Oliver P. Smith

Born October 26, 1893
Menard, Texas
Died December 25, 1977
Los Altos, California

American military leader

As the commander of the First Division of the U.S. Marines, Oliver P. Smith led the highly acclaimed division in its renowned battles in the first year of the Korean War: the successful amphibious landing at Inchon and the grueling battles against the Chinese in the Chosin (Changjin) Reservoir. Smith was a thoughtful, cautious military leader who preferred strategy and planning to rash actions. Known for being soft-spoken and polite, when it came to risking the lives of the men in his command, Smith objected loudly and strongly to the orders from his superiors, General Edward M. Almond (1892–1979), the commander of the X Corps, and General Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964; see entry), the commander of the United Nations forces in Korea. Very few military leaders, including his superiors, had dared stand up to MacArthur, even when they knew he was making rash and dangerous decisions. Many historians credit Smith's heroic leadership in Chosin for saving the lives of large numbers of his troops and avoiding a total massacre.

Becoming a marine

Oliver Prince Smith was born in 1893 in Texas but grew up in California. He attended the University of California at Berkeley, graduating in 1916. In 1917, he was commissioned a second lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve. When the United States entered World War I (1914–18), he was stationed at Guam in the western Pacific, where he joined the regular Marine Corps.

After World War I ended, Smith held a number of positions in the Marine Corps, including commanding a marine unit aboard a ship for two years and being attached to the gendarmerie, a combined army and police force, in Haiti for three years. He graduated from the army's infantry school and from the école Supérieure de Guerre in Paris, France, and became an instructor in operations and training, specializing in amphibious warfare (carried out on land, sea, and air), at the marine corps school in Quantico, Virginia.

In June 1940, Smith became commanding officer of the First Battalion of the Sixth Marine Regiment and in May 1941, took the regiment to Iceland, where he remained until March 1942.

World War II

Smith spent the first years of U.S. involvement in World War II (1939–45) in Washington D.C. In May 1942, he became the executive officer of the Division of Plans and spent two years on the staff at the Marine Corps Headquarters. He was given a combat assignment in January 1944 as the commander of the Fifth Marine Regiment, First Division. He successfully led the regiment through a campaign in New Britain, an island in the South Pacific that is part of New Guinea. After the campaign he was promoted to brigadier general and became the assistant commander of the First Marine Division. In that position, Smith commanded the operations on the beaches of the Peleliu and Ngesebus Islands in the September and October 1944 campaign.

Smith was quickly earning the respect of his superiors for his carefully planned strategies and his intelligent assessment of situations. For his action in the South Pacific islands he received a Legion of Merit Award, which read, in part (as quoted in the Marine Corps Research Center, Marine Corps University, O. P. Smith Collection):

Brigadier General Smith displayed marked professional skill in supervision of the training of the division in landing operations, greatly enhancing its efficiency in the technique of reef landing to a point where successful landings on both islands were made under the most difficult of conditions. Although the initial beachhead was under intense enemy fire, Brigadier General Smith coolly coordinated the three assault regimental combat teams so that the division was able to advance to its initial objectives, repel several intense counterattacks, and launch an attack which gained the Peleliu airdrome.

After the action at Peleliu, Smith served as the Marine Corps deputy chief of staff to the commander of the Tenth Army, to which the First Marines Division was attached. With the Tenth Army he saw action in the Okinawa, Japan, campaign just prior to the end of the war. After World War II, Smith returned to the United States to become the commandant of the Marine Corps School at Quantico.

The Korean War begins

Though the Korean War began in 1950, it was rooted in an arrangement established at the end of World War II. In August 1945, when the Japanese, who were occupying Korea, were defeated, the general order for their surrender included a provision for Korea that had the U.S. troops accepting the Japanese surrender south of the 38th parallel (the dividing line between northern and southern Korea) and the Soviets, who were already on the Korean border, receiving the surrender north of it. Soon the United Nations, and the U.S. government's request, sponsored elections in Korea, with the idea that Korea would become independent after a leader was chosen. (The UN was founded in 1945 to maintain worldwide peace and to develop friendly relations among countries.) The Soviet Union and the northern Koreans did not accept the United Nations' authority to decide the future of Korea, and they refused to take part in the elections. The vote was nonetheless held in southern Korea, without the northern Koreans, and a new government was formed to rule a united Republic of Korea (ROK). Not accepting that government, the Koreans in the north held their own elections and established the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). In the summer of 1950, as North Korea invaded South Korea—both countries hoped to reunify Korea under their leadership—the United Nations, with the strong backing of the United States, entered the war to aid the South Koreans. After the North Koreans suffered massive

losses in counterattacks by the South Koreans and their allies, the Chinese came to the aid of the North Koreans.

