One point:
The North didn't almost kick our ass. The Chinese who intervened on the North's behalf almost kicked our ass. Before the US intervened, the North pushed the South to the Pusan/Busan perimeter. The US landed in Incheon (practically next to Seoul) and on the Eastern side of the country (forgot the name and the battle, but that battle was bloody). The US and allied forces (people seem to forget that some 20 odd U.N. countries were involved on behalf of the north, though the US provided 85% of the fighting force) pushed the North all the way to the Yalu river, which is the border between the Korean Peninsula and China. Everyone thought the war was over at that point. Then, on behalf of the North, China (heavily supplied by Russia) used the human wave tactic to drive the UN forces all the way back to the Pusan/Busan perimeter, in effect losing all the ground the UN forces captured. It was a shoving match from there. The UN pushed back, the North pushed back, and finally the demarcation line was drawn on the original border between the two, the 38th parallel.
On a side note, it was after WWII when the 38th parallel was drawn. Basically, the Russians were entering Korea from China, much like the Russians did in East Germany. We wanted to stop the Russians from advancing, as we feared the Russians could use the peninsula as a staging area for an eventual attack (in 1945, there were some trust issues between the U.S. and Russia) so essentially a guy in America, who knew nothing about Korea (or where it even was for that matter, he had to ask his aid where it was) drew a line on the map effectively separating the two Koreas: the North belonging to Russia, and the South belonging to the US (UN). The North, specifically Kim Il Sung, created a communist government, while the South chose to follow the Western world and create a capitalist government. Talks of unification didn't go well, and in 1950 the North invaded the South.
All pretty tragic considering the Korean past of occupation by the Japanese (from 1910 to 1945, when WWII ended). Level-headed Koreans I know all say Korea had that coming, though, if Koreans would only remember the history of trying to invade Japan several times and failed. Still, tragic how much this country has been through in the past 102 years.
"You keep calling me Walter. I don't like you," -Rorschach
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vowelless_one
12 years ago
On a side note, most military historians today agree that the description of 'human wave attacks' about the Chinese is inaccurate.
Like the NVA, the Chinese strategy revolved around the concept of localised concentrations of force. The Chinese were a light infantry army, and, in hilly or mountainous terrain such as covered most of Korea, this gave them a considerable mobility advantage against armies that were more tied down to heavy supply lines, like the UN were. The Chinese understood this, and used their superior mobility to bring about defeat-in-detail of more heavily-equipped UN forces.
'Human wave tactics' also imply numerical superiority, which the Chinese People's Volunteer Army in Korea didn't have. In the 1950s, China was still recovering from the destruction caused by the Chinese Civil War, with the result that a force which outnumbered the UN was one which they wouldn't have able to keep supplied.
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Epsilon_Pegasi
12 years ago
Did not know all the little nuances, thank you! I do remember hearing about this one especially bloody battle (can't remember names, but I know it was after the initial landings on the Eastern part of the peninsula) where I think I just misunderstood terms/tactics/etc.
Essentially, one night, the UN forces all heard a sound. Horns started blaring, men screaming from all directions, and all of a sudden the Chinese were there, wave after wave, taking many UN forces with them. It was early on, so maybe the Chinese thought these scare tactics could drive the war in their favor. I don't know.
"You keep calling me Walter. I don't like you," -Rorschach
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