DBWI UN forces don't stop the chinese

During the Korean war the chinese launched a surprise attack with large numbers of people. Fortunantly UN forces got lucky, the weather was clear and an all out areal bombardment on chinese positions, luck and Bravery, and some chinese misteps allowed the UN forces to hold the line.

The rest of the war would be spent defending Korea from their position on the southern side of the yalu while the chinese attempted to use human wave attacks upon fortified UN positions. But what if this bout of good luck and skill didn't happen what if the chinese pushed back the UN forces what would the world look like today?
 
During the Korean war the chinese launched a surprise attack with large numbers of people. Fortunantly UN forces got lucky, the weather was clear and an all out areal bombardment on chinese positions, luck and Bravery, and some chinese misteps allowed the UN forces to hold the line.

The rest of the war would be spent defending Korea from their position on the southern side of the yalu while the chinese attempted to use human wave attacks upon fortified UN positions. But what if this bout of good luck and skill didn't happen what if the chinese pushed back the UN forces what would the world look like today?

Human wave tactics were already something the West had learned to deal with... half a century before. If air power hadent worked, I think the most likely responce would have been a fighting retreat while rear line forced worked overtime to dig a WWI style trench complex. That's more then enough to turn the red wave from a figurative to a literal one, if you catch my meaning.
 
If the Chinese breached the UN Ring of Steel, then they'd likely have painted all Korea red.

Now, granted, the Republic of Korea had a damn shaky record (dictatorship, etc.), but the country united has seen radical economic growth and democratisation since the 1980s - it's outstripped even Japan, and it's a major source of consumer electronics. If the Communists had taken over...none of that.

Or it could have stayed divided. In which case it'd probably still have US forces based in it. The ROK government's a US ally and lets them use their airbases, but they haven't had ground forces there since the 1960s...

Mind you...a defeat in Korea would likely have spared us Dugout Doug as President...
 
To be fair to Macarther he worked hard to get the civil rights act of 64 through which fixed a whole lot of problems.

That said what people hate him for was vietnam, and the fact that his so called compromise with people who were against the law was to insitute a cowards clause.

(For non american posters it really was called that....sigh)

The cowards claus allowed people to avoid the draft by giving up their right to vote, their right to hold office, being banned from having any government job Federal, State, county and local. Being forbidden from being allowed to get welfare of any kind, and oh yes your also not allowed to have any teaching positions. Then he made the draft more broad to allow women to serve in support positions which also angered people.


But when you remove vietnam, the cowards clause (Which is still being used to this day), fervent and paranoid anti communism, and his lousy handling of the economy he was actually a semi decent president who did a lot to help forward the civil rights movement.
 
Human wave tactics were already something the West had learned to deal with... half a century before. If air power hadent worked, I think the most likely responce would have been a fighting retreat while rear line forced worked overtime to dig a WWI style trench complex. That's more then enough to turn the red wave from a figurative to a literal one, if you catch my meaning.
Oh, for fuck’s sake, not this again. The Chinese were not using human wave tactics! They were using quite sophisticated light infantry infiltration tactics, and quite skillfully, too. Human wave attacks don’t have troops hiding under cover or supporting their attacks with mortars.

Anyway, count me in as one of the people who think it’ll be a divided Korea. Even if the Chinese break through, I doubt their supply lines could stretch far enough to overrun the entire peninsula.

To be fair to Macarther he worked hard to get the civil rights act of 64 through which fixed a whole lot of problems.

That said what people hate him for was vietnam, and the fact that his so called compromise with people who were against the law was to insitute a cowards clause.

(For non american posters it really was called that....sigh)

The cowards claus allowed people to avoid the draft by giving up their right to vote, their right to hold office, being banned from having any government job Federal, State, county and local. Being forbidden from being allowed to get welfare of any kind, and oh yes your also not allowed to have any teaching positions. Then he made the draft more broad to allow women to serve in support positions which also angered people.


But when you remove vietnam, the cowards clause (Which is still being used to this day), fervent and paranoid anti communism, and his lousy handling of the economy he was actually a semi decent president who did a lot to help forward the civil rights movement.
This is like saying that when you remove the massive death tolls, massive corruption, inefficient bureaucracy, and general shortages, Communism isn’t a bad system. I don’t care about MacArthur’s civil rights record. That’s good and all, but he got us into a mess of a war that killed over 50,000 American troops and millions of Vietnamese for no real purpose. He sent the economy into a tailspin it only just recovered from in time for the oil shock to hit. His anti-communist paranoia... yeah, there’s a reason far too many American universities don’t accept federal scholarships or grant money.

And don’t even get me started on the Coward’s Clause! That’s a disaster we still haven’t recovered from, and I’m still astounded it required Nixon browbeating Congress into repealing it rather than get struck down by the Supreme Court. The only good thing it did was allow women to serve in non-combat positions.

And this is why Richard Nixon is the best president since WWII. He inherited MacArthur’s mess and did a damn good job cleaning it up, this on top of his detente with China and a great many other accomplishments. The only thing that defeated him was stagflation, but nobody knew how to handle that.
 
Then he made the draft more broad to allow women to serve in support positions which also angered people.

The only good thing it did was allow women to serve in non-combat positions.

True. Which paved the way for them entering combat positions later on.

Especially since many of the 'non-combat positions' - especially MPs and also Engineering and Logistics - ended up becoming combat positions very quickly in certain engagements when the enemy moved the lines around. In the latter days of Vietnam, more than a few women who were supposed to be rear-echelon ended up trading fire with the enemy. And giving as good at they got - hell, Dana Munro ended up with a posthumous Bronze Star.
 
