[304] Hermes, Truce Tent, p. 392.
On 23 March, a Chinese Communist regiment attempted to capture three outposts manned by the U.S. 7th Division, at the far right of the I Corps line. Hills 225 (Pork Chop Hill) and 191 held. The enemy’s main effort was against Hill 266 (Old Baldy), defended by units of the division’s Colombian battalion. One attack carried the position, despite company strength reinforcements of the original defenders. Two strong UN counterattacks the next day to retake the outpost failed, and the Chinese retained the crest of Old Baldy. Although the CCF had gained their objective in Hill 266, the battles on the three hillocks had cost the enemy 750 casualties, according to 7th Division records.
In one respect, the nature and extent of ground operations affected the type of air activity over North and South Korea during the winter of 1952–1953. Introduction of PRESSURE strategy, which had embodied the policy of the Far East Air Forces since mid-1952, brought more aircraft in close support of Eighth Army ground troops, a change that pleased the corps commanders. When the heavy outpost fighting throughout October diminished to only occasional skirmishes in November, there was temporarily a decreased need for large numbers of CAS sorties. As a result more planes became available for PRESSURE attacks. These strikes at first appeared to be reverting to the previous STRANGLE strategy since railroads were often the targets. But interdiction of the transportation system was only part of the PRESSURE aerial concept which also called for striking enemy production, repair, and storage facilities. The Allied strategy in conducting its air offensive remained the same: to make the bombing hurt the Communists so that they would end their deliberate delaying tactics in the truce sessions and join the UNC in effecting a Korean settlement.
During the winter FEAF maintained a steady air pressure against the Communists. Major raids were made from time to time, but the number of strategic targets was gradually disappearing due to repeated UNC air attacks. Further, much of the enemy logistical net had gone so deeply underground during the prolonged stalemate that UN bombing and rocket attacks were having only a limited destructive effect. The U.S. B-29s, which had carried the fight to the enemy since the first week of the Korean conflict, found their last worthwhile objectives in stockpiles hidden in North Korean towns and villages. For the Fifth Air Force fighters there was little opportunity to increase their skill in air-to-air combat, since the Communist fliers continued to take evasive action and avoid “dogfights.”
Naval aviation contributed importantly to UNC air operations from September 1952 to March 1953. On the first day of this period, three carriers staged the largest all-Navy Korean air strike to date, which simultaneously attacked an oil refinery at Aoji and other targets in the northeastern corner of Korea. Less than two weeks later, two carriers launched another assault in the same part of the country. The significance of these September strikes stemmed from the almost complete lack of enemy response. Apparently the Communists in this area had felt secure and protected, their territory being next to the Chinese border. In fact, their location close to the sanctuary had ruled out bombings proposed earlier. Strikes in this part of Korea were particularly suited to carrier planes of the Seventh Fleet, whose mobile airfields brought the targets within easy striking range along approaches that would not violate the Manchurian haven.
Perhaps the greatest naval contribution to the air war were the Cherokee strikes, so named after the commander of the Seventh Fleet, Vice Admiral Joseph J. Clark, because of his Indian ancestry. This new type of deep air support attack, which came into use in October 1952, employed the maxim of mass delivery of ordnance. Usually, targets were immediately behind the enemy MLR but beyond the range of friendly artillery. In May 1952, when the rail interdiction program was being phased out and Admiral Clark’s pilots were faced with a decreasing number of prime industrial targets, the fleet commander had theorized that he could most effectually damage the enemy by bombing supply dumps, artillery positions, and reserve forces immediately to the rear of the Chinese MLR. As the admiral reasoned, the enemy could not fight the kind of war he was waging “and still have all his forces, supplies, and equipment underground. Some of his stocks of supplies had to be above ground, out of sight and out of range of our artillery.”[305]
[305] Quoted in Cagle and Manson, Sea War, Korea, p. 461.
Eighth Army welcomed the increased support that would result from the strikes, but FEAF expressed concern about the lack of top-level coordination. Admiral Clark had proposed that a EUSAK corps commander be allowed to authorize the attacks, which employed 24 to 36 aircraft. The Fifth Air Force initially maintained that it should control Cherokee strikes, just as it did the CAS missions. The matter was finally resolved in November.
Following a high-level conference it was decided that attacks inside the bombline would be subjected to FAF coordination and that a minimal amount of tactical control would be exercised by the corps commander. Eighth Army gave a big assist to the Navy by moving the bombline to within 3,000 meters (nearly two miles) of the outpost line. A line was also drawn approximately 25 miles beyond the bombline, separating the area of “general support” from “interdiction.” Thereafter, the Cherokee strikes were effectively conducted against enemy installations outside the 3,000-meter line but within 20,000 meters of the ground front. General Clark, CinCUNC, had high praise for the strikes, which the Seventh Fleet employed until the end of the war.
Surface ships of the fleet were in much the same static warfare situation as the ground and air components of the United Nations Command. Aside from the Kojo demonstration in mid-October, the fleet had little diversification in its daily routine other than to maintain the siege around Wonsan. This operation had started in mid-February 1951 and had grown from the original plan to seize certain strategically-placed islands on both coasts into an attempt to isolate the entire port and city of Wonsan. Each day Allied minesweepers cleared the harbor; at night the enemy sampan fleet resowed the fields. Daily, usually during mine-clearing operations, ships of Task Force 95 fired on batteries in the mountains beyond the city and at other military targets in and around Wonsan. From time to time heavy units of the Seventh Fleet bombarded the area to keep the enemy off-balance and to partially deter the solid buildup of Communist arms and defenses just north of the 39th Parallel.