Forgotten American heroes fight to keep a perimeter from becoming a Dunkirk like rout as one of the most audacious amphibious assaults in history is planned.
Now That Should Be A Movie.
Short Pitch
It’s called The Darkest Summer.
It’s a War Drama.
In the vein of Dunkirk.
It is like Saving Private Ryan meets Train to Busan.
It follows always faithful Marine veteran Captain Francis I. “Ike” Fenton, Jr.,
And Churchillian bulldog of a general Walton Walker
As they battle to keep a toehold of freedom on the South Korean Peninsula against Communism
Problems arise when the numerically superior and nearly suicidal North Korean armies push the UN forces into the small area known as the Pusan Perimeter and Douglas McArthur removes the Marines from under Walker’s command to take part in the audacious Inchon Landing
Together their bravery, courage, comradery, and faithfulness to their brothers-in-arms will result in two stunning but little-known victories in American history that ensure South Korea’s freedom.
The idea came to me when I was reading about the Pusan Perimeter and how it was compared to Dunkirk around the same time that Christopher Nolan’s film Dunkirk hit theaters.
My unique approach would be following several different characters, from South Korean civilians fleeing the North Korean onslaught, to American infantry trying to slow down the Communists, to Army generals overseeing the defense of the Pusan Perimeter, to the intelligence officers planning the Inchon Landing. to the Marine grunts liberating Seoul.
Here are two set pieces.
First, General Walker receives word that the Marines under his command are being removed to take part in General Douglas’ daring and hare-brained scheme to land behind enemy lines at Inchon. Walker is being flown over the frontlines in a biplane as he considers his options. He could pull all his men back to the port of Pusan or he could evacuate South Korea entirely and retreat to Japan. Then he looks down at his men. They are lying on their chests, soaked in bloody mud and tired from days of fighting. As the biplane passes over, they look up, smile, and wave at their general. That’s it. When the plane lands, Walker has this message read to his men. “There is no line behind us to which we can retreat. This isn’t going to be another Dunkirk or Bataan… We must fight to the end… We will fight as a team. If some of us must die. We will die fighting together. I want everybody to understand we are going to hold this line. We are going to win!”
Another set piece is when Captain Fenton is preparing for the Inchon Landing. He receives word from Marine General Edward A. Craig that he is not to participate in the operation. Fenton’s father, also a Marine officer, had found out that his son was in combat in Korea by seeing his picture in Life Magazine. Because Francis’ only brother had been killed during World War II, Fenton Sr. had some strings pulled and had his son removed from the landing. Fenton, Jr. refused to be removed. It’s a direct order from above, says the general. My hands are tied. I intend to finish the mission, the captain replies. You’ve done a fine job with courage and distinction, Craig tells him. I owe it to my men to finish the operation with them, Fenton says. Okay, Craig concedes. I’ll let you finish the operation, but as soon as the mission is done, you’re going home. You won’t regret this, Fenton assures him. During the Inchon Landing, First Lieutenant Baldomero Lopez is side by side with Captain Fenton as they lead the charge over the seawall. He throws a grenade, but it bounces back, falling among his fellow leathernecks. He makes eye contact with his captain. Then he throws himself onto the grenade, sacrificing his life for his brothers.
Target audiences would be military servicemen and servicewomen, military historians, history buffs, fans of Joe Wright’s Darkest Hour, Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk, Joseph Kosinski ‘s Top Gun: Maverick and J. D. Dillard’s Devotion, Korean War Veterans and their families, South Koreans, fans of war movies and war video and computer games like Medal of Honor and Call of Duty, and men and women (teens to 70s).
Audiences would want to see the movie due to its themes of faithfulness, comradery, brotherhood, courage in the face of war, and the inspiration and excitement of fighting for freedom against the overwhelming odds of tyranny.
Today’s book I would like to pitch as a movie is The Darkest Summer: Pusan and Inchon 1950 – The Battles That Saved South Korea – And the Marines – From Extinction by Bill Sloan, from Simon and Schuster.
