by Unknown
After fifteen minutes of bombardment, the shells began landing deeper into enemy-held territory. That was the signal for the armor to advance. The tanks emerged from behind the buildings and moved directly into the Korean lines. The second elements were the Bradleys moving through the cross streets and mopping up what resistance there was. The First Cav was in its element, and they were moving through the area like a comb through thin hair. Infantry units followed the others and spread out to find what was left.
Aboard the Iowa, Hammond watched the satellite screen as well as the infrared images from the RPV. When clusters of men or equipment were found, the guns were retargeted to clear it out. Within an hour the enemy had been pushed back five miles.
The same story was happening in Ulsan on the east coast and Gunsan on the west. The battleships had rushed in once the car carriers had landed and poured their fire into pre-marked positions that had been provided by SEAL teams.
In Ulsan, the army compound in the city was wiped out along with all their transportation. The First Marine Division was on the road and moving rapidly out of the big gun’s range. Additional cruise ships had landed the final troops and they were deploying like a large fan from Ulsan across the peninsula.
At Gunsan the North Korean garrison surrendered on the pier. The British commander quickly took advantage of the unopposed invasion and set off in his tanks, followed by the tanks and men of the Big Red One. The First Infantry Division had taken part in every major action since the First World War. Everyone from the top general to the lowest cook was on point and ready to roll. When the call went out, the men poured off the ships, ready for anything. Most were a little disappointed to find no opposition.
The ships were quickly unloaded and the troops pulled out heading east. With no organized opposition, the Massachusetts and the New Jersey held fire until called for. It didn’t take long. The main stockpile of tanks and fuel was found seven miles inland. The ships began firing into the compound as the troops came within three miles. By the time the first tanks arrived the entire compound was burning. To help out, the New Jersey began targeting communication lines the SEAL teams had pinpointed. Major roads were left open unless the RPV found a convoy, then it too was dispatched. Soon more transports arrived to set up the port and land the last of the troops. The Massachusetts broke off and began making her way up the coast looking for targets of opportunity. Her RPV was invaluable for spotting enemy troops, tanks, and other equipment.
In Pusan the troops began receiving heavy fire from North Korean artillery a little over 20 miles from the coast. Ground troops began calling out for gunfire support as the artillery began drawing blood. Unfortunately the American artillery was positioned in another area. Hammond saw the situation but the artillery was outside the range of the guns from where they were outside the harbor. “Get me the Navigator,” he said into the bitch box in Strike.
“Navigator here, Captain.”
“Gator can you get this ship in the harbor?”
There was only a slight pause. “Captain the harbor is deep all the way to the piers, but the entrance could be a little tricky. I’d prefer to have a pilot,” he said.
“So would I, but our guys are taking a pounding from a place just outside our range. If I can get in the harbor, we might just be able to hit it. Do you think you can get me in there?”
On the bridge, all eyes were on the Navigator as he looked at the chart. He made a measurement. Jones looked at the chart and scratched his head. “Captain, let’s go. I can get you in, but you’ll only have about 1,000 yards to play with.”
Hammond looked over at Admiral Thacke sitting next to him. “I can take care of business,” he said.
Thacke nodded. “Detach and proceed as desired. Kick some ass, Roger.”
Hammond pressed the button on the bitch box. “Give the course to the OOD. On the way in have sigs flash the harbor and get us some tugs to meet us. Then get the First Lieutenant and have his people ready to anchor. Got that?”
“Done, Captain,” said the Navigator. He turned to the bridge watch and the XO. “Friends, our captain has more balls than I have. You heard him.” He turned and alerted the navigation team. This was going to be hairy.
The XO took the deck and the conn, altering course and pointing the bow toward the harbor. Speed was increased to fifteen knots to expedite the maneuver. In ten minutes the ship slowed and rounded the concrete breakwater at the harbor entrance. Two large tugs met the ship and a pilot scrambled aboard. He ran to the bridge.
