Word: koreas
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...also the longest distance that airborne troops had ever been flown to a parachute drop. A fleet of 44 C-141s and 33 smaller, slower propjet C-130 Hercules transports carried 2,500 men and 721 tons of supplies and equipment from the eastern U.S. to South Korea. Aside from the weather delay, there were few untoward hitches in the military exercise. One paratrooper's static line failed to release him, and he dangled behind the aircraft until he could cut himself loose with a knife. The 82nd's commander, Major General John Deane, parachuted smack into...
Focus Retina, which cost about $1.5 million, was intended as a show of force to discourage the North Korean commando incursions into the South that have grown increasingly bold since the beginning of 1968. In Pyongyang, North Korea's Foreign Ministry denounced the U.S. for "running wild to provoke a new war in Korea." The exercise, said the Communists, was "the most wanton violation of the Korean Armistice agreement and a reckless playing with fire, threatening peace in Asia and the rest of the world." In the six days before the U.S. parachute drop, four firefights broke...
...best troops to South Viet Nam, feels he may have to withdraw all or part of that force if pressure from Pyongyang continues. He knows that the U.S. cannot spare more men to add to the 55,000 it already has on the ground in South Korea...
Washington, of course, would like him to keep his troops in Viet Nam, so Exercise Focus Retina was set up to show Park that reinforcements could be moved swiftly from the U.S. to South Korea if needed. It may have succeeded too well. The South Korean army already guards all but 18 miles of the 151-mile frontier with North Korea. South Korean officials were impressed with the speed of the U.S. airlift. But they are now worried that the U.S. may try to pull some of its forces out of Korea on the grounds that in any emergency...
...gradually in Moscow, however, assert that the Chinese force involved was the equivalent of a regiment-about 3,000 men. It is in the Soviet interest to portray China's belligerence in lurid terms. Moscow's reports were strongly phrased and probably exaggerated. The Chinese employed their Korea-proven "human wave" attacks-and Moscow claims that Russian casualities were heavy, although exact totals have not been released so far. A Soviet counterattack, using armored cars, reportedly cleared the island. Soviet Colonel Demokrat V. Leonov was killed, and the scale of fighting indicates that both sides probably suffered substantially...