Korea - 50 years ago this week, Jan. 3-9, 1952

[Brooke Rowe <global-national-security@pacbell.net>]

Korea - 50 years ago this week, Jan. 3-9, 1952

(EXCERPT) Soviets want to move peace talks out of Korea, by Jim
Caldwell

WASHINGTON (Army News Service, Jan. 2, 2001) - Following a New Year's
Day bombing by the communists of Kimpo Airfield and the Inchon harbor
west of Seoul, peace negotiations continued on a bumpy course in Korea
50 years ago this week.

Jan. 3-9, 1952 -- At the subcommittee talks on exchanging prisoners,
the reds say they will exchange military and civilian prisoners in
phases, not all at once as the U.N. negotiators want. Civilians will
also have the right to refuse to go home.
 At the top-level talks on enforcing the armistice, the communists
refuse to agree to a ban on building military airfields after the
truce. An unidentified U.N. negotiator says Jan. 7 the red delegates
are acting "like schoolgirls who had a secret and were not telling
their friends." The same day Adm. C. Turner Joy, chief U.N. delegate,
says that "with each passing day there is less and less reason to
think the communists really want a stable armistice." The reds also
stop talking on Jan. 7 because they want to see what happens in the
U.N. General Assembly with Soviet Foreign Mister Andrei Y. Vishinsky's
proposal to move peace talks from Korea to the Security Council. Small
countries were at first afraid of the consequences if they voted
against the Soviet plan, but the United States, Great Britain and
France convinced them that the plan was a trap, and that peace
negotiations should be conducted by opposing militaries on the
battlefield, not in the U.N. where it would be a political issue. On
Jan. 9 the Security Council defeated the measure 40-6, with the Soviet
bloc voting for it. The Political Committee also voted 47-6 (Chile
joined the Soviet bloc in the committee) to cease discussions on
Korea. Gen. Matthew B. Ridgway, U.N. supreme commander, said in Tokyo
Jan. 9 that the communist delegates "represent only a small clique of
power-mad masters in the Kremlin... and do not and never will
represent the will of the people." The battle for a hill named the
"Sasi Bulge" that began Dec. 28 ends Jan. 9 with the reds still
holding the hill.

Jan. 4 -- The Medal of Honor is presented posthumously to Cpl. Clair
Goodblood, 21, of the 7th Infantry Regiment for staging a one-man
fight against the enemy on a hill near Popsu-dong, Korea. He held the
communists off long enough for his demoralized and confused comrades
to regroup and counterattack. When they did they found Goodblood lying
beside his machine gun with more than 100 dead enemy within his field
of fire. Goodblood was the 39th American to earn the Medal of Honor
during the Korean War. South Korean Ambassador to the U.S. Dr. Yu Chan
Yang reports after a meeting with President Truman that the president
told him the U.S. "won't let Korea down" in the truce talks, but now
is not the time for the two countries to join in a mutual defense
pact.

Jan. 5-9 - British Prime Minister Winston Churchill arrives in New
York aboard the Queen Mary luxury liner to begin talks with President
Harry Truman in Washington. Churchill told the news media that the
meetings were not an attempt to "get settlements or sign agreements."
The purpose he said was "establish close and intimate understanding"
so the two countries "may deal with events of the future with
knowledge of each other's point of view." Truman sends his plane
"Independence" to New York to fly Churchill and his party to
Washington. The first session was held aboard the presidential yacht
Williamsburg on the Potomac River. On Jan. 9 a joint communiqué
summarized the substance of the talks: Both countries agree to unite
with each other and other free countries "to ensure peace and freedom"
and "the strength of the free world." Truman agrees to ask Britain's
permission to employ A-bombs from U.S. bases in England. This was to
assure the British population that they wouldn't suffer retaliation
from Russia if the United States dropped nuclear bombs on the
communists. "We are willing to at any time to explore all reasonable
means of resolving the issues which now threaten the peace of the
world," communiqué read, but Truman makes it clear that this does not
include talking to Soviet Premier Josef Stalin. Churchill defends
Great Britain's reason for recognizing communist China, a move which
Truman also rejects. Other items center around strengthening the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization, and the British economy.

Jan. 7 -- Gen. Curtis LeMay, commander of the Strategic Air Command,
tells a New York audience that "almost overnight the communists in the
Korea area have become one of the major airpowers of the world."

Jan. 7-8 -- The N.Y. Times reports that production of new tanks for
the Army is running six to nine months behind schedule. Production of
the 25-ton Walker Bulldog and 50-ton M-47 tanks coming off production
lines in Detroit, Cleveland and Schenectady, N.Y., are mounting up in
depots because the turret control systems are "unacceptable" along
with other engineering problems, the stories say.

Jan. 9 -- The Defense Department reports that U.S. casualties through
Jan. 4 are 104,084, with 17,834 dead. President Harry Truman delivers
the State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress in
the House chambers. He defends foreign aid as strengthening "the
forces of freedom throughout the world" so the United States doesn't
have to "stand alone against Soviet-dominated world." He says that
poverty and hunger anyplace in the world breed "stomach communism." He
said that U.N. forces stopped red aggression in Korea without widening
the war. Defense pacts with Australia, New Zealand and the Philippines
in the Pacific and NATO in Europe are defense arrangements "to hold
back the communist advance." (Editor's note: Jim Caldwell is a writer
for the TRADOC News Service.)

 

http://www.dtic.mil/armylink/news/Jan2002/a20020102koreajan3-9.html

---------------------------
   Brooke Rowe
   Associate Librarian
   The American War Library
   http://www.americanwarlibrary.com