One of the Chosin Few

The Porcupine

Introduction

As a recently retired school administrator, former American history teacher and college instructor in English composition, and as one recently relocated in a retirement community, I quickly came face to face with many veterans of the American armed services.  One of those veterans, John Wedel, was introduced to me on a tennis court near my new home.  After our first tennis match, I learned that John had served as a marine in the Korean War and had strong impressions and opinions about his service.  As a person with a lifetime of study of the American experience, I became quite interested in John’s military service, particularly after I learned that he had served at the Chosin Reservoir in North Korea at the time of the famous retreat from Chosin to Humnang in December of 1950.  Once I learned of his experience in the communications tank known as “Porcupine,” I determined to get a handle on as much as I could of John Wedel’s view of the Korean War in order to shed more light on what is often referred to, quite rightly, as “the forgotten war.”  What follows is a remarkable recollection of the experiences of John Wedel and “Porcupine,” a recollection quite often at odds with what might be called the “accepted” history of that conflict.

Bill Dillon

19298 Congressional Court

North Fort Myers, Florida, 33903

November 16, 2009

In the June, 2003 issue of the Marine Corps Tankers Association Newsletter, there is an article written by former Marine Corps tanker, John Wedel.  In his article, Wedel takes exception to an alleged fact from an earlier article in the MCTA Newsletter.  That earlier piece was an article written about Lt. Colonel Harry T. Milne, Commanding Officer of the 1^st Tank Battalion 1^st Marine Division in the immediate aftermath of the North Korean invasion of the South, which began on June 25, 1950.

Colonel Milne was the officer “who organized and prepared the battalion for loading in San Diego, shipping across the Pacific, transshipping in Kobe, Japan…landing in Inchon, and fighting all the way north to Chosin Reservoir…”(MCTA, June, 2000, p. 5)  This article shows Col. Milne standing in the hatch of what is described as his “M26 command tank.”  This statement is an error, according to John Wedel, who, at the time the photo was taken, was a twenty-year old corporal, in his second year as a U.S. marine, and a member of that tank crew.  In his correction of the earlier MCTA article, Wedel wrote:

In the June 2000 MCTA Newsletter it was stated in error that Lt. Col. Milne’s command tank was an M26.  His command tank was an M4 named Porcupine.  The M4 was an obsolete WWII tank.  To explain how this obsolete WWII tank became the Colonel’s command tank we must go back before the Korean War…

Truly, for an accurate and honest understanding of the Korean conflict, “we must go back,” as John Wedel stated, to the years before the onset of hostilities.

The June 25, 1950 invasion of the South by North Korea took place less than five years after the end of military action in World War II.  When that war ended with the dramatic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, followed by the Japanese surrender on September 2, 1945, many western leaders, including President Truman and his Secretary of Defense Louis Johnson, believed that conventional warfare had become irrelevant and that future military actions would be carried out with conventional and atomic weapons delivered by bombers. <David McCulloch, Truman (1992)> Further, again according to historian David McCulloch:

Both Truman and Johnson had a particular antipathy to Navy and Marine Corps budget requests.  Truman had a well-known dislike of the Marines dating back to his service in World War I, and famously said, ‘The Marine Corps is the Navy’s police force, and, as long as I am President, that is what it will remain.’  In fact, Truman in 1948 advocated disbanding the Marine Corps entirely and was dissuaded only by a campaign led by members of Congress who were former marines. <McCulloch (1992)>

Under Truman defense budgets, which ran through Fiscal 1950, many Navy ships were taken out of service, sold or scrapped.  The army eased recruitment standards and cut back on training.  Much usable equipment was scrapped or sold. <Clay Blair, The Forgotten War: America in Korea, 1950-53 (2003)>

According to Walter LaFeber’s rendition of the Cold War era, “The Marine Corps, its budgets slashed, was reduced to hoarding surplus inventories of World War II-era weapons and equipment.” <Walter LaFeber, American, Russia and the Cold War, 1945-1980 (1993)  In any future engagement, clearly, the United States military would be treading in dangerous territory, in some areas nearly defenseless, in the years between Japan’s surrender and North Korea’s attack to the south.

