Edward L. Rowny
A
The engineering troops assigned to me performed extremely well. With a few
exceptions, we had first-class leaders and soldiers. One poor lieutenant colonel
saw his commander killed while working under fire and cracked up under the
strain. He couldn't understand why we had to push so fast to construct the bridge.
"Why build the bridge under fire?" he argued. `Why not wait until the infantry
has cleaned out the enemy pockets of resistance and then finish building the
bridge?" But we were under orders to finish the bridge before noon on September
25th. MacArthur had attached a great deal of importance to the symbolic
significance of that date.
Although all units performed well, there was one National Guard battalion from
Alabama that did exceptionally well. There had been some discussion at
headquarters over whether or not a National Guard engineer battalion could hold
its own in competition with regular Army units. But the National Guard battalion
assigned to me was absolutely superb. It caused many officers to change their
minds about the performance of National Guard units.
Engineer, X Corps, Eighth Army, East Coast, Korea
Q ..
After the capture of Seoul, how soon was it before you began thinking about the
next step, the landing on the east coast?
A ..
The X Corps staff had made prior plans to follow up the capture of Seoul with an
amphibious landing on the east coast. However, our movement into Seoul went so
quickly that it took several days to regroup and prepare for the next stage.
Q ..
At that time was there a question about whether UN forces would be allowed to
move north of the 38th Parallel?
A
No, We were not looking at the situation politically but only from a military point
of view. While the 38th Parallel came in for a great deal of discussion later on,
it did not have much impact on our planning at the time.
The basic question to be decided was whether we should introduce more forces
through Inchon and move to the north, or whether it would be better to go around
to the other side where the enemy was weaker and move north from there. The
decision was to move to the east and then proceed north from there.
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