Re: Formosa (Taiwan) during the KW

[<geminiad@whidbey.com>]

Jhk789@aol.com wrote:
> 
> What was the ROC medal for?

Not sure yet - not had response from questionnaire (MSGT Curry) ref
initial querry - maybe this weekend. Appears not in my medals but
will await color print of medal to verify.

> Who received them? 

Relates to above, but certainly those who performed services for ROC,
in this case either Joint command or Navy, who were stationed ON Taiwan.
Suspect that this was a medal awarded to Advisory Staff personnel.

Comments on Advisory Staff, aid and war follow  as background - 

Post-WW II, Nanking Headquarters Command was activated in Feb 1946. 
On Feb 25, 1946 President Truman issue and order to the Secretar of War
and Navy to "....establish jointly a U.S. Military Advisory Group to
China..."
On September 17, 1946, advisory personnel in China were charged with
establishment of a joint advisory group - which became JUSMAG-China, 
formally activated November 1, 1948. 

Because of the deteriorating military situation in China by late-1948,
JUSMAG 
was ordered to remove all its personnel from China prior to the end of
the year.

Some Navy personnel served with JUSMAG, but most were with the Navy
Advisory Group, and its successor, the Naval Advisory Division of
JUSMAG. 
This carried over onto Taiwan, as Public Law 512 involved naval
assistance
in the form of ship transfers to ChiNat navy (ROCN). Eventually, 131
ships
were transferred to the ROCN under this PL. In addition to the advisory
group
at Nanking, a training group was established at Tsingtao (old spelling)
to aid in
training crews, most of whose ships were rec'd from the USN in Asia (and
not
as the case would be decades later, come direct from the U.S.). The only
exception would PC-471 class patrol vessels that were transferred to
Chinese
Navy during WW II as part of Lend Lease but had not sailed to China
prior to the ending of the war. 

While our efforts were commendable in this area, the ChinNat navy failed
miserably in its coastal mission, with exceptions of some incidences in
which ChiNat PCs successfully provided offshore or river gunfire support
missions in relief of inland garrisons. Too many ChiNat naval officers
were
also involved in smuggling, which was mostly centered near Hong Kong 
and around the Bohai Gulf (north China). 

Best summary description would be: "During the closing months of 1948
 and the early months of 1949 there was evidence that the morale of 
Chinese naval personnel was so low and the will to fight so lacking that
Chinese
Naval Headquarters had hesitated to permit naval vessels freedom of
operations lest they desert to the Communists." 

Or, "This inability to prod the Government into effective action where
personal interests were involved was accentuated by the incompetence
of the individuals occupying high positions in the military chain of
command.
Advisory activities were further complicated and hindered by the fact 
that the Chief of the Ground Forces, General Ku Chu-tung was no present
at Ground Force Headquarters but remained in command of a field unit." 
(White Paper, 1949)

Options beyond these years would include a period involviing 1950-54
in which naval personnel aided in further ship transfers, made directly
at Taiwan.
Minimal personnel were on-island even at the Tachen Islands Evacuation, 
Feb 1954.  Not until the Air Force flew in a detached Fighter
Interceptor 
Squadron (FIS) during the '58 Quemoy Crisis did U.S. have units assigned
to the island.
> 
> I understand that it was the 7th Fleet that intervened in the
> Formosa Strait. Do you have any info
> on the size and location of the 7th Fleet
> on June 25, 1950?  SEE BELOW -

SEVENTH FLEET (VAdm A.D. Struble)
	ComCarDiv 3 (RAdm J.M. Hoskins)
	Amphibious Force  (RAdm. J. H. Doyle)
	Support Force  (RAdm. J. M. Higgins, ComCruDiv 5) 
(Main Component)
1 Aircraft Carrier 	-  Valley Forge
1 Heavy Cruiser		- Rochester
8 Destroyers		- Shelton, Eversole, Fletcher, Radford, Maddox
				Samuel N. Moore, Brush, Taussig

Support Force -

1 Anti-Aircraft Light Cruiser	- Juneau
4 Destroyers (Destroyer Division 91) - Mansfield, De Haven, Collett,
Swenson

Amphibious Force - 	Amphibious Group ONE 
Mt. McKinley  (AGC-7)  (Hqd.)
Cavalier  (APA-37)
Union  (AKA-106)
LST-611
 Arikara  (ATF-98)

