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O N a rainy morning in early July 1950, American soldiers went to war for the second time in a decade. Four hundred-two men of Lt. Col. Charles B. Smith’s 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment, fought a delaying action against the communist Korean People’s Army (KPA) near Osan in South Korea. Beginning with its June 25, 1950, invasion, the KPA had repeatedly crushed all Republic of Korea (ROK) Army units in its path. American political and military leaders were stunned by the speed and audacity of the communist assault. Pres. Harry S. Truman on June 30 authorized General of the Army Douglas MacArthur to employ U.S. ground troops in Korea to restore the status quo ante. MacArthur, the commander-in-chief, Far East Command (FECOM), believed that without direct American intervention the North Koreans would quickly overrun the weakly armed, numerically smaller ROK Army. Like most Americans, however, he also felt that a demonstration by a small American ground force as “an arrogant display of strength” would suffice to halt the KPA and save South Korea from communist domination. As a result, on July 5, 1950, the soldiers of Task Force Smith became the physical embodiment of what MacArthur later described as a desire “to fool the enemy into a belief that I had greater resources at my disposal than I did.”1 The officers and men of Task Force Smith began their fight at 0816, pitting their six 105-mm howitzers against thirty-three Soviet-built T-34 medium tanks. As the tanks closed on the infantry position, soldiers armed with 57-mm recoilless rifles and 2.36-inch rocket launchers joined the fight. The combined fires disabled just two tanks; the others passed through the American position and continued south toward Pyongtaek. Two hours later the main body Introduction 1 1 2 of the KPA 4th Division (about four thousand infantry escorted by three more tanks) came within range of the defending Americans. After fighting until midafternoon , Colonel Smith ordered a withdrawal. Low on ammunition, unable to communicate with supporting artillery or mortars, and pressed closely by enemy infantry, Smith’s unit disintegrated, and the withdrawal became a rout. American casualties totaled 148 enlisted men and five officers killed, wounded, or missing, including several who were apparently executed after being captured . Approximately 125 North Koreans died or suffered wounds; none were captured.2 The next day at Pyongtaek, the 1st Battalion, 34th Infantry Regiment withdrew in the face of attacks by the same KPA 4th Division. Both 1st and 3rd Battalions of the 34th Infantry Regiment subsequently failed to hold the town of Chonan. The remainder of the 21st Infantry Regiment fought a series of delaying actions from July 8 to July 12, 1950, between Chonui and Chochiwan but ultimately failed to halt the North Koreans’ progress. On the night of July 15–16, KPA units pushed across the Kum River in the 19th Infantry Regiment’s sector, forcing the entire 24th Infantry Division to withdraw toward Taejon. Frustrated by repeated American “bug-outs,” on July 29 Lt. Gen. Walton H. Walker, commanding general, Eighth U.S. Army, issued his famous “stand or die” order. Even so, Walker’s forces required another six weeks to stabilize their defenses sufficiently to allow MacArthur to conduct his decisive turning movement at Inchon on September 15.3 Historians and soldiers have not been kind to either MacArthur or the soldiers whom he placed in harm’s way in the summer of 1950. The circumstances of MacArthur’s relief in April 1951 have colored all subsequent interpretations of his actions during the Korean War. Post-1975 revolutions in training methods have led professional soldiers to condemn the army of 1950 for tolerating a crisis of “institutional environment and values.” Such arguments fail to account for many mitigating factors, however, and merely add to the insults heaped on the men of the Eighth Army. Instead of lauding the significant operational advantages gained by Task Force Smith’s delaying action , standard interpretations portray that unit as the epitome of unreadiness. Indeed, as early as July 24, 1950, the editors of Life blamed the soldiers of the Eighth Army generally for failing to emulate the example of their World War II forebears, beginning a historiographic trend that continues to this day.4 This study seeks to redress the imbalance that exists between fact and interpretation . For too long historians and soldiers have roundly criticized Task ForceSmith’sperformance,extrapolatedfromitsfateasetof assumptionsabout what constitutes...

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