User:WeldNeck/sandbox

Dale Kuelh's narrative of events at No Gun Ri:

Just after midnight on 26 July, the Division G3 calls all regimental S3s to the division command post at Hwanggan to discuss adjustments to the withdrawal plan addressed in Division Order 10.2-50. They discuss the final details of command and control and supporting the withdrawal with artillery and close air support. The 8th Cavalry Regiment will control air during the withdrawal since they are the only regiment with a TACP and the location of their command post gives them an excellent vantage point to coordinate artillery and air with the withdrawal of units from the front.

After the meeting breaks up, Major Witherspoon calls back to the 7th CAV command post alerting the regiment for movement, and starting the chain of events that leads to panic within the 2nd Battalion. The 7th CAV falls back leaving the 5th and 8th CAV to deal with an enemy probe against the front them in the vicinity of No Gun Ri. The regimental command post is likely in disarray with little capability to gain control of the situation without leaders like Witherspoon and Chandler getting on the ground to sort it out. Meanwhile the 8th CAV command post prepares for the withdrawal of its 2nd Battalion and the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 5th CAV. The disorganization of the 7th CAV’s CP and the displacement of the 5th CAV made 8th CAV’s position all the more important. It provided the only operational command post of the three regiments during the withdrawal from the positions east of Yongdong. To assist in establishing the defense of Hwanggan, 1-8 CAV occupies defensive positions about 1500 yards up the road to the east of No Gun Ri. As the Korean refugees head towards No Gun Ri, troops stop them along the road and moved them towards the railroad. These soldiers, probably from 2-5 or 2-8 CAV withdrawing in the late morning and early afternoon of 26 July, move the Koreans off the road to allow vehicles to move to the rear.29 After the refugees reach the railroad other soldiers stop them and search their belongings, a common practice by American soldiers trying to ensure guerrillas do not infiltrate through friendly lines. Koreans rest on the railroad embankment while the soldiers check their belongings and an officer or NCO, using an SC-300 radio, requests instructions on what to do with the refugees. The officer received orders to keep the civilians there; they were not to pass through friendly lines. These instructions are consistent with the new refugee policy just then promulgated.

After all of the withdrawing vehicles pass through the roadblock, these soldiers return to their units. About this time, the 8th CAV calls in an air strike previously planned to support the withdrawal from the forward positions. Before the air attack, the regiment calls for white phosphorous rounds from the division artillery to mark the target for the aircraft. Tragically, the artillery lands short among the refugees on the railroad embankment. The F-80s, flying too fast to accurately determine the target, identifies the smoke and engage the civilians.

This scenario makes more sense than the belief by many Koreans that soldiers on the ground near the railroad ordered the air attack. The 7th CAV definitely could not have gotten close air support in such a rapid manner. The regiment did not have a TACP at the time, was still trying to sort itself out from the confusion of the night before, and was completely untrained in the use of close air support. The air force required the use of a TACP to guide aircraft for any use of air in the proximity of troops. The only unit within the division with a TACP at the time was the 8th CAV. 30 Close air support requests at this point in the war took an inordinate amount of time. A memo released by the division artillery on 28 July told units to expect planned air support missions to take at least four hours, unplanned missions would likely take much longer. However, it makes sense that the division would have used aircraft to support troops withdrawing from enemy contact. The division likely had a pre-planned mission that went awry when the marking rounds fell short. The proximity of the air attack to friendly troops also indicates that they did not hit the intended target.31

