The Korean War gets a lot less attention than the wars that America participated in immediately
before and after it, World War Two and The Vietnam War. But anyone who is interested in history and
why the world is the way it is today should know about The Korean War. Understanding the Korean War
shows how the American armed services went from being a force that could destroy Nazi Germany and
Imperial Japan to a military that failed to stop the communist takeover in Vietnam. In some ways,
the Korean War was almost much more disastrous for the Americans than Vietnam. In fact, at one point,
the North Koreans almost pushed the American Army out of the country for good. And the South
Koreans, whom the Americans were allied with, did some terrible things that will make you wonder
why the US even wanted to fight for them in the first place. At least two million civilians died,
although that number might be much closer to three million. Similarly, the combined military
deaths were at least 500,000 and might be well over one million. But it was also a weird war,
where both sides made some strange decisions. Today let’s go back in time to reveal weird and
sad things about the Korean War that you didn’t know. Viewer discretion is advised for this video
as some of this video may be offensive or disturbing. We, the makers of this video,
in no way support or condone the atrocities that were committed during the Korean War.
In the lead-up to the war, the South Korean President, Syngman Rhee, forced anyone he
suspected of being a communist sympathizer to enroll in a re-education program that was supposed
to set them on the “correct” way of thinking. And when they couldn’t find enough communist
sympathizers, they just started forcibly enrolling random people into this education program.
Then, when war officially broke out, these people were imprisoned. Two days after the North Korean
Army invaded South Korea in 1950, the South Korean president ordered the execution of the people in
this re-education program and also people who were part of the South Korean Workers Party.
From that day onward, huge swathes of people were massacred by the South Korean Government.
When the USA entered the war, little happened to stop the heartless acts. Instead, some commanders
even approved of the executions. Others, such as General Douglas MacArthur, turned a blind eye
to the atrocities. The youngest known victim of these massacres was a young girl in her teens. The
most common method of execution was by firearm. But the South Koreans also used crueler methods.
For instance, suspected communist sympathizers who lived on the coast
were often tied together and thrown into the sea, ensuring that they would drown. The
saddening ordeal was then suppressed, until the 1990s and 2000s, when South Korea’s government
ended its authoritarian regime and became much more democratic. The government has
since uncovered thousands of human remains. The true extent of the massacres may never be known.
After the North Koreans invaded South Korea, you’d be right in thinking that the Americans
acted quickly to defend the south. But you’d be wrong in thinking that this went smoothly,
as the first US battle highlights. Less than two weeks after the outbreak of the war,
American soldiers arrived on the Korean peninsula with the goal of forcing the communists back.
The first American engagement was the Battle of Osan, which occurred on the 5th of July,
1950. The day before, the US soldiers, who were made up of a group of 540 GIs from a
few different battalions that had been hastily grouped together, nicknamed Task Force Smith,
set up defensive stations on two hills on both sides of the road just outside the village of
Osan. Task Force Smith’s soldiers were almost all teenage boys. Only one-sixth of the men had
combat experience. Most had only been trained for a total of eight weeks before being deployed into
the theater of war. And to defend themselves, they had equipment that dated to the early
days of World War Two. Few of these weapons were strong enough to pierce North Korean tank armor.
And what made matters even worse was that the group only had a total of six anti-tank rounds.
On the morning of July 5th, the soldiers saw eight North Korean tanks approaching.
The timing was terrible, as they approached during a heavy rainstorm, meaning that air
support could not aid the men. At 8:16 AM, the Americans fired on the tanks with artillery fire.
Then they watched in horror as the tanks continued to creep forward, barely scratched. The tanks
reached a roadblock that the Americans had set up. The Americans fired their six anti-tank
rounds. Two of the tanks were damaged. A third one caught on fire. A North Korean then exited
this flaming tank and fired on the Americans, killing one GI before being killed himself.
The Americans were then able to disable another tank by hitting its tracks, but the North Koreans
then destroyed the American communication lines, making logistical coordination impossible. When
things seemed hopeful, another 25 North Korean tanks rode up to the Americans. Soon, most of the
North Korean tanks had ridden past the Americans without being damaged, with the tanks firing upon
the US posts. The surviving Americans tried their best to fortify what was left of their defenses
when three more tanks and a column of trucks that stretched as far as they could see arrived. The
Americans shot at these tanks and trucks. Some trucks were destroyed. But by 2:30 pm,
the Americans had used up all of their ammo and suffered heavy losses. The survivors retreated.
Wounded Americans stayed behind, hoping that the North Koreans would imprison them. Instead, the
Americans were all rounded up. Those that still had two arms were bound with the communication
line wires that the tanks had disabled and they were terminated. Task Force Smith lost almost half
of its soldiers in that battle. The North Korean invasion force had been delayed by a grand total
of seven hours. Sadly, the Americans took a long time to learn from their mistakes in this battle.
Over the month of July, similar battles played out across the Korean peninsula, with
inexperienced American soldiers using ineffective weapons and inevitably being overwhelmed.
Because the US Army was so badly equipped and trained, the North Koreans were on the
verge of winning the war within two months of first invading South Korea.
Throughout July, the American and South Korean armies just kept on getting pushed
further and further south. By early August, the North Koreans had taken over 90% of the peninsula.
Kim Il Sung (Kim Ill Soong), the North Korean leader, thought that victory was imminent.
Instead, the Americans and the South Koreans were able to fortify the 10% of the land that they had
been pushed back to, on the southeastern tip of the peninsula. On August 2nd,
1950, the US and South Korean Armies finally succeeded in halting the North Korean advance.
Soon, the Americans had planned a counteroffensive to take back the land they had lost.