Mine Squadron  Three (Mineron 3) - part of Support Force.  
 6 AMs - Redhead, Mocking Bird, Osprey, Partridge, Kite, Chatterer

(Above does not count miscellaneous service craft or those amphibious
ships which may have been involved in transfer to ROCN or aiding
movement
of ChinNat troops in and around the coastline of China) 

Also, Royal Navy's Task Group 96.8 was in Southern Japan, under
command of Rear Admiral Andrews,
consisting of: 1 x  light aircraft carrier, Triumph, 2 x  light
cruisers, Belfast and Jamaica,
2 x destroyers, Cossack, Consort, and 3 x  frigates Black Swan,
Alacrity, and Hart.  
-----------------
What was the assessment
> of the U.S. Naval intelligence, prior to the outbreak
> of the Korean War, as to the timing of PRC's attack on Formosa?

I don't have a specific Intelligence Report that focuses on Formosa 
invasion threat per say. This would probably have been a JCS report,
likely to have had origins at CIA or U.S. Army, Pacific. 

The decision was probably more political anyway, in view of the
widespread
deterioration of "friendly" military forces to the U.S. - both in ROK
and ROC.
The October 6-8, 1949 closed-door Asian policy review held  in
Washington, DC
was clearly a watershed for American policy. This involved key officials
in and out
of the USG, including Marsall, George F. Kennan and others.

"Subsequently the trend of policy, which with certain exceptions 
represented rather well the sense of the discussions, was to withhold
recognition from the Communists while at the same time further 
dissociating the United States from the Nationalists. The United States
also indicated it would regard any Chinese Communist military or
political
activity beyond the borders of China as a threat to peace. This policy
was
plainly express in January 1950." Both, of course by Dean Acheson and
Truman,
thgat stated the U.S. would NOT provide military aid or advise to
"....the Chinese
forces on Formosa." , 

that we intended to keep hands-off and that the island, having little
strategic significance, lay outside our first line of defense in the
Western
Pacific. " (Lyman P. Van Slyke)  Truman had over-ruled, largely at
Acheson's
advise, a JCS memo (Dec. 22, 1949) recommendation to the National 
Security Council that a military mission be sent to Formosa to assess
defensive
and other operational requirements of ChiNat forces. Senator Knowland
was
a sharp and immedicate critic, as was Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson
with regard to State Departments general failure to support Chiang and
his
concern "generally speaking, it seemed to me that the State Department
was critical of and did not support the goverment we recognized.
Personally,
I was extemely fearful taht we were going to recognize Commmunist China
in the indirect way of permitting it to become a member of the United
Nations." 

Truman's June 27, 1950 order changed all the above regards
Formosa/Taiwan
and the ROC. Overnight, Formosa now became strategic to our war in
Korea. 

In the practical matter of the PLA invading Formosa, there were plans in
Beijing
to do just that, but as unfortunate as was the North Korean invasion of
the South
in June 1950, it also interrupted PRC plans to end the civil war by
invading Taiwan.
It was only in April 1950 that the CCP invaded Hainan Island and the KMT
withdrew
its last troops from the island only in late-April. A very short period
before June 25th!

It is probably the CCP would have used the PLA 40th and 43d Corps(part
of
Lin Piao's Fourth Field Army)  as the  spearhead of an invasion of
Formosa,
 as these two corps had been used in  the assault on the Leishou
Peninsula  			(and Kwangsi) beginning Dec 7, 1949.

Some 400 sanpan's (junks) were used in the amphibous assault of Hainan.
Relatively inexperienced in amphibous landings (other than across
rivers),
the CCP suffered heavy lossed. But, after the landing at Linkao on April
17th,
the Nationalist defenses quickly collapsed and Linkao was evacuated
between
April 23-29th. ChiNat forces now controlled only numerous island groups
from just north of Wenchou southward along the Fukien Province coastline
-
and Formosa.  

 The CCP Fourth  (4th) Field Army would dominate Canton  Military Region
- 
under Lin Piao - from 1950 to 1969. I mention this because Lin Piao
(Biao)
was apparently a strong supporter of the NKPA's Korean invasion. Had not
the invasion occurred, its likely 4th Field Army would have returned to
its
roots in Manchuria.  
-------------

Keith Jacobs