“You need pilot to go in harbor!” he almost shouted.
The XO glared at the man in the dark. “Sir, are you going to yell or help us in. I still have to get past one more breakwater before I get where I need to go and it’s just 4,000 yards ahead.”
“Where you going?”
“Right in the middle of the inner harbor. I intend to anchor here and I need to have your tugs keep us pointed in this direction,” he said pointing at the chart.
“Why there?” the pilot asked. Obviously he didn’t understand there was a war on.
“To get in range to shoot the enemy!” the XO almost yelled.
Behind them, the navigation team was calling out the ship’s position. At ten knots, they were almost there.
After blinking a moment the pilot looked over at the radar picture. “Steer 300,” he ordered. The XO relayed the order and the helmsman changed course slightly.
On the bow of the ship, Boats Patnaude had his guys knock all but the last chain stop loose. The crew set the brake and waited. The sound of distant gunfire was heard above the usual ship sounds they had grown accustomed to hearing. On the deck the XO could occasionally see the flash of a red light as the men attended to their duties. Things seemed to happen quickly now as the ship neared the last hurdle in the channel. A single concrete breakwater sat just at the closest point. They had been lucky that the usual small craft that used the harbor were no longer there. It could have been difficult at best.
“All engines ahead one third,” the XO ordered. His orders were relayed and repeated along with small course changes the pilot made as they finally entered the inner harbor. The ship eased the last few hundred yards to the point the XO wanted. “All engines back two thirds,” he ordered. Glancing up at the RPM indicators for the shafts, he saw that the shafts suddenly ceased their forward turns and began going in reverse. The pit log showed the ship coming to a stop. “Stand by the anchor.”
On the bow, the brake was released and a bos’n’s mate stood by to trip the latch on the stopper. The XO watched as the ship made just a slight amount of sternway. “All stop. Let go the anchor!” he shouted through the window. He watched as the big bos’n swung the sledge hammer, striking the latch and releasing the stopper. The heavy anchor dropped into the water and its chain began to rapidly clatter out of the chain locker, around the windless and through the hawse hole. Using a red flashlight the men watched for the painted links that told them how much chain had gone out. When the prescribed length was reached, the brake was applied and the chain stopped again. After another few fathoms had been released through the anchor windless everything stopped and the stoppers were reapplied.
By now the pilot had the two tugs at the rear of the ship ready to hold her in place. “Navigator, get an exact position and feed it down to the Captain,” the XO said.
In Strike, the CO received the position information and they determined the bearing and range to the artillery site. It was twenty-three miles away. Hammond looked over at the Operations officer. “Ops lets see if we can hit it a few times,” he said. The bearing and range information was passed to Main Battery Plot. In less than a minute the guns elevated nearly to their full forty-five degrees.
On deck, Boats Patnaude saw the guns rise. “You cocksuckers better cover your ears, we’re shootin’,” he yelled. The men pulled on their “Mickey Mouse” ear protection – large ear cups that effectively deadened the sound. The men wore ear plugs at the same time. Upon the Cap
tain’s order the guns fired once again.
The concussion from the guns actually broke glass in the buildings surrounding the waterfront. The men on deck could clearly be seen in the flash of flame as the guns recoiled. The loading sequence was immediately started and the guns fired again. Boats kept an eye on the anchor chain and watched it slowly pull toward the direction of fire. On the bridge, the pilot and XO watched the gyro compass and had the tugs keep the stern from swinging around. A third salvo left the guns.
Twenty-three miles away the North Korean artillery commander thought he had placed his equipment far enough away to prevent them from being hit. His father told him about the times he fought in the first conflict, and only one kind of ship could shoot that far. He remembered something about the big ships being able to shoot twenty miles, but those ships weren’t around anymore. Well, at least they weren’t getting bombed, although he faintly heard the sound of something flying around up there.