John Wedel, in 1948, was an eighteen-year old high school graduate of prestigious Baltimore Polytechnic with an ambition to become a naval pilot.  In August of that year, he learned, to his disappointment, that his best friend (and future brother-in-law) was considered physically unsuitable for flight training.  The two friends had intended to enlist together.  A Marine recruiter happened to be in the vicinity and was more than willing to enlist these healthy, young six-footers.  They wanted to “see the world” and decided, on the spot, that the Marine Corps was almost as good as the Navy for accomplishing this goal.  On August 5, 1948, John Wedel became a private in the United States Marine Corps.

Sent to recruit training at Parris Island, South Carolina, Private Wedel completed his boot camp in ten weeks and was promoted to Private First Class.  Wedel’s memory of his training evokes the standing of the entire Marine Corps in the eyes of the country’s political leaders at that time.  The U.S. Marines in the post-World War II era were barely hanging on.  Much of the equipment issued had a rag-tag quality.  Practically everything was obsolete or missing, but the training itself remained at Marine Corps standards.  Again with a trace of bitterness, Wedel remembers that later in his experience, in battle in North Korea, how much better prepared were he and his fellow marines than the army recruits sent in to the fight in those early days with poor training and worse morale.  “I felt sorry for the soldiers that were stationed near us after we got to Korea.  They were like civilians in uniform.” <Wedel, Personal interview, February, 2009>

After his recruit training where he did well on the rifle range, although not of sharpshooter status, Pfc. Wedel was sent to Electronics School at the Great Lakes Naval Training Station at Great Lakes, Illinois.  At Great Lakes from November, 1948 until June, 1949, Pfc. Wedel emerged from elementary electronics training with a promotion to corporal and a transfer to Signal Battalion Camp at the Pendleton Marine Base in Oceanside, California.  By December, 1949, Corporal Wedel had completed Radio Technicians School and was transferred to the Second Tank Battalion at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, where, unfortunately, the marines’ diet would largely consist of WWII C-rations.  In fact, former Staff Sergeant Wedel has often voiced criticism of the rations provided to Marines.  He has pointed out that, from six months before his arrival in Korea until the Chosin campaign itself, he and his fellow crew had only one real meal: Thanksgiving, 1950.  For their entire Korean service, they ate C-rations, which typically consisted of beans, fruit cocktail, inedible meat products, and cigarettes.  His teeth, in excellent condition upon his enlistment, were filled with cavities upon his return to the United States in 1951. <Wedel, Personal interviews, February/November, 2009>

In just six short months after Wedel’s transfer, the North Koreans would begin their invasion that started what President Truman preferred to call “the police action” in Korea.

Having given the background to the Korean conflict, in terms of readiness and equipment, John Wedel refers to his MCTA article, “The Porcupine: Lt. Col Harry Milne’s Command Tank.” In it, John Wedel tells the fascinating story of a major technological advance in military communications that has fallen completely “under the radar,” historically.  That advance was the development of “the Porcupine,” a tank turned into a communications center with so many aerials that it came to resemble its namesake.  And John Wedel was a key member of the team that made it.

Throughout military history, communications and the level of effectiveness of communications have always been a key element in success or failure.  The American military experience showed this particularly vividly during the Civil War when new developments such as the use of observation balloons allowed for improved artillery effectiveness and the use of the telegraph enabled President Lincoln to maintain close to his commanders even though separated by many miles.  A telling example of the impact of poor communication between Generals Lee and Stuart may have led to the South’s defeat at Gettysburg, which marked the beginning of the end for the Confederacy.  Thus, particularly for the American military, the development of the best possible communications between military units has often been a goal of the highest order.