By 1950, Smith had been promoted to major general. He took command of the First Marine Division at around the time the North Koreans invaded South Korea on June 25, 1950. In the early days of the war, the better trained and equipped North Korean People's Army relentlessly drove the South Koreans as well as U.S. Army troops steadily southward in one disorganized retreat after another. By the end of July, U.S. and South Korean forces were concentrated in an area called the Pusan Perimeter, in southeast South Korea. By the end of July, it was clear that the training and experience of the marines was desperately needed.

Meanwhile, General Douglas MacArthur had a plan. He formed a new corps separate from General Walton H. "Johnnie" Walker 's (1889–1950; see entry) Eighth Army, then penned in at the Pusan Perimeter. MacArthur's new X Corps, under the command of General Almond, would carry out an amphibious invasion (a coordinated attack using land, sea, and air) at the port of Inchon, thirty miles from Seoul and well to the north of the defense line. Knowing that the First Marines were on their way to Asia, he asked the Joint Chiefs of Staff to send them to him for deployment at Inchon. (The Joint Chiefs are the advisors to the president and the secretary of defense on matters of war and are responsible for developing battle plans and directing unified combat actions.) After heated debate, the Joint Chiefs reluctantly agreed. Between August 14 and 18, 1950, Smith sent a hastily pulled-together division by ship to Asia.

Inchon

MacArthur's plans to land at Inchon caused a great deal of concern among military and defense leaders. The tides at Inchon are among the most dangerous in the world, the islands surrounding it were held by the enemy, and there were many other ports that made more sense. Smith, an expert on amphibious warfare, was among those who argued for another point of attack. He tried to discuss the matter with Almond, but Almond was insulting and dismissive to Smith, starting ill will between the two that lasted into other battles. Smith said of his conference with Almond, as quoted in Joseph C. Goulden's Korea: The Untold Story of the War: "I tried to tell him a few of the facts of life, and he was rather supercilious [patronizing or haughty], and he called me 'son,' which kind of annoyed me."

Smith and his division went ahead with the plans for Inchon. In one of the most famous battles of the war, a huge fleet of ships, well supported by aircraft, landed at the port city without much difficulty. The marines were the first to hit the beaches and secure the city, incurring few casualties. Inchon was a smashing success and the months of retreat were over.

On from Inchon

The X Corps drove on from Inchon to liberate the capital city of Seoul from the North Koreans. Almond told Smith that MacArthur wanted the capture of the city by September 25, to mark the three-month anniversary of the initial invasion of the South on June 25. Smith viewed the order with some disgust, not wanting to rush the operation and risk hundreds of his troops' lives for a publicity gesture. Smith's own strategy for invasion would have cut off the enemy from aid, ensuring the safety of his men, but it would have taken longer. Almond wanted a direct attack immediately. The arguments persisted. In the end Smith obeyed Almond's orders, but ordered his units to move slowly and with great caution. They fought a desperate battle against the well-armed North Koreans. Even after the main battle, there were several more days of vicious fighting inside the city before the UN forces held the capital. Smith later learned that Almond told the press that Seoul had been recaptured before the first battle had even started.

After the capture of Seoul, the North Korean army was exhausted, and the Eighth Army and X Corps pushed on up to the 38th parallel and beyond. MacArthur split the two armies, with the Eighth Army going by ground north from the 38th parallel and X Corps going by boat to the port city of Wonsan. Smith grimly obeyed orders that cost the Marines two weeks at sea when they could have been in hot pursuit by land. When the Marines finally reached Wonsan, the South Korean soldiers had already liberated it.

The Battle at the Chosin Reservoir

After great delay, the First Marines moved on, again under the command of Almond, up into North Korea toward its border with China at the Yalu River. The X Corps was still split from the Eighth Army. Having heard that Chinese troops had attacked the South Korean soldiers, Smith was very apprehensive about following the orders to send his division into the Chosin (Changjin) Reservoir in North Korea. If an attack of any power occurred, they were without standard support and there were too few of them to safely cover such a large territory.

