Limited Offensive

While peace talks were but a sporadic, long-distance mumble, the guns spoke sharply again. Allied artillery began pounding the enemy lines along a 40-mile front west of Kumhwa, through Chorwon, Yonchon, Korangpo, to within a few miles of Kaesong. At the same time, allied naval units bombarded east and west coasts of North Korea, and carrier-based aircraft and bombers from bases in Japan and Okinawa began tearing up enemy supply lines. Next day allied troops attacked all along the line. By nightfall 100,000 men of nine allied nations were in combat.

Squeeze Play. The weight and suddenness of the offensive at least momentarily stunned the Communists. At the southwest end of the active front, the British Commonwealth Division, going into action as a combined unit for the first time, flanked by the U.S. 1st Cavalry Division and the Greek battalion, took up the Red recoil, achieved its objectives on the second day. The U.S. 3rd Division breached the Red line northwest of Chorwon. Fierce fighting developed at the northeast end, along the long line of rugged peaks of Heartbreak Ridge.

The ridge was attacked from widely separated points by units of the U.S. 2nd Division. It was a squeeze play. As the Communists divided their forces to meet the attacks, other U.S. and French units drove through to take, for the third time, the dominating peaks. From the top of Heartbreak Ridge, the allies could look down over the wide Mundung Valley, in the direction of the so-called Iron Triangle from which the Communists have mounted many attacks. Realizing that the allies were now in position to streak down the valley toward Pyonggang, the Communists sent their fiercest counterattacks into this sector, but at week's end they had not dislodged the U.N. soldiers.

Winter Readiness. Captured enemy redoubts were found to have been dug deep, with walls, in some places, 4 to 8 ft. thick. Large supplies of winter clothing were stashed underground, indicating that the Reds had planned a winter-long stopover. In addition to jerking the enemy out of his prepared winter positions, the offensive had helped strengthen the allied winter line by pushing the enemy back out of reach of the railroad which runs down from Kumhwa through Chorwon and Yonchon to Seoul. What had seemed at first to be an all-out offensive had turned out to be a limited tactical offensive. "Splendid," said tough-talking General Van Fleet. "We have broken up their potential so they cannot surprise us."

The U.N. command still hopes, by its slogging, to hurry the Reds to the peace table.

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