"Do Not Josephine!"

In northwest Korea last week, an air-ground liaison officer attached to the U.S. 24th Division gave a nervous laugh as he listened to the radio chatter of Mustang pilots overhead. "Do not Josephine," the pilots cautioned one another. "Do not Josephine!" In Air Force parlance, "Do not Josephine" means "Don't use up all your ammunition on ground targets; you may need it to fight your way home."

Barrage in Chinese. Throughout Korea U.N. troops had abandoned the easy optimism of previous weeks. U.N. pilots who had long had the air almost to themselves were meeting increasing numbers of Yak fighters. Last week they had their first brushes with enemy jets coming from north of the Yalu--Soviet MIG-15s with swept-back wings and a speed of 600 miles an hour. Ground troops faced enemy units heavily equipped with tanks, automatic weapons, 76-mm. howitzers and multiple rocket launchers like the Russian "Katushas" of World War II. The men who handled the weapons displayed skill and high morale. Said one G.I. last week: "Those guys who hit us last night are the best we've run up against in Korea."

General MacArthur's headquarters estimated that the Reds were using twelve divisions and five independent brigades in North Korea. Some of these were probably remnants of North Korean forces ' defeated farther south, and others might be "ghost units," i.e., North Koreans held in reserve since the beginning of the war and never before met by U.N. forces. But many of the enemy troops were Chinese Communists. Nobody knew just how many Chinese had crossed the frontier, but in northwest Korea Eighth Army Headquarters had identified Chinese army units equivalent in strength to two Chinese divisions, and in the northeast two more Chinese regiments had been firmly identified. Over their loudspeakers U.N. front-line propaganda crews had begun to barrage the enemy with speeches in Chinese as well as Korean.

Red Buzz Saw. Whether Chinese or Korean, the enemy had succeeded in breaking up a triumphant U.N. offensive, by midweek was harrying U.N. defenses. In the northwest powerful Red units had driven southwest from the Manchurian border to Unsan, 70 miles north of Pyongyang. Four overextended R.O.K. divisions --the ist, 6th, 7th and 8th--crumpled or were chopped up piecemeal in the Red attack. The enemy seemed to be trying to break the U.N. line below Unsan, then drive west along the Chongchon River to the coast.

To prevent this, U.N. commanders sent the U.S. ist Cavalry Division racing toward Unsan to bolster the sagging R.O.K. units. At Unsan the cavalrymen ran into a Red buzz saw (see below). One field hospital south of Unsan treated more than 500 U.S. casualties in a single day. But, though badly cut up, the ist Cavalry Division averted a Communist breakthrough --at least for the time being.

Burning Mountains. Southwest of Unsan, the wheeling Red offensive carried to within 15 miles of Sinanju, a vital U.N. transportation and supply center, and threatened both the rear and right flank of the U.S. 24th Infantry Division. The 24th, which had pushed one spearhead to within 14 miles of the mouth of the Yalu River, promptly pulled back nearly 50 miles to the west coast town of Chongju.

The U.N. "tactical withdrawals" were made in an effort to establish a firm defense line in the west running along the Chongchon and Kuryong Rivers. To strengthen this line, the U.S. 2nd Infantry Division was hurried north and thrown into positions along the Chongchon River. By week's end the new defense positions had not yet been subjected to an all-out Red attack. But large supply trains from Manchuria had been sighted, and Communists were massing north of Chongju.

Dangerous Reservoir. In northeastern Korea, where there was no easily defined front, the battle seemed to be everywhere at once. Elements of the R.O.K. 3rd Division in the Pujon Reservoir area had been cut off from their base. A strong Red force had slipped in behind two Marine battalions driving northwest from Hamhung toward the Changjin Reservoir, and had thrown a roadblock across the Marines' only line of communication. Hit both behind and before, the Marines were raked with mortars and small arms fire.

The Marines finally managed to reopen the lines to their bases. But intelligence officers reported that the Communists were continuing to build up strength near the Changjin Reservoir despite heavy U.N. air attacks. And 20 miles above their east coast base at Iwon, advanced elements of the U.S. 7th Infantry Division won a bitter battle for a snowy mountain pass--only to discover that Red troops had cut in behind them 35 miles to the rear. While 7th Division reinforcements battled the Reds, the Communist spearhead got its supplies by air drop.

At week's end U.N. commanders in Korea were still worried and U.N. troops were melancholy. Troopers of the ist Cavalry Division, who had hoped to lead an Armistice Day victory parade in Tokyo, instead took up defensive positions, fearing a repetition of the savage actions they had fought in the days of the Pusan perimeter. Farther west, a column of U.S. infantry slogged south down a coastal road toward the new defense lines. Their commander stared glumly at half a dozen burned-out Russian tanks and a pile of land mines which his engineers had dug up a few days earlier. Said he: "Three men died to get this stretch. It will be tough to come back the next time."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.