1968 North Korean Attempt To Assassinate the ROK President

[2RHPZ]

[The Dawn of Modern Korea] Trying to Bring the House Down

By Andrei Lankov

On Jan. 16, 1968, a bus left a top secret North Korean military base in Hwanghae Province. The passengers were officers of the elite ‘Unit 124,’ young and fit soldiers in their mid-20s. That evening they departed for a special mission in Seoul.

Their morale was high: the soldiers believed that their operation would hasten the collapse of the ‘puppet regime’ in the South. They were given the password for passing through the DMZ on their way back, but they understood: the chance they would ever get to use the password was close to zero. Theirs was a mission of no return. The 31 North Korean commandos were supposed to attack the Blue House, the official residence of the South Korean presidents.

At some point in 1966 the North Korean leaders (in all probability, Kim Il-sung himself) decided that the South was ripe for a Vietnamese-style revolution. This was a gross misjudgement, but for a few years Pyongyang acted in accordance with this assumption. Thousands of Koreans on both sides of the DMZ paid with their lives for this miscalculation.

‘Unit 124’ was trained for guerrilla and terrorist activities in the South. The unit included a number of Southerners who had moved to the North, with their parents, prior to or during the Korean War. This is yet another reminder that the entire Korean conflict was essentially a civil war where Koreans fought Koreans.

The Korea Times (http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/opinion/200402/kt2004020417202411410.htm)

... thanks to historic-battles.com (www.historic-battles.com) forum ...

[KB]

Thanks for sharing.

[Jedburgh]

Little-known Korean border war offers lessons for Iraq, Afghanistan (http://www.newsobserver.com/nation_world/story/2832650p-9283560c.html)
Dubbed the Second Korean Conflict by historians and veterans, this undeclared and relatively unknown border war lasted 37 months from late 1966 until late 1969.

But if the Korean War is America's "forgotten war," then the Second Korean Conflict is its forgotten echo.

Few know about this successful defensive campaign against North Korean infiltrators who hoped to drive a wedge between the United States and South Korea. Fewer still realize that the fighting along the Korean DMZ marked an American military victory that offers bedrock lessons for the counterinsurgency campaigns against the irregular forces fighting American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"It turned out differently than the Vietnam War, but nobody knows about it," said Army BG Daniel P. Bolger, author of the most detailed comprehensive historical analysis of the Second Korean Conflict and commander of the team training the new Iraqi army. "It was a success. It's like Sherlock Holmes -- the dog that didn't bark. When you hold the line against bad things and you do what you're supposed to do, you don't get special credit for that."
Written when the BG was a Major, his book is available on-line at the Combined Arms Research Library (http://www-cgsc.army.mil/CARL/) of the General Staff College. But - unfortunately - not in downloadable pdf. You have to read it online, or try to find a hard copy.

Scenes From an Unfinished War: Low Intensity Conflict in Korea, 1966-1969 (http://www-cgsc.army.mil/carl/resources/csi/Bolger/bolger.asp)
In Leavenworth Paper No. 19 Major Daniel P. Bolger, USA has subjected the events and evolution of this more recent Korean conflict to close analytical scrutiny. The results of his effort require careful study. He not only describes in detail the vast range of military operations short of war that an adversary can employ against countries supported by the United States, but he also assesses how allied forces can adapt to the unexpected and devise countermeasures that, if not completely effective, can at least disrupt the designs of the adversary so he cannot obtain his primary objectives. Through the exemplary leadership of General Charles H. Bonesteel III, Bolger also demonstrates the importance of personality in warfare and the essential need for officers to recognize the dominance of political considerations at the lower end of the conflict spectrum. In short, Bolgers' study reinforces current doctrine. which states emphatically that commanders and staff officers "must adopt courses of action which legally support those political considerations even if the courses of action appear to be unorthodox or outside what traditional doctrine had contemplated".

[madjack]

Scenes From an Unfinished War: Low Intensity Conflict in Korea, 1966-1969

Got a copy back home in my library next to Joe Bermudez' book on NK SOF.

[RFSU]

There was a movie made not long ago about the South Korean retaliation. as I remember it they tried a dirty dozen type mission but all the commandos mutinied.

edit: the movie is called "Silmido"