[514] Tank and artillery ammunition allocations had been cut 50 percent the afternoon of the 19th, with a subsequent reduction of normal destruction missions and elimination of H&I fires. ComdDs Jul 53 1st TkBn, p. 3 and App. 2, p. 4 and 1/11, p. 5.
MAP 30 K. White
7TH MARINES MLR SECTOR
(Division Right)
LINEAR DEFENSE
19–20 July 1953
Between noon and the last flight of the day, when a trio of AUs from Lieutenant Colonel Wallace’s VMA-212 attacked a northern enemy mortar and automatic weapons site, 35 aircraft had repeatedly streaked over the Berlin territory and adjacent Chinese strongpoints. Strikes by VMA-121 at 1145, 1320, 1525, 1625, 1700, 1750; and VMA-212 at 1413, 1849, and 1930 had released a combined total of 69½ tons of bombs and 6,500 rounds of 20mm ammunition on hostile locations.
The Chinese casualty toll during this renewed flareup in the fighting on 19–20 July was conservatively placed by 3/7 at 75 killed and 300 wounded. It was further believed that “the enemy battalion was so weakened and disorganized by the attacks that it was necessary for the CCF to commit another battalion to hold the area captured.”[515] Regimental reports indicated that 6 Marines had been killed, 56 listed missing,[516] 86 wounded and evacuated, and 32 not seriously wounded.
[515] 3/7 ComdD, 20 Jul 53, p. 5. With respect to the number of enemy casualties that night, battalion, regimental, artillery support, and division command diaries given differing accounts. Other figures cited are: 9 CCF killed, between 234–284 estimated killed, and 630 estimated wounded.