This month we commemorate the 60th anniversary of the amphibious landing at Inchon, Korea. On 15 September 1950, the 1st Marine Division landed behind the North Korean lines in a sweeping envelopment from the sea that cut off the enemy and relieved the beleaguered force pressed up against the sea inside the Pusan Perimeter. It was a masterful stroke planned by GEN Douglas McArthur and executed by the Navy-Marine Team and the U.S. Army’s 7th Infantry Division. This month, in commemoration of that anniversary, we are linking to the splendid history of the Inchon to Seoul Campaign, entitled Over the Seawall: U.S. Marines at Inchon. We will also present an online photo gallery of some photos from the battle. If you are reading the Gazette online, simply click on the title on the table of contents page. If you are reading the paper edition of the Gazette, the link to the historical pamphlet is on our website at www.mca-marines.org/gazette.
As many Marines know, there were many roadblocks and impediments to the successful landing at Inchon known as Operation CHROMITE. A study of this critical campaign can yield many lessons learned at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels of war. However, the most important lesson is capability.
Inchon is the landing that almost never happened. If the seers and analysts of the early postwar years had their way, amphibious operations on the scale of Inchon would not have been possible. This Nation came within inches of giving up forcible amphibious operations as a military capability. In October 1949 GEN Omar Bradley testified, “Large-scale amphibious operations will never occur again.” Eleven months later the order was given at Inchon to “land the landing force.” Intermittently throughout the years, as we have shaped our national security strategy, the utility of amphibious forces has come into question. In 1975 the Secretary of Defense, James Schlessinger, stated:
An amphibious assault force . . . has not seen anything more demanding than essentially unopposed landings for over 20 years, and . . . would have grave difficulties in accomplishing a mission of over-the-beach and flanking operations in a high threat environment.
In 1991 the threat of an amphibious assault tied down several Iraqi divisions as I MEF breached the Iraqi defenses and raced on to Kuwait City.
In this age of hybrid warfare and access denial, the utility of Navy and Marine forces should not be discounted. Recently, in a congressionally mandated report to Congress to assess the recently completed Quadrennial Defense Review, former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry and former National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley explicitly stated that the size of the U.S. Navy should be increased to counter Chinese maritime influence and ensure that America’s security interests are protected. Included in that buildup, in my opinion, is additional amphibious ships that have utility across the spectrum of warfare.
In this month’s issue, as one example, we have an article by LtCol Karl C. Rohr on page 46 titled “Chokepoint.” In this article he paints a scenario of the requirement for maritime forces to control chokepoints in vital sea lanes against a myriad of threats, including hybrid threats and piracy. A quick scan of the globe would reveal that this same threat exists in other areas of the world.
At the end of the day we may not need to seize Wolmi-do Island again to facilitate a landing at Inchon, but it is not outside the realm of possibility that we may have to seize an island or littoral in the Straits of Hormuz to reopen vital shipping lanes. Hopefully we will still have the ships and training to “land the landing force.”
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