DBWI: Chinese Intervene in Korean War

One of the more interesting inflection points in history is the disastrous attempt by Mao to intervene in the Korean War. The Chinese tried to night march and hide their forces from UN reconnaissance, but trying to march that many men in hiding simply wasn't possible and it was clear to UN forces by October 10th that China was going to invade and warned in no uncertain terms that any units crossing the Yalu would be dealt with with nuclear weapons due to their size.

The incident of course spooked both sides. It's only with hindsight that the UN realized that it was as much luck as inevitability that the Chinese were discovered before they crossed over into what was North Korea, and the Chinese realized that their massive human waves were useless if they were eviscerated before they even reached their enemy.

Of the two Communist Chinese leaders who most supported intervention, one would recover, one would not. Zhou Enlai regained a lot of respect in the party after forcing the US/UN to acknowledge the PRC and hammering out a 'favorable' solution for China regarding the Chinese/Korean DMZ* in the Camp David Accords of 1951. Mao, however, would not, and would die 'Falling down some stairs' shortly after Stalin bit it in 1953 and usher in Liu Shaoqi.

The Korean War is often one of the more forgotten wars simply because the Cold War was focused on the US vs the Soviets and not 'The Other Communists who weren't belligerent.' But what if we hadn't spotted the PVA intervention force before it was too late and they were overwhelming the frankly overextended UN forces? Or if Truman hadn't fired MacArthur on the spot for trying to goad the Chinese and force a nuclear response by moving beyond the freeze line of October 13th? How would world politics have evolved under a singular Containment policy of the US/NATO vs the Comintern as opposed to the carrot and stick approach of Containment or Engagement?

OOC: The DMZ is the top 70 km or so of what would be North Korea from the Chinese Border.
 
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It was indeed fortunate for MacArthur that thae intelligence report he got a week before the Chinese attacked, believed it and ordered the UN armiestotake up defensive positions fromwhich they eviscerated theattacking Chinese human waves. It was the great UN victory in the Battle of the Yalu,on top of his great successes in the Pacific and the brilliant amphibious landing of Inchon that enabled MacArthur to win the Presidency from Truman in 1963 despite a strong challenge from Eisenhower,

Tsouras'Korea: AnAlternative history has theChinese surprising MacArthur,driving him back beyond the38th Parrallel. The part about MacArthur wanting to use the bomb and being fired to avoid a nuclear World War 3 and being fired for this by Truman does seem hard to believe. Tsouas isprobably correct in his view that a more succesful Chinese offensive would have been halted and reversed eventually but would result in a stalemate somewhere in the middle of Korea. In this case Korea,rather than being thewealthy democracy iti s today would instead have been a divided nation with a militarily tense borderThe Northin particular wouldhavesuffered with theCommunist government putting most funding into the military and security forces ensuring the survival of the regime and its' supporters. Incredibly Tsouras has KimilSung founding a communistdynasty in which his son and grandson become presidentafter him. A littlehard to believe as no other Communistregimedidanythinglike this and that Ithink spoils an otherwise good and thought provoking book.
 
I imagine that a separate Korea in the North wouldn't be all that successful, but I could see the Chinese supporting it, begrudgingly, I mean there's nothing the Chinese military would like more than for the USA to be much further away. I wonder how things between Japan and the peninsula would be changed.
 
It was indeed fortunate for MacArthur that thae intelligence report he got a week before the Chinese attacked, believed it and ordered the UN armiestotake up defensive positions fromwhich they eviscerated theattacking Chinese human waves. It was the great UN victory in the Battle of the Yalu,on top of his great successes in the Pacific and the brilliant amphibious landing of Inchon that enabled MacArthur to win the Presidency from Truman in 1963 despite a strong challenge from Eisenhower,

Tsouras'Korea: AnAlternative history has theChinese surprising MacArthur,driving him back beyond the38th Parrallel. The part about MacArthur wanting to use the bomb and being fired to avoid a nuclear World War 3 and being fired for this by Truman does seem hard to believe. Tsouas isprobably correct in his view that a more succesful Chinese offensive would have been halted and reversed eventually but would result in a stalemate somewhere in the middle of Korea. In this case Korea,rather than being thewealthy democracy iti s today would instead have been a divided nation with a militarily tense borderThe Northin particular wouldhavesuffered with theCommunist government putting most funding into the military and security forces ensuring the survival of the regime and its' supporters. Incredibly Tsouras has KimilSung founding a communistdynasty in which his son and grandson become presidentafter him. A littlehard to believe as no other Communistregimedidanythinglike this and that Ithink spoils an otherwise good and thought provoking book.

OOC: MacArthur did not fight Chinese forces in this DBWI, the Chinese halted when they were found out, the UN did the math about their troops facing 5:1 odds and threatened to use nukes tactically. MacArthur wanted very much to expand the war into China both OTL and TTL and so he made some very poor choices, he would not have been elected dog catcher anywhere after he was canned by Truman.

I'm afraid this post can't be canon. Sorry.

