Battle of Chipyong-ni

After Chinese forces unexpectedly entered the Korean War in November 1950, the greatly outnumbered and surprised UN forces retreated below the 38th parallel. Plans were even made for complete withdrawal from the peninsula. Lieutenant General Matthew Ridgway decided to make a stand at Chipyong-ni and also at Wonju. He recognized that Chinese forces had overstretched their supply lines and would not be able to keep up their advance much longer. Ridgway intended to use the 23rd Regimental Combat Team to blunt the Chinese attack so that the Eighth Army could carry out a counterattack before the Chinese had a chance to consolidate their forces. ==Prelude==

Following the Battle of the Twin Tunnels on 1 February 1951, the 23rd Regimental Combat Team (RCT) under the command of Paul L. Freeman Jr. reached the important crossroads town of Chipyong-ni on 3 February and immediately set up a perimeter defense. Over the next few days, the 23rd RCT dug in and was reinforced by artillery, tank, and engineer elements. By 13 February, their strength consisted of three infantry battalions; the French Battalion and 1st Ranger Company, both attached to the regiment; the 37th Field Artillery Battalion; Battery B, 82nd Antiaircraft Artillery Automatic Weapons Battalion; Battery B, 503rd Field Artillery Battalion; Company B, 2nd Engineer Battalion (Combat); elements of the 2nd Signal Co. (attached); and a platoon from the 2nd Medical Battalion. In all, Freeman had 4,500 men under his command, including 2,500 front-line infantrymen. Informed of this, Freeman began to strengthen his defenses and requested resupply by air and airstrikes for 14 February. He deployed his 1st Battalion to the northern part of the perimeter, the 2nd to the south, and the 3rd on the east, with the French on the western side. The 1st Battalion's Company B and the Rangers were kept in reserve behind the 1st Battalion line. ==Battle==

Day 1 Throughout the day, Freeman kept advancing Chinese forces at bay with artillery fire and air attacks. During the afternoon, the Chinese forces took up positions around the 23rd's perimeter, though their attempts to advance were stopped by artillery. The U.S. forces observed heavy flare activity throughout the afternoon. Early in the evening, Freeman gathered his unit commanders and told them to expect an attack during the night. At 14:00, the Chinese retreated from their position inside the perimeter under pressure from an Air Force napalm bombardment and an attack by B Company, in which they lost 50% of their men. When B Company took the position at 16:30, its soldiers could see Task Force Crombez in the distance; the task force arrived at 17:25 with nearly 20 tanks. Now short of supplies, their roadblocks penetrated, and their casualties mounting, the Chinese withdrew to the north. According to the memoirs of Xu Guofu, commander of the 119th Division and also field commander of the Chinese forces at Chipyong-ni, five Chinese infantry regiments were deployed to attack the UN troops in this area by Deng Hua, third commander and commissar of the Chinese People Volunteer Army. However, two regiments (the 343rd and 376th) lost their way in the dark and wound up in the wrong place. Due to poor communications, only three regiments (356th, 357th, and 359th) numbering around 3,000 soldiers, were actually committed to the attack on Chipyong-ni. After a bloody fight overnight, on the morning of 15 February, Xu's troops broke through the perimeter and expected to launch another attack when night fell. But Xu received an order from Wen Yucheng, commander of the 40th Army, to withdraw as the Chinese discovered that there were over 6,000 UN troops in Chipyong-ni instead of the initial estimate of 1,000 men. In the aftermath of the battle, Xu insisted that the West overestimated Chinese casualties. According to him, the three Chinese regiments committed to the attack suffered a little over 900 casualties, one third of which were killed (Xu does not give figures for non-combat casualties or prisoners). ==Aftermath==

UN casualties during the battle numbered 51 killed, 250 wounded, and 42 missing. The Chinese lost approximately 2,000 killed and 3,000 wounded. Ridgway continued by saying: The headquarters of the Chinese XIX Army Group, in a critique of the battle which was later captured and translated, described the shock of the armored spearhead which battered its way into Chipyong-Ni: and continued ==Awards==

On 20 February, Sergeant First Class William S. Sitman, a machine gun section leader in M Company, was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for bravery during the battle after he threw himself on a grenade to save five of his fellow soldiers. On 3 January 2025, Private Bruno R. Orig was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions on 15 January 1951, manning a machine-gun allowing a platoon to safely withdraw. After the battle, the 23rd RCT and all attached units were awarded the United States Army Distinguished Unit Citation. ==Notes==