Smith was in a difficult position. Known as the "intellectual" Marine—soft-spoken, thoughtful, polite, and very intelligent—he reacted strongly against the rashness of MacArthur's plan to race up through North Korea without adequate support for his units. While the Joint Chiefs and the Truman administration were very concerned about MacArthur's plans to use UN forces near the Chinese border and especially about his splitting the Eighth Army from the X Corps, no one had the nerve to stand up to the charismatic and dramatic commanding general. Smith had the nerve. He argued fiercely with the commander up until the day the order came through to proceed. Then he had no alternative but to obey. He ordered an airstrip to be built in the city of Hagaru, so that casualties— of which he thought there would be many—could be taken out. He ordered his units to move north from the port of Hungnam very slowly, taking time to continuously restock ammunition and supplies. His precautions were to save many lives in the brutal days ahead.

On the night of November 27, 1950, as the Marines of the Fifth and Seventh regiments set up positions in the frozen hills of the Chosin Reservoir, three Chinese divisions attacked. The Chinese had heard of the First Marine Division and knew it was a formidable enemy, so they sent a powerful force out to annihilate them. The marines were outnumbered by more than three to one and the casualties were tremendous. The Chinese cut off their road of exit and surrounded them.

That night, an anguished Smith listened by radio to the reports of what was happening to his marines in Chosin. The Eighth Army had already been defeated and there was no longer any point to the offensive. His men were being slaughtered for a doomed mission. He desperately tried to reach Almond to get new orders. He did not hear back from Almond for nearly two days. Unable to order a retreat without permission, Smith ordered the Fifth and Seventh Marine regiments to forget their offensive, but to continue to defend their positions.

"When you break out, you attack"

In the late hours of November 28, Smith finally received orders to retreat. Under the very extreme circumstances, he staged a remarkably orderly withdrawal of the First Division while it was being assaulted by eight enemy divisions. Under his skillful leadership his troops were able to inflict great damage on the attacking Chinese units and remain in position as they worked their way out of the trap. The marines had no history of retreating and the breaking story caused a sensation worldwide. When war correspondents questioned Smith about the retreat, he snapped back at them, "Retreat, hell, we are simply attacking in another direction." The quote became famous. Donald Knox's oral history The Korean War: Pusan to Chosin provides Smith's explanation of this quote from a later interview: "You can't retreat or withdraw when you are surrounded. The only thing you can do is break out. When you break out, you attack. That's what we were doing." In fact, the retreat to Hagaru from November 28 through December 5 presented some of the most brutal fighting in the Korean War.

When they had completed one of the most fierce ordeals in U.S. Marine history, the marines had not been able to carry out their mission, but they had defied the Chinese efforts to annihilate them. The Chinese had sent twelve divisions to face three American and two South Korean divisions and they had focused most of their manpower on the First Marines. By managing to survive at such odds, in brutal sub-zero temperatures, the First Marines had a true victory. But of the approximately twenty-five thousand troops from the UN forces in the Chosin campaign, there were six thousand casualties: one in every four men had been killed, wounded, or was missing in action.

By the new year, the X Corps was incorporated into the Eighth Army. Smith returned to the United States in the spring of 1951, where he took command of the Marine base Camp Pendleton in southern California. He was promoted to lieutenant general in 1953 and took command of the Fleet Marine Force, Atlantic. He retired from the military in 1955 to live a private life for the next twelve years. Smith was married to Esther King and the couple had two daughters. He died in Los Altos, California, in 1977.

Where to Learn More

Alexander, Bevin. Korea: The First War We Lost. New York: Hippocrene Books, 1986, revised edition, 2000.

Goulden, Joseph C. Korea: The Untold Story of the War. New York: Times Books, 1982.

Knox, Donald. The Korean War: Pusan to Chosin: An Oral History. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1988.

Ohl, John Kennedy. "Oliver P. Smith." In The Korean War: An Encyclopedia, edited by Stanley Sandler. New York: Garland Publishing, 1999.

Webster's American Military Biographies. Springfield, MA: G. & C. Merriam Company, 1978.

Web sites

"O. P. Smith Collection." Marine Corps Research Center, Marine Corps University. [Online] http://www.mcu.usmc.mil/MCRCweb/archive5smith.html (accessed on August 14, 2001).