The Battle of Yongsan was an engagement between United Nations Command (UN) and North Korean forces early in the Korean War from September 1–5, 1950, at Yongsan in South Korea. It was part of the Battle of Pusan Perimeter and was one of several large engagements fought simultaneously. The battle ended in a victory for the UN after large numbers of United States Army (US) repelled a strong Korean People's Army (KPA) attack.
During the nearby Second Battle of Naktong Bulge, the KPA broke through the US 2nd Infantry Division lines along the Naktong River. Exploiting this weakness, the KPA 9th and 4th Divisions attacked to Yongsan, a village east of the river and the gateway to the UN lines of supply and reinforcement for the Pusan Perimeter. What followed was a fight between KPA and US forces for Yongsan.
The KPA were able to briefly capture Yongsan from the 2nd Infantry Division, which had been split in half from the penetrations at Naktong Bulge. Lieutenant general Walton Walker, seeing the danger of the attack, brought in the US Marine Corps 1st Provisional Marine Brigade to counterattack. In three days of fierce fighting, the Army and Marine forces were able to push the KPA out of the town and destroy the two attacking divisions. The win was a key step toward victory in the fight at the Naktong Bulge.
Background
Pusan Perimeter
From the outbreak of the Korean War and the invasion of South Korea by the North, the KPA had enjoyed superiority in both manpower and equipment over both the Republic of Korea Army (ROKA) and the UN forces dispatched to South Korea to prevent it from collapsing. The KPA tactics were to aggressively pursue ROKA/UN forces on all avenues of approach south and to engage them aggressively, attacking from the front and initiating a double envelopment of both flanks of the unit, which allowed the KPA to surround and cut off the opposing force, which would then be forced to retreat in disarray, often leaving behind much of its equipment. From their initial June 25 offensive to fights in July and early August, the KPA used these tactics to effectively defeat any ROKA/UN force and push it south. However, when the ROKA/UN forces, under the Eighth United States Army, established the Pusan Perimeter in August, the ROKA/UN troops held a continuous line along the peninsula which KPA troops could not flank, and their advantages in numbers decreased daily as the superior UN logistical system brought in more troops and supplies to the UN forces.
When the KPA approached the Pusan Perimeter on August 5, they attempted the same frontal assault technique on the four main avenues of approach into the perimeter. Throughout August, the KPA 6th Division, and later the KPA 7th Division, engaged the US 25th Infantry Division at the Battle of Masan, initially repelling a UN counteroffensive before countering with battles at Komam-ni and Battle Mountain. These attacks stalled as UN forces, well equipped and with plenty of reserves, repeatedly repelled KPA attacks. North of Masan, the KPA 4th Division and the US 24th Infantry Division sparred in the Naktong Bulge area. In the First Battle of Naktong Bulge, the KPA division was unable to hold its bridgehead across the river as large numbers of US reserve forces were brought in to repel it, and on August 19, the KPA 4th Division was forced back across the river with 50 percent casualties. In the Taegu region, five KPA divisions were repulsed by three UN divisions in several attempts to attack the city during the Battle of Taegu. Particularly heavy fighting took place at the Battle of the Bowling Alley where the KPA 13th Division was almost completely destroyed in the attack. On the east coast, three more KPA divisions were repulsed by the ROKA at P'ohang-dong during the Battle of P'ohang-dong. All along the front, the KPA troops were reeling from these defeats, the first time in the war their tactics were not working.
September push
In planning its new offensive, the KPA command decided any attempt to flank the UN force was impossible thanks to the support of the UN naval forces. Instead, they opted to use frontal attack to breach the perimeter and collapse it; this was considered to be the only hope of achieving success in the battle. Fed by intelligence from the Soviet Union, the North Koreans were aware of the UN forces building up along the Pusan Perimeter and that they must conduct an offensive soon or they could not win the battle. A secondary objective was to surround Taegu and destroy the UN units in that city. As part of this mission, the KPA would first cut the supply lines to Taegu.
On August 20, the KPA commands distributed operations orders to their subordinate units. The plan called for a simultaneous five-prong attack against the ROKA/UN lines. These attacks would overwhelm the ROKA/UN defenders and allow the KPA to break through the lines in at least one place to force the ROKA/UN forces back. Five battle groupings were ordered. The center attack called for the KPA 9th, 4th, 2nd and 10th Divisions to break through the US 2nd Infantry Division at the Naktong Bulge to Miryang and Yongsan.
Battle
On the morning of September 1 the 1st and 2nd Regiments of the KPA 9th Division, in their first offensive of the war, stood only a few miles short of Yongsan after a successful river crossing and penetration of the US line. The 3rd Regiment had been left at Inch'on, but division commander Major general Pak Kyo Sam felt the chances of capturing Yongsan were strong.
As the KPA 9th Division approached Yongsan, its 1st Regiment was on the north and its 2nd Regiment on the south. The division's attached support, consisting of one 76 mm artillery battalion from the KPA I Corps, an anti-aircraft battalion of artillery, two tank battalions of the KPA 16th Armored Brigade, and a battalion of artillery from the 4th Division, gave it unusually heavy support. Crossing the river behind it came the 4th Division, a greatly weakened organization, far understrength, short of weapons, and made up mostly of untrained replacements. A captured KPA document referred to this grouping of units that attacked from the Sinban-ni area into the Naktong Bulge as the main force of KPA I Corps. Elements of the 9th Division reached the hills just west of Yongsan during the afternoon of September 1.