In the case of the development of “the Porcupine,” the principle of having the closest communications center to battle translates into the most accurate and effective communications.  Thus, a tank, modified to incorporate the latest and most reliable radio communication, became the brainchild of one Captain Risner, Communications Officer of Headquarters Company, 2^nd Tank Battalion, 2^nd Marine Division.  According to John Wedel, “When the Korean War started (Captain Risner) proposed a tank that had all of the communications equipment required (for) coordinating and directing artillery, aircraft, infantry, tank and naval gunfire.” <Wedel, “The Porcupine” MCTA (2003)> In truth, calling in artillery and air support while on the offensive from the body of a tank, was an incredible innovation.

Corporal Wedel, the by now a nineteen-year old marine radio technician, became a key member of the team which created this communications innovation.  He writes:

Captain Risner requested a tank that could be modified as “The Command Tank.”  Due to the shortage of tanks, what we were given was an obsolete M4.  Captain Risner gave me the task to modify the tank and install the communication equipment.  The 105 mm howitzer was removed and replaced with a wooden gun barrel to make room for the electronic equipment…Extra batteries were installed in the ammunition compartment.  The turret was welded so it could not turn and break the electrical harnesses used by the communications equipment.”

Corporal Wedel and his crew began work on the tank at Camp Jejune and completed the work in Kobe, Japan, after their arrival at that jumping off point for Korea.  He remembers the dawn of this ingenious example of American common sense innovation—Porcupine and its crew:  “When the Korean War started, many units of the 2^nd Marine Division and some reserves were sent to San Diego to be integrated into the 1^st Marine Division to form a combat division.  Sergeant Street was our tank driver, called up from the reserves.  The assistant driver was Corporal LaRue, a regular.  I was stationed in the loader’s position to operate the radios for the Colonel or a Fire Control Officer.” <Wedel, (2003)>

From the landing at Inchon on September 15, 1950, to the recapture of Seoul two weeks later, to the battle north to Oijambo, to the landing at Wonsan, the drive to the Chosin Reservoir and subsequent retreat, the Porcupine and Corporal John Wedel were in the thick of it.  As the lightest tank in the battalion, with its wooden “cannon” and wiring instead of armor piercing projectiles, the Porcupine was on several occasions the lead tank, although it was usually placed in the middle of the tank column.  As John Wedel put it, “When we arrived on the Korean East Coast, Porcupine was selected to be the first tank to head north to Hagaru-ri.  It was our smallest and lightest tank and if we made it the larger M26’s would follow” <Wedel, (2003)>

Although Hagaru-ri and the Chosin campaign would sorely test Wendel and Porcupine, a spectacular amphibious operation, the “meat” of the Marine Corps mission, was yet to come.

The tides at Inchon are so great that in 1950 it was considered an impossibility to conduct an amphibious assault there.  Nevertheless, General MacArthur’s brilliant plan for an assault took advantage of that belief and the Marines and Navy made it happen.  Ironically, what happened to the Porcupine at Inchon on September 15, 1950, almost made its use as a major military innovation the shortest on record.

The LST which carried the Porcupine and its crew was Japanese—in an even greater irony, there were no American vessels available for the landing as most had been mothballed, scrapped, sold or given away—and their inexperience showed as they missed the beach and rammed one of the landing barriers.  By the time they made another run at it, the tide had turned and the Porcupine was dropped on a mud flat hundreds of yards from the beach.  Probably because of its relatively light weight, the M4 made its way gingerly and most incredibly across the mud and onto the beach to begin its communications work. <Wedel, (2003)>

Within two weeks of the Inchon landing, Seoul had been retaken, following its initial capture by the North Koreans on June 28, 1950, and the North Koreans began a panicked retreat, in many cases, simply dissolving as military units.  Meanwhile, the 1^st Marines were loaded aboard ship at Inchon and sailed on Oct. 15 for Wonsan, on the east coast of the Korean peninsula. On October 25, with a victorious end to the Korean conflict practically within sight and with United Nations troops pushing to the Yalu River, Chinese Communist forces began pouring across their border with North Korea.  On the very next day, October 26, the 1^st Marines landed at Wonsan.  This set the stage for a series of battles between the Chinese Peoples Liberation army and the 1^st Marine Division and several accompanying units, including a regiment of British Royal marines.  These battles throughout late November and into December, 1950, are often collectively referred to as the “Chosin Retreat.”

