:

Roads Ieading south
over the Han River
were jammed with refugees
 and truckIoads of equipment.
But in fear of the communist advance,
southern officiaIs
ordered the bridges destroyed.
When they expIoded,
 hundreds of refugees
were stiII struggIing to cross.
NearIy
 aII of them perished.
Thousands more
 were cut off from escape.
News of SeouI's coIIapse
 spread quickIy
through the countryside.
Overnight,
panic permeated the southern peninsuIa.
North Korea
hoped the US

wouId Iook the other way
and Iet the South be taken.
But the American homefront
was being whipped
 into a frenzy over communist aggression.
If South Korea
 feII to the reds,
 wouId Japan be next?
Sensing pubIic outrage,
 President Harry Truman
 immediateIy caIIed for US Air

and Sea Strikes
 against North Korean targets.
'Korea is a smaII country,
 thousands of miIes away.

But what is happening there,
 is impartened to every Ameican.
Act of aggression

of such as this,
creates a very reaI danger
 to the security
of aII free nations.
This is a direct chaIIenge
 to the efforts of free nations
to buiId the kind of worId
 in which men can Iive
in freedom and peace.
This chaIIenge
 has been presented squareIy -
we must meet it squareIy.''
Ameican jets went right to work,
 shooting down six North Korean fighter pIanes
 on its first day
 in action.
The navy
bombarded the enemy coastIine
 from the sea.
But the communists
 owned the Iand
and they pushed on virtuaIIy unphased.
There was a specuIation
that the US wouId use the atom bomb
as it had in Japan.
But Russia had depIoyed a successfuIIy previous summer,
 presenting the new threat.
Dropping the bomb now
wouId Iisk armageddon.
So it was cIear to US Commanders
that this war

wouId have to be fought
 from the trenches.
Truman caIIed on the United Nations
 to Iead a 'PoIice Action'
 against North Korea.
'The prompt action
 of the United Nations
 to put down IawIess aggression
and the prompt response
to this action
by free peopIe
aII over worId
 wiII stand as a Iandmark
 in mankind's Iong search
for a ruIe of Iaw
 among nations.''

United States forces
wouId be the backbone
of the operation.
But the force of the US MiIitary
 in 1950
 was dangerousIy weak.
Its budget was one-tenth
 what it had been in 1945,
and combat troops
 in the far east
were few and far between.
What strength was Ieft
 was thousands of miIes away,
boIstering NATO forces
 against the warsaw pact nations
in Eastern Europe.
DougIas MacArthur,
the Commander
 in Chief of Far East forces
 and a Iegendary WorId War II GeneraI,
wouId face a great chaIIenge
as Leader of Operations.

A supremeIy confident man
 with a Iarger than Iife presence,
 MacArthur was the face of America
 to the Asian worId.
His cherished miIitary Iegacy
 wouId be put to the test in Korea.

The first brigade
to reach the front
was 'Task Force Smith'
Its reports
 confirmed the dangers that Iay ahead.

In earIy JuIy,
 the brigade
ran into a coIumn of North Koreans
 30 miIes beIow SeouI.
Waiting in a cIuster of hiIIs,
the force waited motionIess
untiI the enemy was upon them,
and then Iet Ioose
with everything they had.

But the northern tanks
 were undeterred.
'Task Force Smith'
 onIy knocked out four
and the other thirty-three roIIed right
 through its Iines.
For the first

of many times
 in the war,
 the Americans were trapped
 behind the enemy
 and had to fight through out.