Another division, nicknamed Task Force Kean, which was composed of 20,000 men, headed west to take
the Chinju Pass, which would allow the Americans and South Koreans to rapidly move further inland.
Task Force Kean headed toward the Chinju Pass on August 7th. But as they left their base,
they encountered thousands of North Korean troops, who had been attempting to reach Task Force Kean’s
base. The two armies fought bitterly out in the open until both sides set up temporary bases.
For the next three days, the Americans and North Koreans fought incredibly bloody battles.
Eventually, the Task Force Kean was beaten back to their original base,
failing to take any land. Once more, the Americans had been defeated.
Instead, the South Koreans and Americans had to remain in their tiny block of land,
bitterly defending it throughout August and the first half of September 1950.
The “never give up” mentality of the US and South Korean soldiers proved to be victorious.
At 6:30 am on September 15th, 1950, hundreds of ships approached the coastal city of Incheon,
which was based hundreds of miles north of the land that the US ground forces were defending.
Much like D-Day in World War Two, thousands of American soldiers stormed the beaches,
destroying North Korean defensive positions. The North Koreans were taken completely by surprise,
and the poorly maintained defensive positions were soon abandoned. Within two weeks of this surprise
amphibious assault, the Korean capital of Seoul was back in American and South Korean hands. The
North Koreans also suffered heavy losses. In fact, by mid-October, America had taken in over 135,000
North Korean prisoners of war. From that point onward, America and South Korea had the upper
hand in the war. You may think that this account is an exaggeration of just how close the North
Koreans came to taking over the entire Korean peninsula. Well, it isn’t. Even the American
commanders at the time realized that they were on the brink of defeat. For instance, General Matthew
Ridgway said that, “the war would have been over in 60 days with all Korea in Communist hands,” if
it hadn’t been for the US’s air force. Most people know that North Korea is one of the strangest and
most secretive nations on Earth. While every other country has embraced internationalism to a certain
degree, the North Korea of the present day is known as the hermit kingdom, which refuses to
integrate with other countries. It reveals very little about what happens within its borders,
and even then, much of what it says is blatant propaganda. Why is this? It all
lies in the fact that North Korea and South Korea are technically still at war. Of course, nowadays,
battles are not being fought between North Korean and South Korean soldiers. So in that sense,
it isn’t a physical war. But it is still happening because no side has ever formally ended the war.
Instead, this is how the conflict ended. In June 1953, the Communist forces and the combined US,
South Korean, and UN forces had been locked in a stalemate for years. In that month,
they fired millions of shells at one another. This led to a major escalation in hostilities.
To soldiers on the ground, It must have seemed like the fighting would only get worse. But the
Communist governments were actually in the process of ending the war at this point. Joseph Stalin,
the ruler of the Soviet Union for decades, had died in early 1953. The remaining Soviet leaders,
who were in an internal power struggle to become the new ruler, lost interest in supporting the
North Korean War. Suddenly, the North Koreans and the Chinese lost all their resources. Soon, the
North Koreans accepted peace talks with the United Nations. By the end of July, most of the heads of
the nations at war had signed the Korean Armistice Agreement, ending immediate hostilities. But this
agreement makes it clear that the war is not over. Instead, it says that all fighting shall stop,
“until a final peaceful settlement is achieved.” So basically, this agreement is a stopgap measure
to prevent lives from being lost until final peace accords can be drafted. But no final peace
agreement has even been signed. In fact, South Korea hasn’t even accepted the terms of the Korean
Armistice Agreement, and no representative from South Korea has ever signed it.
This was because the then South Korean president, Syngman Rhee, still wanted to take the entire
Korean peninsula. Of course, without support from America, he did not have the strength to do this,
so the fighting stopped. Because of this, the Korean War is still officially ongoing.
When the fighting officially ended, all of the soldiers who had been captured by either side
were freed and allowed to return home. Not all of them did. As can be expected, tens of thousands
of North Korean and Chinese soldiers refused to return to their communist dictatorships
and remained in the West. A small number of South Korean soldiers, 327 to be precise, remained in
North Korea. Many of these people probably had family in the North that they wanted to stay with.
But most weirdly of all, 21 Americans and one Scottish soldier who had been captured
refused to return home. Instead, they chose to remain under communist influence. These men all
had different reasons. Some were genuinely impressed with the communist way of life.
Others were disgusted by the injustices of their home country. One such individual was Clarence
Adams. Adams was a corporal who originally came from Memphis, Tennessee. He was African American,
so he had seen more than his fair share of suffering in the pre-civil rights USA.
In Communist prison, for the first time ever, he had access to a high standard of education.
He studied Communist political theory. Once he had become an expert on the subject,
he started lecturing other American prisoners on what he considered to be the virtues
of Communism. When the war ended, Adams knew that the other American soldiers would say that he had
spent his entire incarceration learning about and preaching about Communism, meaning that he would
probably face even more prison time and be given a dishonorable discharge. So Adams moved to China
and married a Chinese woman. He remained sympathetic to the Communist way of life.
In fact, during the Vietnam War, Adams would often appear on Communist radio shows, during which he
would plead for the American soldiers in Vietnam to return to the USA and fight for civil equality.
But in 1966, Adams decided to return to America, because Communism couldn’t provide him with the
thing he wanted most in the world: his mother. The US government did subpoena him shortly after his
return, but he avoided prison time. Instead, he opened a Chinese restaurant in Memphis.
Most of the imprisoned soldiers who sided with Communism eventually returned home.
Perhaps the soldier who was most successful was Corporal Morris Wills, who returned to America
in 1965 and ended up at Harvard University. Well, that’s all we have for you. Thank you
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