He was loath to agree, unless he had to.
The limited attacks of the Eighth Army during August, September, and October 1951 had unquestionably improved its military stance, and had unquestionably inflicted deep wounds on the enemy forces.
But as Boatner said, 'Everybody was sick to death of the casualties.'
Men die to make others free, or to protect their homeland. They do not willingly die for a piece of real estate ten thousand miles from home, which they know their government will eventually surrender. Nor do the generals appointed over them, nor the governments they elect, willingly spend them so.
As the thousands of notification telegrams to next of kin went out, so soon after the high hopes raised by the negotiations, Washington grew more and more concerned. The public had accepted the end of the war, but continued casualties were rapidly becoming unacceptable.
In Tokyo, General Ridgway was so informed.
And Matt Ridgway had to put his foot firmly on Lieutenant General James Van Fleet's neck.
Now field commanders writhed under a new restriction:
The United Nations Command had learned a great deal from Heartbreak and Bloody ridges. They had learned that, with the new enemy fortifications and the newer, greener troops in the Eighth Army, effective pressure on the enemy could be achieved only at a cost in blood unacceptable to Washington.
On 17 November 1951, the U.N. Command agreed to accept the Communist position on the cease-fire line, provided the armistice was signed within thirty days. The Communists eagerly assented.
They had a thirty-day reprieve. They utilized it by reinforcing their defensive lines in depth until they were almost impervious to attack. With a flank firmly anchored on each side by the sea, in broken ground, it would now require an effort equivalent to that of the Somme, or Verdun, to dislodge them, short of use of nuclear weapons.
Three hundred thousand French and British troops fell trying to breach the German fortifications at the Somme in 1916. No Western power had the heart for such useless slaughter, ever again.
On 27 November the cease-fire line, the present line of contact, was formally ratified by each side. Initialed maps were exchanged.
The Communists had a great part of what they had wanted from the first hour they had requested peace talks. They had dissipated the danger of a U.N. march to the Yalu, or a disastrous defeat in the field.
From this time forward, smarting under the losses they had taken in the abortive attacks of later summer, having agreed to a firm line, and despairing of breaching the enemy lines anyway, the U.N. took no more large-scale offensive action.
At the end of thirty days the enemy was no nearer signing the armistice than he had been in July. He now felt free to delay as long as he pleased, and it was soon apparent he intended to do so, reaping whatever propaganda coups he could.
In Korea the U.N. had granted a sort of cease-fire, but there was no peace.
It was now, not openly, but in mess tents and private gatherings along the brooding lines of entrenchments, that some men began to say, 'MacArthur was right.'
Captain Arthur B. Busbey, Jr., a slightly built, dark-hazel-eyed advertising executive with thinning black hair and faint East Texas accent, was recalled to the Army in September 1950, at the age of twenty-eight. He had served from 1941 through 1946, before becoming a partner in an agency in Wichita Falls, and now, with his orders, Busbey decided the hell with it.
He decided to try to stay in the service. He would be one of the more fortunate ones who took this course, since eventually he would be integrated into the Regular Army.
He had always done Public Information Officer work in the Army, but had never particularly cared for it. When in March 1951 he received orders for Korea, he resisted all attempts of his commanders to keep him in this slot, insisting he be given a rifle company.
Because Busbey had never had combat in World War II, like many such men, he had a faint feeling of guilt. In Korea, he was one of the few who asked for line duty.
He joined the 7th Infantry Division in June, in the east-central sector north of the Hwach'on Reservoir, near Kurnwha. He took command of Baker Company, 32nd Infantry, just as the 7th Division was finishing Matt Ridgway's Operation Killer against the Chinese.
And, like all newcomers, at first the hills bushed him. A man who has never climbed the thousand-foot slopes of the Taebaek Range cannot appreciate their steepness, or the difficulties they caused an army used to mechanization.
Almost as soon as he arrived, there was rumor of peace talks. He spent July dug in, in a combat situation, while the Eighth Army marked time.
Then, in August, Baker of the 32nd became involved in the line-straightening designed by the Eighth Army in the Punchbowl area.
On 27 August, Lieutenant Colonel Woods, 1st Battalion C.O., briefed the officers for the operation: it was conceived as a battalion attack against light resistance, to erase a bulge.
'A Company will jump off, take this first hill—then B Company will take the ridge line on its east, up to this high point on that larger ridge. After these are secured, A and B will furnish fire support for C, which attacks to seize the final ridge beyond.'
On its face, it was simple infantry operation. The 32nd Infantry had been doing things like it all spring, with great success.
But Busbey, looking at the map, pointed to a huge hill mass just beyond his own objective: 'Who will take care of that monster?'
Woods said, 'Division's worried about that, too.'
But intelligence estimates stated that few enemy were in the area and that the battalion would meet only weak resistance. Intelligence was not aware that these hills were held by five enemy battalions and that the easy days were almost over.
Early in the misty morning, the attacks jumped off. A Company took its objective within the hour, and Busbey's crowd shoved off. For the first three hundred yards, moving along steep slopes, they encountered nothing, and they advanced in a column formation of platoons.
They arrived at a very steep rise at the base of their objective. And halfway up, Lieutenant Petsche's leading platoon drew fire.
It drew fire such as the battalion had not seen in Korea. The whole ridge was covered with artillery fire, an experience new to 32nd Infantry.
Dirt from a near miss by a Russian-made 76mm covered Busbey, as he dived into a hole.
Petsche's platoon was stopped cold. Approximately half its men went down The platoon leader's ankle was broken, and his messenger killed standing beside him.
Busbey, just behind, ordered the company to advance. But he quickly realized he was stretched out along a long ridge, attacking into a 'T'—the worst position possible for a rifle company. He could put little fire down on the enemy, while they could enfilade him from each side.
He requested C Company be committed to assist him. Battalion wouldn't buy that, and finally told him to hold where he was, and to consolidate for the coming night. 'Hold every inch you've got!'
B Company was in a lousy position to form a perimeter, strung out along the sides of a steep rise. But Busbey dug in, deciding if he were hit hard he would have to pull back.
Across the small valley from him, A Company dug in, also. So far, Able had had no troubles.
Under shelling, Busbey held until nightfall.
At 2300 the men of Baker Company heard firing and saw flares ascending from Able's ridge. Fire seemed to rush at Able's perimeter from three sides. Soon things in Able were a mess. The C.O. was killed, the perimeter broken. Then the firing died away, while Busbey's men waited tensely.
At exactly 0200 it was his turn. The enemy rolled out of the night at him from three sides. He called his outer platoon to come in, and for the artillery to fire flares over him for the rest of the night.
As the big artillery flares, throwing whitish light, popped over him, giving his men light to shoot by, someone