Luath said:
I imagine that a separate Korea in the North wouldn't be all that successful, but I could see the Chinese supporting it, begrudgingly, I mean there's nothing the Chinese military would like more than for the USA to be much further away. I wonder how things between Japan and the peninsula would be changed.

IC: I know I'm gonna take some flak for this, but IMO it's a good thing Liu finally pulled the plug on the rump state that Kim Il Sung tried to hold onto after the Treaty of Seoul. And as much as the Chinese officially don't like the US presence so close to their border, it's amazing just how much they've milked that presence when the Chinese and Soviets finally came to blows in the Ussuri River War of 1963-1964. I shudder to think just how badly that could have gone if the Soviets had felt they could've gotten away with using nukes.

Alex1guy said:
McArthur wanted to nuke the Chinese?

God Chinese intervention could have triggered WWIII! :O

There was a scarily large contingent in the US/UN military at the time that thought nukes were acceptable for use in certain situations other than armageddon. Using nukes in 1950, however, would not have triggered WW3 since the only other power that had nukes were the Soviets and they only had a very few compared to the US's hundreds. But if MacArthur had dragged us into a nuclear conflict in 1950 the mere precedent of using them would have been pretty disastrous in the wars that would follow like the above Ussuri River conflict, the Indo-Pakistani Kashmir wars, the Israeli Arab wars, the Rhodesian / African Coalition War or especially the Warsaw Pact liberalization tensions from the mid 70's onward.
 
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I think UNFK would've gotten the better of the PLA. People forget that the 2nd ARU already had eyes most of the bridges across the Yalu before MacArthur got put back on his leash. I'm sure air and artillery strikes would've knocked 'em down. Which would've presented a sizable logistical challenge to the Chinese troops unlucky enough to be on the southern side of the border when the balloon went up.
 
I think UNFK would've gotten the better of the PLA. People forget that the 2nd ARU already had eyes most of the bridges across the Yalu before MacArthur got put back on his leash. I'm sure air and artillery strikes would've knocked 'em down. Which would've presented a sizable logistical challenge to the Chinese troops unlucky enough to be on the southern side of the border when the balloon went up.

But the Yalu freezes during winter, and the main point was that the volunteer corps weren't a conventional army; they bombed them non-stop in OTL but at at the end of the day camouflage, bridges just underwater , good repair teams and that the PLA simply didn't need much supplies kept them going . Also destroying them was provocation for escalation, they would give the PRC actual reason for escalation ;you can only advocate bombing them in hindsight.
 
That one book by... ah, what his name, Barry O-something - you know, the history guy from Harvard - said something about Mao's planning to initiate some crackpot industrialization scheme that would have starved 10 million peasant to death. Needless to say, Liu [1] did a much better job at improving China's infrastructure and international image. Oh, slightly off-topic here, Zhou's gradual democratization is genius. As a British colonial [2], I applaud his effort to create a better society for all Chinese citizens.

[1] OOC: AFAIK Deng was nowhere near the seat of power in the early '50s. The immediate probable successors of Mao, IMVHO, would boil down to Lin Biao or Liu Shaoqi.
[2] Butterflies gave Hong Kongers a plebiscite to decide on their future in 1981. By a margin of 51-49, British maintained colonial rule over the Fragrant Harbor, though by 2012 it is pretty much de facto independent. :p:D

Marc A
 

SpencerH

Banned
I cannot imagine the amount of destruction that would have come had the Chinese intervened. Such a bad thought.
 
That one book by... ah, what his name, Barry O-something - you know, the history guy from Harvard - said something about Mao's planning to initiate some crackpot industrialization scheme that would have starved 10 million peasant to death. Needless to say, Liu [1] did a much better job at improving China's infrastructure and international image. Oh, slightly off-topic here, Zhou's gradual democratization is genius. As a British colonial [2], I applaud his effort to create a better society for all Chinese citizens.

[1] OOC: AFAIK Deng was nowhere near the seat of power in the early '50s. The immediate probable successors of Mao, IMVHO, would boil down to Lin Biao or Liu Shaoqi.
[2] Butterflies gave Hong Kongers a plebiscite to decide on their future in 1981. By a margin of 51-49, British maintained colonial rule over the Fragrant Harbor, though by 2012 it is pretty much de facto independent. :p:D

Marc A

*OOC: I'm not knowledgeable of Mao's successors as of 1950 which is why i defaulted to OTL, I've changed the scenario to Liu Shaoqi, thanks for the info.

IC: Well... improving China's image from the USA's perspective, at least. ;) I remember reading how he and Beria came to actual physical blows at the supposed 1960 'Harmony Summit' (or whatever they called it) that ended up being the harbinger for the Ussuri River War, where the Soviets got the nasty shock that their advanced T-55 and T-60 tanks and MIG-22 jet fighters could be buried under the weight of all the WW2 and other obsolete surplus equipment we'd been selling to China ever since then VP Nixon's mission to China in 1954.
 
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