Ultimately, the 1^st Marines and army and U.N. forces connected with them were nearly overwhelmed at Chosin and forced to retreat through overwhelming odds back to the port of Hungnam where they and thousands of fleeing Korean civilians were finally evacuated on December 11.

The location of this series of battles is described by James A. Field in The History of United States Naval Operations: Korea:

Fifty miles north of Hungnam, at an altitude of 3,400 feet, lays the Chosin Reservoir. For 13 miles from north to south and 8 from east to west its narrow arms extend into the mountain valleys. At Yudam-ni at the western extremity there are a few square yards of flat land; at Hagaru at the southern tip there is rather more; but in general the shores are steep, and the hills which rim the water’s edge are ringed at a distance of five or ten miles by mountains rising 3,000 feet above the reservoir. The country is barren and sparsely populated; the vegetation a none-too-plentiful mixture of fir, aspen, and brush. Between Hungnam at the sea and Hagaru, where the Marine Division had established its advanced base, a single road, narrow, twisting, inadequate to heavy traffic, and with bridges of only light construction, provided the MSR (main supply route).

It was here in the area of the Chosin Reservoir that the Marine legend added another chapter.  Between November 24 and December 11, the 1^st Division Marines added two new problems to all those they were already facing: the Chinese army and the bitter cold of North Korea.  John Wedel remembers that the Arctic cold simply became a fact of life in those weeks.  It is noteworthy that the Chosin Few National Headquarters Fact Sheet reported the climate at the Chosin was considered even more severe than the Russian winter battlegrounds of World War II, which were so destructive to the German war effort in that theater. Temperatures in North Korea were documented at below -40F and winds to 78 miles per hour equivalent to -116F, and much lower by modern chill factors.

There was no way to keep warm, although one of Wedel’s efforts, which ultimately backfired, was to walk or run behind the Porcupine in an effort to take advantage of the heat from its engine.  This led to sweating and then to being chilled all over again.  As for the Chinese, with whom he had many close encounters, this former Marine remains ambivalent.  “The Chinese were not particularly brutal in my experience.  My main impression was that they did not want to be there.  They were cold, like we were, and frightened.” <Wedel, Personal interview, Nov. 12, 2009>

Author Eric Hammel, in his book Chosin (1981) draws several interesting views from what was, arguably, one of the greatest defeats in Marine Corps history:

If anything, the defeat that was meted out at the Chosin Reservoir was the defeat of possibly the most professional force of American men-at-arms ever assembled to that time.  Most of the officers and a great many of the enlisted men had been bloodied in World War II.  They knew precisely how to wage the war they waged, and they waged it well.  They were defeated by overwhelming numbers, which is forgivable.  They were defeated by incredibly bad weather, which is understandable if not entirely forgivable.  And they were defeated by the political game that their highest commanders chose to play against one another and, ultimately, against them.  That last was not without precedent, but is utterly unpardonable.

Kennedy Hickman (About.com) has a somewhat different take on the Chosin campaign:

While not a victory in the classic sense, the withdrawal from the Chosin Reservoir is revered as a high point in the history of the US Marine Corps.  In the fighting, the Marines and other UN troops effectively destroyed or crippled seven Chinese divisions, which attempted to block their progress.  Marine losses in the campaign numbered 836 killed and 12,000 wounded.  Most of the latter were frostbite injuries inflicted by the severe cold and winter weather.  US Army losses numbered around 2,000 killed and 1,000 wounded.  Precise casualties for the Chinese are not known but are estimated at 35,000 killed.

