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Significant
Quotations during the Korean War
"Request
immediate assignment Marine Regimental Combat Team and supporting
Air Group for duty this command. . ."
On July
2, 1950, General Douglas MacArthur requested Marines to augment
U.S. forces in Korea. 
".
. . these Marines have the swagger, confidence, and hardness
that must have been in Stonewall Jackson's Army of the Shenandoah.
They remind me of the Cold streams at Dunkerque."
A British
military officer, visiting U.S. Marines in Korea included
the above statement in his daily report to the British command
in Tokyo, August 16, 1950.
"The
amphibious landing is the most powerful tool we have."
General
Douglas MacArthur, USA, Planning Conference for the Battle
of Inchon, 1950.
"I
can almost hear the ticking of the second hand of destiny.
We must act now or we will die. . . . We shall land at Inchon,
and I shall crush them."
General
Douglas MacArthur, USA, at a meeting with his commanders,
Tokyo, August 23, 1950.
"I
know that this operation will be sort of helter-skelter.
But the 1st Marine Division is going to win the war by landing
at Inchon."
General
Douglas MacArthur, USA, in conversation with Major General
0. P. Smith, USMC, August 1950.
"The
amphibious landing of U.S. Marines on September 1950 at
Inchon, on the west coast of Korea, was one of the most
audacious and spectacularly successful amphibious landings
in all naval history."
Bernard
Brodie, A Guide to Naval Strategy, p. 238,
"Our
tactical air arm should spend a few months with the Marines.
I don't know what causes the difference, but it is there.
The Marine pilots give us the impression that they are breaking
their hearts to help us out."
By an Army
captain in Korea: Quoted from Combat Forces Journal; Geer,
The New Breed; Heinl, Soldiers of the Sea, p. 570,
"Retreat
Hell! We're just attacking in another direction."
Attributed
to Major General Oliver P. Smith, CG of the 1st Marine Division
in Korea (1950), regarding his order for Marines to move southeast
to the Hamhung area from the Hagaru perimeter.
"We've
been looking for the enemy for several days now, we've finally
found them. We're surrounded. That simplifies our problem
of getting to these people and killing them."
Attributed
to Colonel Lewis B. "Chesty" Puller during the Chosin Reservoir
campaign in Korea, November 1950. Quoted in Marine! The Life
of LtGen Lewis B. (Chesty) Puller, USMC (Ret.)
"The
safest place in Korea was right behind a platoon of Marines.
Lord, how they could fight. The Reds told us they were afraid
to tangle with the Marines and avoided them when they could
be located."
Major
General Frank E. Lowe, USA, Presidential observer on Korean
War, in the Washington Daily News 26 Jan 1952.
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UNITED
STATES MARINE CORPS
