerned, almost all of them are infantry with light weapons, and sometimes they can get some artillery support during the battle, and many times, grenades are heavy weapons.
Compared with the US military, the huge gap in the quality of weapons and equipment of the Chinese Volunteers reflects the "generational gap" in the technological level of the armed forces at different stages of development.
It is under such asymmetrical conditions that the Chinese and US militaries engage in a desperate contest.
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