A War of Patrols

Canadian Army Operations in Korea

By William Johnston
Categories: History, Military History, Canadian History
Series: Studies in Canadian Military History
Publisher: UBC Press
Hardcover : 9780774810081, 448 pages, May 2003
Paperback : 9780774810098, 448 pages, January 2004
Ebook (EPUB) : 9780774841061, 448 pages, November 2011
Ebook (PDF) : 9780774850544, 448 pages, November 2007

Table of contents

Introduction

Prologue: Verrieres Ridge, Normandy, July 1944

1 War and Recruitment, June - August 1950

2 Rocky’s Army, September 1950 - April 1951

3 Into Battle, December 1950 - March 1951

4 Kap’yong, April 1951

5 The Brigade Arrives, May - July 1951

6 The Commonwealth Division, July - October 1951

7 The First Rotation, October 1951

8 No Withdrawal, No Panic, November 1951

9 The Active Defence, December 1951 - April 1952

10 The Professionals, May - June 1952

11 The Inactive Defence, July - October 1952

12 On the Hook, November 1952 - April 1953

13 The Third Battalions, May - July 1953

Epilogue

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Description

The extended peace the world anticipated following the decisive Allied victory in the Second World War was abruptly shattered in June 1950 by the invasion of South Korea by communist North Korea. Responding to a United Nations’ call to assist the South Korean regime, Canada deployed an 8000-man brigade to the peninsula to fight as part of an American-led UN force. This comprehensive account of the Canadian campaign in Korea provides the first detailed study of the training, leadership, operations, and tactics of the brigade under each of its three wartime commanders as well as its relationship with American and Commonwealth allies. An impeccably researched analytical history, the book examines the uneven performance of the various Canadian units and argues that the soldiers of the "Special Force" initially sent to Korea were more thorough and professional in their operations than were the army’s regular battalions that eventually replaced them at the front.