Next, someone in the positions on the hills decides to fire mortars on the refugees believing the battalion was under attack. It is also possible that someone was trying to use mortar fire to keep the refugees from coming through the lines and to get them to move away from the American positions. If so, this had to be one of the stupidest ways to get refugees to move in a specific direction and extremely negligent. Mortars, as an area weapon, are quite unpredictable as to the point of impact. To use this type of weapon to move refugees in the direction one wants them to go is absurd. The clearance for firing mortars at the refugees on the railroad would have come from an officer. Commanders had to give approval for the firing of mortars within their area of operations. This clearance of fires could have come from one of any number of officers, but most likely either the battalion commander, one of the company commanders, or the battalion executive officer. If the intent of firing mortars was to have the refugees move away from the battalion, it actually had the reverse effect. Refugees, seeking cover from the air attack and mortar fire flee towards the railway trestle, which many of them knew lay a short distance ahead. Soldiers on the hill, perhaps initially masked from the events unfolding down the railroad see the refugees wearing white clothes running towards them, seeking cover and hiding to avoid getting hit. Machine gunners open up believing that either they were under attack, or that the refugees were a legitimate target, despite being civilians. Other soldiers closer to the refugees see what is happening and try to push the refugees towards the trestle to keep them under cover. After a short period, leaders restore order on the line and soldiers move forward towards the trestle. While a guerrilla, either South Korean or from the NKPA, could have been among the refugees, the possibility seems remote. Soldiers had checked the belongings for the refugees when they stopped them at the roadblock. Also, a guerrilla would do everything in his power to avoid contact with the main defending forces. The guerrillas’ main goal was to either infiltrate to get to a rear area or to determine the strength and disposition of American forces. If pinned down a guerrilla would have been more inclined to get rid of his weapon and withdraw than to open up on American forces defending in strength. The motivation for soldiers to shoot into the refugees would have been as varied as the number of soldiers in the area. Once the firing started, other soldiers quickly join in. Scared, untrained, lacking cohesion, missing leaders, and disorganized from the debacle the night before, soldiers panic and the line opens up as it often does with green troops in combat. Some soldiers recognize that the refugees are not a threat and do not fire. While some soldiers fire their weapons, others wanted to herd the refugees under the bridge and fire over their heads with warning shots to get them to and keep them under the trestle. Some soldiers panic thinking they are under attack. Some probably believe that they are under orders to shoot civilians and did so. Finally, some soldiers, such as machine gunner Norman Tinkler, do it because he was scared and did not trust Korean civilians.

After officers and NCOs restore order on the line, some soldiers go forward to check on the refugees. Medics treat some of the wounded, which the regiment then evacuates. Conversations in English and Japanese between Koreans and Americans lead the Koreans to believe the Americans said they were under orders to shoot them. More likely the Americans were trying to tell them to stay under the trestle, that they were under orders not to let them pass. Thus, miscommunication due to barriers in language and culture lead to the Korean belief that the Americans are intent on killing them. Other Americans continue to herd Koreans into the tunnel, which begins to fill up. Americans are dealing with the dilemma of what to do with the civilians without letting them pass. As a result they decide to herd them under the trestle which seems to provide some degree of protection. The soldiers who came down eventually return to their positions, leaving the refugees in the trestle. As night falls some refugees try to venture out of the tunnels while Americans in the hills shoot near them to keep them under the bridge. That night 1-7 CAV takes control of the positions opposite the bridge from 2-7 CAV. The soldiers of 2-7 move further to the north, for the most part out of the range of the bridge, except for machine gun fire. Through the night NKPA soldiers, some located in the vicinity of the bridge, fire on the American positions. (The North Koreans often used small arms fire while conducting reconnaissance on American positions.) The soldiers from 1-7 CAV, not aware of the situation from earlier in the day open up on the bridge and the surrounding area. Through the course of the next few days North Korean probes and American defensive positions keep the civilians trapped inside a deadly engagement area. The North Korean’s intend their probes to keep the Americans focused on the road to their front, while other forces infiltrate to the flanks and rear of the American defense. The North Koreans also launch several attacks on the 1st Battalion. Their attack on 28 July threatens both the left and right flanks of the 1st Battalion. Of note, the right flank is in the vicinity of the bridge. (Any attack that pressured the battalion’s right flank would have gone right across the bridge.) While the North Korean attacks do not threaten to dislodge the Americans from their positions, they would have made the area to the immediate front extremely dangerous as the center of an engagement area with both the NKPA and US soldiers trading small arms, mortar and artillery fire. The attacks by the NKPA and the American’s defense of the position are consistent with Korean accounts of shooting and explosions continuing on the bridge for the next several days. Finally, 7th CAV's withdrawal on the morning of 29 July puts an end to the ordeal of the Koreans underneath the bridge.