Oh, for fuck’s sake, not this again. The Chinese were not using human wave tactics! They were using quite sophisticated light infantry infiltration tactics, and quite skillfully, too. Human wave attacks don’t have troops hiding under cover or supporting their attacks with mortars.

Anyway, count me in as one of the people who think it’ll be a divided Korea. Even if the Chinese break through, I doubt their supply lines could stretch far enough to overrun the entire peninsula.


OOC: See below from the OP...

During the Korean war the chinese launched a surprise attack with large numbers of people. Fortunantly UN forces got lucky, the weather was clear and an all out areal bombardment on chinese positions, luck and Bravery, and some chinese misteps allowed the UN forces to hold the line.

The rest of the war would be spent defending Korea from their position on the southern side of the yalu while the chinese attempted to use human wave attacks upon fortified UN positions. But what if this bout of good luck and skill didn't happen what if the chinese pushed back the UN forces what would the world look like today?


"Sophisticated"; you mean those glorified stuffed tin cans shot out of piping and ducking into shellholes? How on earth is that anything more than the most basic of improvized and primative tactics?
 
OOC: See below from the OP...




"Sophisticated"; you mean those glorified stuffed tin cans shot out of piping and ducking into shellholes? How on earth is that anything more than the most basic of improvized and primative tactics?
Sorry, reflex. You would not believe how many people think it was all human wave attacks.

What I should have said was this: the Chinese didn't open with human wave attacks. They opened with the sophisticated light infantry tactics I mentioned my last post, and were doing a good job pushing the UN forces back - and then the bridges got bombed, the east wing of the UN advanced slammed into their flank, and bye-bye their offensive.

After that, they couldn't use those tactics because a. getting the initial assault rolled up lost them a large chunk of their veteran trained infantry, b. the defensive positions along the Yalu precluded use of these infiltration tactics, and c. the Chinese basically spent the rest of the war just trying to get across the damned river, which reduced the amount of even infantry equipment they could bring with them. They did go back to those earlier tactics when they got a bridgehead, but they never went anywhere.

The point being, without having to butt heads with a fortified-out-the-wazoo Yalu defense line, I would assume the Chinese could keep using their initial tactics and not have to resort to human wave attacks.
 
Sorry, reflex. You would not believe how many people think it was all human wave attacks.

What I should have said was this: the Chinese didn't open with human wave attacks. They opened with the sophisticated light infantry tactics I mentioned my last post, and were doing a good job pushing the UN forces back - and then the bridges got bombed, the east wing of the UN advanced slammed into their flank, and bye-bye their offensive.

After that, they couldn't use those tactics because a. getting the initial assault rolled up lost them a large chunk of their veteran trained infantry, b. the defensive positions along the Yalu precluded use of these infiltration tactics, and c. the Chinese basically spent the rest of the war just trying to get across the damned river, which reduced the amount of even infantry equipment they could bring with them. They did go back to those earlier tactics when they got a bridgehead, but they never went anywhere.

The point being, without having to butt heads with a fortified-out-the-wazoo Yalu defense line, I would assume the Chinese could keep using their initial tactics and not have to resort to human wave attacks.

Eh, I have a tendency to disagree, due to the fact that I think The United Nations forces would still have set up a strong line eventually, against which infiltration tactics and light mortars would have been next to useless, and that such co-ordinated actions required a solid NCO corp and well-trained troops which the Red Chinese, having only recently emerged from their civil war in which they'd primarily used guerrilla rather than mass battle tactics, diden't have a deep pool of. Once you start to run short on those proffesionals, their conscript "People's Army" would have been unable to pull off those kind of advanced offensive tactics.

Now, if they hold out long enough or get the UN to make a mistake, you could see the Soviets get involved. In THAT case you end up with an entirely different kettle of fish, combining China's pool of manpower with Soviet training capacity and military-industrial output. Set up a few boot camps in Siberia with specialist cadres to give the Chinese troops crash courses in WW II style mass combat, feed them some military surplus tanks...
 
Before the Chinese crossed the Yalu MacArthur was advocating use of dirty nuclear bombs to poison the land & prevent resupply. I don't see Truman not giving that authority if The Chinese get anywhere near the 38th parallel.
 
Eh, I have a tendency to disagree, due to the fact that I think The United Nations forces would still have set up a strong line eventually, against which infiltration tactics and light mortars would have been next to useless, and that such co-ordinated actions required a solid NCO corp and well-trained troops which the Red Chinese, having only recently emerged from their civil war in which they'd primarily used guerrilla rather than mass battle tactics, diden't have a deep pool of. Once you start to run short on those proffesionals, their conscript "People's Army" would have been unable to pull off those kind of advanced offensive tactics.

Now, if they hold out long enough or get the UN to make a mistake, you could see the Soviets get involved. In THAT case you end up with an entirely different kettle of fish, combining China's pool of manpower with Soviet training capacity and military-industrial output. Set up a few boot camps in Siberia with specialist cadres to give the Chinese troops crash courses in WW II style mass combat, feed them some military surplus tanks...
I did say that the Chinese would run out of steam well before overrunning the entire peninsula...;)
 
I did say that the Chinese would run out of steam well before overrunning the entire peninsula...;)

That you did. I'm just pointing out that they don't exactly have a good head of steam to begin with, and it would lead out fast the second they hit organized defense. Light artillery is well and good against exposed, recently advanced infantry; not so much against prepared field fortifications. The famous "Pyongyang Pocket" demonstrated that much
 
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