One incident that occurred during the retreat was typical of one action after another during those last days of November and the first days of December, 1950.  Wedel recalls:

As we proceeded down the road, the column stopped.  The road was on a knoll that crossed over a flat meadow.  The Chinese set up an ambush there.  The Marine Infantry was on the west side of the knoll and the Chinese on the east side, approximately twenty feet apart.  Our tank looked like a sparkler from the shells ricocheting off of it.  The M26 tanks used their 30 cal machine gun.  Porcupine did not have a turret gun so the colonel had the tank turned to face the Chinese so LaRue could use the 30 cal bow gun.  After firing several rounds, the bow gun jammed.  LaRue opened his hatch and stood up to fire the Thompson submachine gun.  You could see sparks from all the shells ricocheting all around him and it was a miracle he was not hit. <MCTA, (2003)>

Corporal John Wedel and Porcupine were there for all of it and John Wedel has yet another take on the elements and outcome of this fight.  In an interview fifty-eight years after that series of engagements, John Wedel makes four points with emphasis: First, the Marines did not comprise an entire division at the Chosin Reservoir.  His second point is that while the Marines had some allies at Chosin, particularly a regiment of British Royal Marines for which Wedel has the highest regard, the performance of nearby army units was abysmal.  Many army units left their units because they were told “to get behind the Marine lines”.  At Chosin, as at Hoengsong in March three months later, army units were poorly led, poorly equipped and so badly trained that, in his words, “Most of the soldiers we had contact with were untrained civilians in army uniforms.  If the army had done their job, many of our Marines would be alive today.” <Wedel, (2003)>

One relatively minor incident which occurred during the Chosin campaign illustrates Corporal Wedel’s and his fellow Marines’ frustration with army units involved with them:

On the third night of the Chinese attack, there was a big push by the Chinese on East Mountain.  We were holding our own, when we heard a noise like tanks coming down from the north.  The tanks were from the 31^st Battalion.  They lined up along the road facing East Mountain, and started to fire their 50 caliber machine guns at East Mountain.  This went on for hours.  They then left and went off toward Hagaru-ri.  We appreciated their help, but were upset with several things.  First, they should have stayed with their battalion, which was getting slaughtered at that time.  Second, they brought out on the backs of their tanks their Korean guards (used for night guard duty—a big mistake), and boxes of food. If they had decided to run from their battalion, why didn’t they bring out the wounded American soldiers who were left behind?”  <Personal Interview, November 12, 2009>

Third, the Marines were not defeated at Chosin.  As General Oliver Smith was reputed to have said, “We are not retreating.  We are advancing in another direction.”  Whether that is a true statement or strictly apocryphal, it fits John Wedel’s feelings.  “When we left the Reservoir,” he says, “there was no one left to fight.  The Chinese were finished.”  An interesting point the former Marine makes is that there was apparently little interest in the war at home.  He notes:

“From what I was told when I returned home, little news was reported about the Korean War.  Since the public was not interested in the war, we hardly ever saw a news reporter (explaining perhaps the lack of understanding back home).  In fact, I do not believe there were any reporters at the Reservoir.  The Marines knew the Chinese were beaten and wondered why we were ordered to leave.  Our tank commander (Lt. Col. Milne) was in charge of rear guard action.  When we left Hagaru-ri, there were no Chinese left in the area.”<Wedel, Personal Interview, February, 2009>

In his fourth point concerning his Korean experience, John Wedel, then corporal and later staff sergeant, has only the highest praise for the men of the Porcupine and their leader, Col. Milne.  In his article on Col. Milne and the Porcupine in the June, 2003 issue of the Marine Corps Tanker Association Magazine, Wedel states:

“… not enough can be said about the Colonel and the Marine Corps in Korea.  It was a privilege and a pleasure to serve under him.  He was an outstanding commander.  The Marines that I worked with in Porcupine were typical of the Marines that made up the 1^st Marine Division.  They were the best.  We worked with many different units from the US and other countries but none could compare to our Marines.”