He ordered his men to shift fire to another hot spot when he heard the sound of incoming shells. The first landed 100 yards away, sending dirt high into the air, covering his men as they tried to load their weapons. The second salvo actually passed overhead landing in some trees. The trees acted as if they had been attacked by a buzz saw. Wood splinters sailed through the air cutting through men like shrapnel. All around him people screamed and writhed in agony as the jagged splinters ripped into them. Mercifully, the third salvo landed directly along the main line of guns. More would come, but he and his men didn’t hear them. His last thought was to wonder at the guns he saw being flung into the air.
DMZ, Korea
Another act from the opening salvo of the war occurred along the former DMZ. After the Tomahawks eliminated the search and fire control radars along the coasts, two B-1 bombers entered Korean airspace and loitered near the tunnels. One was north of the DMZ, the second south. Upon initiation, the bombers dropped two Mk-84 bombs fitted with a GBU-15 electro-optical guidance system on each of four small tunnels. The bombers then made their way south while still receiving the images from each missile.
Upon opening their bomb bays, the aircraft presented a much bigger target, but no radar in the vicinity was turned on. It didn’t matter. The previous air raid had forced the tunnel crews to close their doors to protect them from blasts. Unfortunately, the Vietnam era Mk-84 bomb was a 2,000 pound weapon that could penetrate up to fifteen inches of steel. The one-half-inch thick plates on the doors would prevent bullets, but not this. Inside the bombers the infrared picture clearly outlined the cool steel doors from the warmer concrete and dirt. The electro-optical sensors homed in on the difference in temperature. Both struck within five feet of each other, penetrating the doors and then detonating their Tritonal high explosive a good ten feet under the surface of the road inside. The effect was catastrophic. The bombs opened a crater that was wider than the tunnel itself causing the sides of the tunnel for fifty feet to collapse. In addition, the blast along the tunnel ceiling fractured the rock above causing it to fall as well. The shockwaves traveled down the shaft, breaking down supports and the concrete shoring. In all over 100 yards of the weakly reinforced tunnels collapsed on both ends, crushing trucks and drivers at the ends of the tunnels while trapping those in the center.
The remaining tunnel had been built to act as a temporary aircraft storage and troop shelter in case the United States used weapons of mass destruction. The entrances and the tunnel walls were heavily reinforced to act as a nuclear shelter. Additional ventilation was added and the facility designed to withstand any kind of air drop, from bombers or ICBMs. Like the other tunnels, there were heavy doors on each end. In this case, the doors were over one-foot thick and swung inward when not in use. When the air raid sounded, the traffic stopped in the tunnel and the huge doors swung closed and locked shut. A second set of doors rolled into place behind those forming an air tight seal.
The truckers turned off their engines and began walking around in the lighted tunnel. Many lit up cigarettes and shared a few moments with other truck drivers secure in the knowledge that they would be safe from anything the Americans would throw at them. The guards and sentries were smiling and urging everyone to relax and remain calm. Everyone was certain the raid would be over soon. If not, they had enough supplies to keep them alive for weeks.
One of the drivers decided to take this time to check out a smell he had been noticing coming from his engine. He climbed down from the cab and pulled open the hood. It was hard to tell where it might be coming from since the engine was filthy and there was oil and grease caked everywhere. Looking under the valve cover, he noticed that oil was dripping out of a small crack onto an exhaust pipe. Grunting to himself, he grabbed a rag and wiped it clean, then used a tube of sealer to cover the crack. It was a standard thing he had been forced to do since there were never any spare parts. A driver had to be inventive in his repairs.
“Problems?” asked one of the post sentries with a smile.
“No. I had a small oil leak but I fixed it. I smelled it through the vents all the way here,” he said to the sentry. “At least I won’t have to smell it the rest of the way,” he said.
