Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River

Overview

The Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River, also known as the Battle of the Ch'ongch'on, was a battle in the Korean War that took place from November 25 to December 2, 1950, along the Ch'ongch'on River Valley in the northwestern part of North Korea. In response to the successful Chinese First Phase Offensive against the United Nations (UN) forces, General Douglas MacArthur launched the Home-by-Christmas Offensive to expel the Chinese forces from Korea and to end the war. Anticipating this reaction, the Chinese People's Volunteer Army (PVA) Commander Peng Dehuai planned a counteroffensive, dubbed the "Second Phase Campaign", against the advancing UN forces.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Significance

The Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River was the decisive engagement of the Chinese People's Volunteer Army's Second Phase Campaign, which shattered MacArthur's Home-by-Christmas Offensive and fundamentally altered the course of the Korean War. UN forces, numbering over 254,000, had advanced expecting to end the conflict, but PVA commander Peng Dehuai had anticipated this move and prepared a large-scale counteroffensive. The resulting engagement inflicted approximately 11,000 UN casualties while UN forces in turn caused an estimated 45,000 Chinese casualties. The battle effectively ended UN hopes of a rapid conclusion to the war and forced a large-scale retreat from the Ch'ongch'on River Valley in northwestern North Korea, pushing the front lines dramatically southward and transforming the conflict from what MacArthur had framed as a final offensive into a prolonged war of attrition that would last until the 1953 armistice.

Forces & casualties

Commanders (11)