The war wasn’t over for the 1^st Marine Division or for Corporal Wedel after they disembarked from Hungnam in December.  Returning to South Korea, they rested for just one week before being sent to Hoengsong, a town in central South Korea due east of Seoul.  On February 11, Communist troops had attacked an ROK unit whose responsibility was to provide protection for American artillery.  Attacking during the night, the Chinese completely overran the American artillery as ROK soldiers fled in panic.  A slaughter ensued that even the hardened 1^st Marines found appalling upon their discovery of the killing ground three weeks later.  Corporal Wedel was among the first to discover the remains of a number of his countrymen after a Chinese ambush February 12, which was described by Col. Harry Milne, Wedel’s commanding officer, as, “…as bad as anything I’ve ever seen…It was horrible.”<Wedel, (2003)>

After the discovery of the slaughtered soldiers, the Marines of the 1^st Tank Battalion learned, probably from a captured Chinese soldier, that the Chinese were planning a night attack on horseback.  According to John Wedel,

The plan was to have large searchlights on the hill and flame thrower tanks below in front of the lights…The plan was to let the Chinese on their horses come within range of the tanks, then turn on the lights.  The Chinese knew what a flame thrower tank looked like and were deathly afraid of them.  If they got within range of the tanks they would probably surrender rather than be burned alive.  We heard them starting their charge, but out of range of the tanks.  The army, as usual, panicked and turned on the lights…”  Clearly, the trap was sprung too soon and many of the Chinese escaped, although, according to Wedel’s narrative, “Many were still shot and their horses captured. <Wedel, (2003)>

After the Hoengsong campaign, the Korean battleground quieted for a time except for largely guerrilla activity and Corporal Wedel spent several months working on unit communications.  On August 1, 1951, he was transferred to back to Headquarters Battalion, Quantico, VA, and promoted to sergeant.  For the next year, Sergeant Wedel served as an instructor of radio installation and repair, primarily for graduates of the Naval Academy sent to Quantico for boot camp.  In August of 1952, by now Staff Sergeant, John O. Wedel officially ended his active duty with the United States Marines.  He continued working closely with the military for a time, repairing radios for the U.S. Coast Guard.  Just over one year after his discharge, John Wedel married that girl whom he had known since they were grade schoolers, his best friend’s sister, Peggy Flanagan.  Over time, they had two children, Mark and Dana, and today have six grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

John Wedel’s later career, first with Westinghouse, and later with Electronic Communications, Inc., was connected to his Marine Corps service like the elements of a two-stage rocket.  His Marine Corps work in technology was the first stage, igniting his skill and experience with radios into later work with phased array radar antennas and radar, and their many applications in modern technology, the second stage.  In his words, “We did good work.”

John Wedel’s story as an American citizen and Marine is as alike and as unique as that of every other Marine since the beginning of the service.  Modest to a fault about his own contributions, there is no hesitation in his praise of the officers and men with whom he served in the Corps.  Despite the suffering many Americans endured in Korea, and particularly all of the men associated with the Chosin Reservoir, there is absolutely no bitterness in his voice as he relates, with incredible objectivity and calm, the literally earth-shaking things he experienced in “the forgotten war.”

This member of the “Chosin Few,” like all of his fellows who fought in that hellish, nearly forgotten campaign represents all those qualities in the men and women who have sacrificed themselves for their comrades and their country since the first soldiers of the Continental Army faced misery, disease and death in the fateful winter of 1777-78 at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania.  Free men and women who decide to sacrifice their safety, their health, and their lives to protect a country which represents, as Abraham Lincoln called “The last, best hope of earth,” they personify, regardless of their era, “the greatest generation.

William Dillon, Ed.D

November 16, 2009