Satisfied the problem was solved, he wiped the surface one more time, then closed the hood. As he was getting down he noticed a section of black pipe resting against the side of the tunnel road. It looked like the kind of pipe used when putting up a building. The black sealer had been marred where the pipe had fallen and scraped along the roadbed. “Looks like somebody lost something,” he said walking over to the pipe.
The guard looked over that way and waved it off. “We get things falling off trucks all the time. Had a whole load come loose a couple of weeks ago. Took forever to clean up,” he said nonchalantly.
The driver looked at the pipe. “I’ll put it in the truck and take it with me. Maybe one of the Army units can use it,” he said. The man reached down and tried to lift the pipe. It was heavy – far heavier than a pipe should be. Curious, he took one end and lifted it up. Wasn’t a pipe supposed to be hollow, he wondered?
A split second later the driver, the guard, the truck and everything within 1,000 yards of the pipe was vaporized. The temperature went from a normal 80 degrees to the temperature of the sun and turning everything, from the steel in the trucks, the concrete and the rock surrounding the tunnel into a white-hot molten mass. Great gouts of escaping air shot out of several places in the mountain. The huge steel doors at first contained the blast. But they had been designed to withstand something exploding over them, not coming from within the tunnel itself. The containment within the tunnel magnified the blast effect, and the doors could not contain the dynamic onslaught. Both ends blew outward as the doors were ripped from their hinges and flung over a mile away. Smoke and heat radiated from the entrances, and molten rock and steel spewed out of the tunnel like a volcano into the forest on both sides, setting the trees on fire and flinging more debris far away from the tunnel entrances. People within two miles of either entrance were thrown from their feet as if there had been a tremendous earthquake. At the same time, the mountain itself appeared to lift from its base and collapse downward as if something had lifted it six or seven feet and dropped it . Suddenly the blast ceased as the molten center began to cool and the mountain began filling in the void of the explosion.
Crews hurried to get to the entrance to find out what happened, but there were no traces of any entrance – only a road that appeared to stop along the side of the hill. Even the loose dirt and what scrub that wasn’t burning looked like it hadn’t been disturbed.
Pusan, South Korea
In a small radio station set up by the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service, several reporters watched as a shortwave transmitter was set up to broadcast a live signal to the world. Only one man had been selected and approved for a live broadcast. His material had general approval and he would be operating with a five-second delay so that it could be stopped if necessary. Strangely, no one seemed to think there would b
e any problems. The script was in hand and seemed perfect.
The reporter was a fairly young man in his mid-twenties. His face was long and his dark hair was already receding. But he had the look of someone with experience far beyond his years. He was a professional and it showed. As the sound of the naval gunfire could be heard through the walls, the engineers powered up the system and prepared to broadcast. Preliminary messages were sent and replied to. Someone brought out an old RCA 77 ribbon microphone and stuck it in front of the man, who laughed and thanked the technician. The hands on the clock came to 10:30 and the technician pointed to him.
“This is Pusan, Jason Murrow reporting. The people of this city are rejoicing tonight. For months they and the people of South Korea have held out against the determined forces of North Korea. Yard, by exhausting yard they have fought, not giving up one inch of ground without a struggle. Yet the North Koreans, with their army of over a million strong, have pushed these people back until only a small toehold of their country remains.
“Still they fight on. These are a proud and determined people. Once before they fought against the oppressors from the North. Then too, with the help of the United Nations and primarily from the Americans, they were able to win back their cherished freedom. They have proven to be an industrious and freedom loving people who understood their responsibilities as a nation and lived in peace.
“Yet after decades of coexistence, the North saw fit to try and take away the freedoms these people had fought so hard to earn. To accomplish their goals, the North Koreans struck out against not only neighboring countries such as Japan and the Philippines, but took their vengeance out against the United States as well, unleashing weapons of mass destruction upon the people. Since that time, the South Koreans have fought hard. They have vowed to never give up their fight for the freedom they love. They and their American allies have come together once again to hold out as long as possible until the forces of freedom could be brought to bear.