Summary of the Korean War

Marshal Peng crossed the Yalu River with the vanguard units on October 18, and by October 25 all the Chinese People's Volunteers had entered Korea.

As proposed by Peng Dehuai, the Central Military Commission decided that the Volunteers should fight a mobile war in most cases, combine it with positional warfare in some cases, and conduct guerrilla operations behind enemy lines.

Fighting in close coordination, the Volunteers and the Korean People's Army mounted two counteroffensives between October 25 and December 24, 1950, and wiped out over 50,000 enemy troops. They recovered Pyongyang on December 6 and drove the enemy back to the 38th parallel.

The Korean and Chinese armies followed up this victory with three more counteroffensives from December 31, 1950, to June 10, 1951, during which they put 179,000 enemy troops out Of action, stabilized the battlefront along the 38th parallel, and compelled the U.S. side to accept a proposal for armistice talks advanced by Yakov Malik, the Soviet Union's delegate to the United Nations, on June 30, 1951.

The armistice talks started in Kaesong on July 10. Because of the stalling tactics used by the U.S. side, the negotiations dragged on for a long time amidst almost incessant hostilities. To force its unjustifiable terms on the Korean-Chinese side, the U.S. army launched in October 1952 the biggest offensive in a year against a group of heights known as the Sangkumryung Ridge.

In 43 days, ending November 25, 1952, U.S. forces poured 1.9 million shells and heavy bombs over the ridge and blasted 2 meters of rock off the summits. Fighting back from tunnel fortifications deep underground, the Chinese People's Volunteers repulsed 678 enemy attacks and inflicted a total of 25,000 casualties.

Then the Korean-Chinese side launched three summer offensives between May and July 1953, wiping out 120,000 enemy troops and pushing the battle line southward. In these circumstances the U.S. side was compelled to sign the Armistice Agreement at Panmunjom on July 27, 1953. General Mark W. Clark, Commander-in-Chief of the "UN Forces" made the well-known remark: "In carrying out the instructions of my government, I gained the unenviable distinction of being the first United States army commander in history to sign an armistice without victory».

During the three years of war the Korean and Chinese armies killed, wounded or captured a total of 1.09 million enemy troops, including 390,000 U.S. troops, shot down or damaged 12,000 enemy planes, destroyed or damaged 2,690 tanks and 257 enemy ships.