In the following excerpt from War Stories of the Tankers, Lt. Chris Byron (U.S. Army) recounts his experience as a tank commander in the 70th Tank Battalion at Songhyon-ni, South Korea on October 12, 1950.
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I served in the Korean War as a platoon leader and was a member of the 70th Tank Battalion, which was attached to the 1st Cavalry Division.
In Korea, because of the terrain, tank battalions and even tank companies didn’t operate together as a unit. We were usually parceled out to an infantry unit. Quite often, it was just a platoon of tanks that was attached to an infantry battalion, and the platoon operated under the direction of the infantry battalion commander. Chances were that he didn’t know anything about tanks. Even so, some of them were pretty good. One would say to me, “Tell me how you can help us in this mission that we have.” Others were bullheaded and told you what to do. They thought they knew everything, like the one that I worked under quite a bit, Lt. Col. Paul Clifford. A good example would be on October 12, 1950.
Colonel Clifford commanded the 2nd Battalion of the 5th Cavalry Regiment. His battalion was given the mission of passing through the 8th Cavalry in a place called Songhyon-ni and attacking toward Kumchon, South Korea. On that morning, Colonel Clifford told me that he wanted me to lead an attack through a valley that contained heavy ground fog. Fog was not a common occurrence in Korea, but on that day, it was thick. I told the colonel that because of the heavy ground fog the gunners could not see through their telescopic sites; under those circumstances, it would be much better if the infantry lead the attack. His reply to me was, “If you can’t see them, they can’t see you.” Of course, you know, they could hear us coming, and because of the size of the tanks, we would be seen first. Tanks in those days were not known for their stealth in storming enemy positions.