On the morning of September 1, with only the shattered remnants of E Company at hand, the US 9th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division had virtually no troops to defend Yongsan. Division commander Major general Laurence B. Keiser in this emergency attached the 2nd Engineer Combat Battalion to the regiment. The US 72nd Tank Battalion and the 2nd Division Reconnaissance Company also were assigned positions close to Yongsan. The regimental commander planned to place the engineers on the chain of low hills that arched around Yongsan on the northwest.
North Korean attack
A Company, 2nd Engineer Combat Battalion, moved to the south side of the Yongsan-Naktong River road; D Company of the 2nd Engineer Battalion was on the north side of the road. Approximately 2 miles (3.2 km) west of Yongsan an estimated 300 KPA troops engaged A Company in a fire fight. M19 Gun Motor Carriages of the 82nd AAA Battalion supported the engineers in this action, which lasted several hours. Meanwhile, with the approval of the Assistant Division Commander Brigadier general Joseph S. Bradley, D Company moved to the hill immediately south of and overlooking Yongsan. A platoon of infantry went into position behind it. A Company was now ordered to fall back to the southeast edge of Yongsan on the left flank of D Company. There, A Company went into position along the road; on its left was C Company of the Engineer battalion, and beyond C Company was the 2nd Division Reconnaissance Company. The hill occupied by D Company was in reality the western tip of a large mountain mass that lay southeast of the town. The road to Miryang came south out of Yongsan, bent around the western tip of this mountain, and then ran eastward along its southern base. In its position, D Company not only commanded the town but also its exit, the road to Miryang.
The KPA had also approached Yongsan from the south. The US 2nd Division Reconnaissance Company and tanks of the 72nd Tank Battalion opposed them in an intense fight. In this action, Sergeant First Class Charles W. Turner of the Reconnaissance Company particularly distinguished himself. He mounted a tank, operated its exposed turret machine gun, and directed tank fire which reportedly destroyed seven KPA machine guns. Turner and this tank came under heavy KPA fire which shot away the tank's periscope and antennae and scored more than 50 hits on it. Turner, although wounded, remained on the tank until he was killed. That night KPA soldiers crossed the low ground around Yongsan and entered the town from the south.
The KPA now attempted a breakthrough of the Engineer position. After daylight, they were unable to get reinforcements into the fight since D Company commanded the town and its approaches. In this fight, which raged until 11:00, the engineers had neither artillery nor mortar support. D Company remedied this by using its new 3.5-inch and old 2.36-inch rocket launchers (Bazookas) against the KPA infantry. The fire of the 18 Bazookas plus that from machine guns and the small arms of the company inflicted very heavy casualties on the KPA, who desperately tried to clear the way for a push eastward to Miryang. Tanks of A and B Companies, 72nd Tank Battalion, at the southern and eastern edge of Yongsan shared equally with the engineers in the intensity of this battle. The company commander was the only officer of D Company not killed or wounded in this melee, which cost the company 12 men killed and 18 wounded. The edge of Yongsan and the slopes of the hill south of the town became covered with KPA dead and destroyed equipment.
Reinforcements
While this battle raged during the morning at Yongsan, commanders reorganized about 800 men of the 9th Infantry who had arrived in that vicinity from the overrun river line positions. Among them were F and G Companies, which were not in the path of major KPA crossings and had succeeded in withdrawing eastward. They had no crew-served weapons or heavy equipment. In midafternoon September 2, tanks and the reorganized US 2nd Battalion, 9th Infantry, attacked through A Company, 2nd Engineer Combat Battalion, into Yongsan, and regained possession of the town at 15:00. Later, two bazooka teams from A Company, 2nd Engineer Combat Battalion, knocked out three T-34 tanks just west of Yongsan. US ground and air action destroyed other KPA tanks during the day southwest of the town. By evening the KPA had been driven into the hills westward. In the evening, the 2nd Battalion and A Company, 2nd Engineer Combat Battalion, occupied the first chain of low hills 0.5 miles (0.80 km) beyond Yongsan, the engineers west and the 2nd Battalion northwest of the town. For the time being at least, the KPA drive toward Miryang had been halted. In this time, the desperately undermanned US units began to be reinforced with Korean Augmentees (KATUSAs) However, the cultural divide between the KATUSAs and the US troops caused tensions.
At 09:35 September 2, while the KPA were attempting to destroy the engineer troops at the southern edge of Yongsan and clear the road to Miryang, Eighth United States Army commander Lieutenant general Walton Walker spoke by telephone with Major general Doyle O. Hickey, Deputy Chief of Staff, Far East Command in Tokyo. He described the situation around the Perimeter and said the most serious threat was along the boundary between the US 2nd and 25th Infantry Divisions. He described the location of his reserve forces and his plans for using them. He said he had started the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade, under Brigadier general Edward A. Craig, toward Yongsan but had not yet released them for commitment there and he wanted to be sure that UN commander General of the Army Douglas MacArthur approved his use of them, since he knew that this would interfere with other plans of the Far East Command. Walker said he did not think he could restore the 2nd Division lines without using them. Hickey replied that MacArthur had the day before approved the use of the Marines if and when Walker considered it necessary. A few hours after this conversation, at 13:15, Walker attached the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade to the US 2nd Division and ordered a co-ordinated attack by all available elements of the division and the Marines, with the mission of destroying the KPA east of the Naktong River in the 2nd Division sector and restoring the river line. The Marines were to be released from 2nd Division control as soon as this mission was accomplished.