The Chinese People's Volunteers successively invested more than 2 million troops, sacrificed nearly 200,000 people, provided incalculable supplies free of charge, and owed the Soviet Union 3 billion yuan in arms debts.
It was only after all these difficulties that it was difficult to push the US-led "United Nations Army" back to the 38th parallel and ensure the strategic territorial security of the mainland.
In the impression of the Chinese people, after the Chinese People's Volunteers entered the DPRK, the battles were basically fought by us, and the Korean People's Army had a very low sense of existence.
But after all, this is a war in North Korea, how many troops did they send?
The war was unequal from the start, and in terms of numbers, the enemy had 17 countries, with only China and North Korea and a small amount of Soviet air support on this side;
In terms of overall national strength, many of the 17 countries are old European powers, as well as behemoths like the United States, and the overall industrial level is very high. China and North Korea, on the other hand, have just driven out the invaders, and they are poor and white in terms of economy, and there is almost nothing in terms of industry.
So, if we want to win this battle, we can only make up for the lack of others through numbers. In the early stage of the battle with the US army, the volunteers were also keenly aware of this.
Lacking heavy weapons, we are often suppressed by the enemy's powerful firepower, and on several occasions we clearly surround each other, but we can't eat it. If such a bald head can have an extra force in his hand to help, the situation will be completely different.
Therefore, under the overall planning of the central government, the strength of the volunteer army continued to increase, and 2.4 million people entered the DPRK one after another.
These 2.4 million people are composed of the 3rd, 9th, 13th, 19th, 20th, and 23rd corps, plus several special arms, and 500,000 supplementary soldiers.
Of course, so many people were not in North Korea at the same time, and the volunteers adopted the method of rotational warfare, so that the front-line troops could rest and recuperate, and the domestic troops also had the opportunity to exercise.
Since the war was prepared and initiated by the DPRK, suffered a major blow from the United States, and the volunteers breathed a sigh of relief after entering the war, the number of the Korean People's Army also had a fluctuating curve.
After Japan's surrender in 1945, Kim Il Sung returned to the peninsula with the help of the Soviet Union and began to build up the armed forces.
In 1948, when the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the Korean People's Army (KPA) were formally established, the KPA consisted of only one central border battalion, one separate mixed brigade and two army divisions.
With this military force, it was difficult to protect oneself, and Kim Il Sung, who was bent on reunifying the peninsula, was unwilling to accept the status quo and began to make efforts to expand his armaments. However, the total population of the DPRK is more than 20 million, and labor is needed for construction and production, so it is not easy to expand the army.
Just when Kim Il Sung was worried, China's war of liberation was coming to an end, and it occurred to him that there were still many Korean commanders and fighters in the PLA, and these were high-quality soldiers who did not need training.
He then went to Beijing in person, hoping to get the North Korean soldiers in the People's Liberation Army to hand him over. Chairman Mao thought that the liberation of the country was a foregone conclusion, so he nodded in agreement.
As a result, the 164th and 166th Divisions of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) returned to Korea as a formation and were organized into the Fifth and Sixth Divisions of the People's Army; the Korean soldiers of the 139th, 140th, 141st, and 156th Divisions of the People's Liberation Army were also transferred and reorganized into the Seventh Division of the People's Army.
There are also some other fragmentary units, adding up to the PLA has handed over nearly 50,000 people, these are all elite, only the 156th Division transferred 4,500 people, more than 100 people have won the title of personal "hero" awarded by the field army headquarters, they are very rich in combat experience, and they are extremely excellent soldiers.
By the time the war broke out, the total number of KPA troops had reached 137,000, and a small number of air force, navy, tank force, and motorized unit had been formed.
At the same time, South Korea, on the other hand, had only 98,000 troops and was inferior to the People's Army, which had a large number of Soviet weapons, so Kim Il Sung launched a war of reunification in June 1950.
At the beginning, the KPA fought very smoothly, taking Seoul in 3 days, Daejeon in 20 days, and pressing the U.S. and South Korean forces to the Busan line in 3 months. At this time, North Korea controlled 90% of the territory and 92% of the population of the peninsula, and it looked like reunification was just around the corner.
Unfortunately, this is just a look, and there is a major crisis hidden behind it. After months of fighting without recuperation, the KPA was very tired, and when it reached the Pusan defensive circle, it was actually unable to fight.
Their goal on the way south is wrong, mainly to advance and capture the city, not to annihilate the enemy's living forces, which makes the US and South Korean side still have enough foundation and time to arrange a response.
In the encirclement, the United States and South Korea outnumbered the KPA, but they did not launch a counterattack, but used Pusan as a magnet to attract the KPA to continue to attack, so as to cooperate with MacArthur's Inchon landing.
Both the mainland and the Soviet Union repeatedly warned Kim Il Sung of the possible landing of American troops in the rear. However, Kim Il Sung, who had been carried away by the victory, did not listen to it and continued to bring in a new force from the north.
Kim Il Sung only arranged for more than 3,000 people to defend Incheon, but the United States mobilized more than 70,000 men to attack at a time, and the place quickly changed hands.
Immediately after the battlefield, a chain reaction was triggered, and the Korean People's Army was cut off, and in the end, only more than 30,000 people who fled back to North Korea in the formation (and some fled back one after another), and the losses were extremely heavy.
At this time, the situation was reversed, and the south was to unify the north, and the "United Nations Army" crossed the 38th parallel and launched an attack on the remaining Korean troops. If there were no external forces, the number of KPA would probably be reduced to zero.
At the critical moment, the Chinese People's Volunteers crossed the Yalu River to participate in the war, both to protect the northeastern territory of the mainland from bombing and to support comrades in the same camp.
At this time, Kim Il Sung was very grateful to China, because the People's Army under his command was really unbearable, and it seemed that there were still tens of thousands of people, but most of the old soldiers were left in the south, and these recruits basically had no combat effectiveness.
After the volunteers came, he could finally settle down. In the months that followed, the KPA was intensively training, and it was not until the third campaign that it recovered a little, with 130,000 men again.
It's just that at this time their combat effectiveness is not enough, and most of them can only perform combat missions in secondary areas. It was not until June 1951, when the fifth campaign ended, that the People's Army passed the baptism of actual combat and tempered into a team capable of undertaking the main attack.
At this point, the KPA has also expanded to 250,000 people, both in terms of quantity and quality, far better than at the beginning of the war. By the time the armistice was signed in 1953, the size of the Korean regular army had increased to 450,000.
In general, in this war that took place in Korea, the volunteer army was more like the protagonist, and the local people's army was assisting and cooperating most of the time. The friendship between the two countries is a friendship irrigated by blood.