Spare Not the Brave: The Special Activities Group in Korea

4. Kunsan

52 Spare Not the Brave 4 Kunsan The outcome of an amphibious operation is limited to one of two choices, either a complete success or a disastrous failure. —Lloyd E. Peddicord Mission planning Although the Raiders were conducting amphibious training, none knew what their mission might be. Perhaps Wear knew, but during interviews in 2000, 2001, and 2002, he was not able to recall any details of the creation of the Raiders or of planning for the initial operation. According to the 5 September FEC deception plan, the Raider Company was to conduct “practical ruses including actual beach reconnaissance in the vicinity of Kunsan.” Two days later, commander, Far East Command, attached the Raiders to commander, U.S. Naval Forces Far East (COMNAVFE), for operations. On 8 September Lt. Cdr. J. V. Brothers, commander of the British frigate HMS Whitesand Bay, received Operations Order 16–50, message 080346Z September, from COMNAVFE (Vice Adm. Charles Turner Joy) while his ship was en route from Sasebo to Kobe. The mission was to facilitate OPLAN 100-A: “ROK landing force will seize and occupy one or more islands off harbor entrance Kunsan; FEAF will conduct bombing and strafing attacks . . . centered on Kunsan; NAVFE will conduct amphibious raiding operations . . . in vicinity Kunsan . . . in order to disrupt coastal communications . . . hamper enemy reinforcements of the Kunsan area and to obtain essential information on beach area. HMS Whitesand Bay with about 115 amphibious reconnaissance personnel from the Provisional Raider Company and the Royal Naval Volunteer Group under command Col. Ely USA embarked. Conduct earliest pos52 kUNSaN 53 sible amphibious raiding operations and beach reconnaissance. Operations to be conducted by sleath [sic] where possible.” Neither Ely nor Wear was an addressee on that message, but the message stated that it “has been passed to COL Ely CO Special Activities Group GHQ UNC by other means.”1 How and when the message was passed is unknown. Also on 8 September SAG was detached from COMNAVFE and attached to X Corps. A second message, this one from Almond, was specifically addressed to “CO SP OPN GP, COL L B ELY.” It made no mention of the landing near Kunsan, but addressed operations to be conducted beginning the evening of 15 September in the vicinity of Inchon. These two messages are significant in that they leave no doubt as to Ely’s position as commander of the Special Activities Group.2 Significantly, there was no rehearsal for the difficult night operation to be conducted by soldiers from two different nations. Army infantry field manuals of 1942, 1944, and 1949 indicated that rehearsals should be included in planning. Ely had to have been aware of army doctrine regarding rehearsals. In June 1941 he had been assigned to Amphibious Force, Atlantic Fleet, and participated in Operation TORCH in North Africa (November 1942). During his assignment at Quantico, Virginia, units that were to participate in TORCH underwent extensive training and conducted numerous rehearsals in Chesapeake Bay. He headed the Amphibious Training Section in England until January 1944, but whether he was aware of planning for amphibious rehearsals prior to D-Day is unknown. Nevertheless, because he was responsible for revising the Army manual on amphibious operations, it is difficult to accept that Ely would not have examined the disastrous rehearsal conducted at Slapton Sands, England, which resulted in more than seven hundred Americans killed and missing prior to the Normandy invasion. There is no evidence that Wear learned of the deception operation prior to meeting Ely immediately before boarding Whitesand Bay. Certainly, he could not have planned a rehearsal for an unknown mission. Pounds would have liked to rehearse the operation, but he presumed it could not be done because of lack of time.3 At 3:00 a.m. 10 September, Ely boarded the British frigate at Kobe along with an unknown naval officer from Rear Adm. James H. Doyle’s Task Force 90 to which the ship was assigned. Ely proceeded to brief Brothers on the details of the operation. Presumably those details had been hashed out at the meeting aboard Mount McKinley less than forty-eight hours earlier. Ely informed Brothers that the “requirement was to land the special operations group to carry out a beach reconnaissance in the vicinity of Kunsan on the night of 12th/13th.” Ely 54 Spare Not the Brave told Brothers that the “beach had been considered as a possible landing place . . . and was...