Until the 1950s, Korea, known as the Hermit Kingdom, was hidden in the shadows of its larger Asian neighbors, often being the conquered territory of one or another. One of the longest and most brutalist conquerors was the Japanese (August 29, 1910 – August 15, 1945). This is the simple version of how at the end of World War II America found itself on the Korean peninsula, backing the South Korean government against North Korea, which was backed by Soviet Russia. Despite having a military presence in an area that was a front of the Cold War and had a history of conflict, the United States government cut defense spending. At the time of the communist invasion on June 25, 1950, there would only be 500 U. S. troops, The Korean Military Assistance Group, in South Korea. Only one American, Joe Darrigo, would witness the start of the Korean War.
The U. S. government scrambled to respond. Discipline among the troops stationed in Japan had been slacking and many of them were not ready to face combat. Therefore, when the 500-man Task Force Smith became the first American troops to meet the North Korean People’s Army (NKPA) in battle at a place called Osan. it was a disaster. Nearly half the men became casualties and the survivors had to play a running game of hide and seek until they made it to friendly lines. United States forces would again take stands at the Kum River and Taejon but would be forced to pull out or be overrun by overwhelming numbers and superior artillery. For example, the only tanks on the peninsula at the time belonged to the communists.
There were a few bright spots during this time. Colonel Robert R. Martin gathered up men during the Battle of Chonan while personally firing a bazooka before being killed. He became the first Korean War recipient of the Distinguished Service Cross, his citation reading…
…For extraordinary heroism in connection with military operations against an armed enemy of the United Nations while serving as Commanding Officer, 34th Infantry Regiment, 24th Infantry Division. Colonel Martin distinguished himself by extraordinary heroism in action against enemy aggressor forces at Ch’ŏnan, Korea, on 8 July 1950. Observing enemy tanks and infantry in force penetrated his regiment’s forward position, Colonel Martin, with total disregard for his own personal safety, rushed forward to organize and personally led rocket launcher and grenade attacks against the tanks and infantry at ranges of ten to twenty yards. Despite heavy small-arms and tank gun fire, Colonel Martin, by his heroic example, so inspired his men that they destroyed several tanks and forced others to withdraw, thereby preventing the enemy from immediately overrunning the position. During this action Colonel Martin lost his life while single-handedly attacking an enemy tank with a rocket launcher at a range of about fifteen yards.
Another bright spot was the July 10th air strikes. The North Korean army suffered its worst losses of the war in just thirty-six hours as the Air Force and Navy flyers bombed its tanks and trucks.
Then there was Major General William Dean, who inspired his men by fighting shoulder to shoulder with them on the frontline and directing fire before being separated and captured by the communists. He would be the first recipient of the Medal of Honor for actions during the Korean War. His citation reads
Maj. Gen. Dean distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the repeated risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty. In command of a unit suddenly relieved from occupation duties in Japan and as yet untried in combat, faced with a ruthless and determined enemy, highly trained and overwhelmingly superior in numbers, he felt it his duty to take action which to a man of his military experience and knowledge was clearly apt to result in his death. He personally and alone attacked an enemy tank while armed only with a hand grenade. He also directed the fire of his tanks from an exposed position with neither cover nor concealment while under observed artillery and small-arm fire. When the town of Taejon was finally overrun he refused to insure his own safety by leaving with the leading elements but remained behind organizing his retreating forces, directing stragglers, and was last seen assisting the wounded to a place of safety. These actions indicate that Maj. Gen. Dean felt it necessary to sustain the courage and resolution of his troops by examples of excessive gallantry committed always at the threatened portions of his frontlines. The magnificent response of his unit to this willing and cheerful sacrifice, made with full knowledge of its certain cost, is history. The success of this phase of the campaign is in large measure due to Maj. Gen. Dean’s heroic leadership, courageous and loyal devotion to his men, and his complete disregard for personal safety.
The U.S. military forces retreated until they were boxed in along the 120-mile-long front known as the Pusan Perimeter. Here they would take a stand until reinforced by the Marines of the First Provisional Marine Brigade and the First Marine Division who landed at the port of Pusan. August 7th, the anniversary of the Marines landing on Guadalcanal during World War II, saw the first Marines in action during the Korean War as Second Lieutenant John J. “Blackie” Cahill’s First Platoon went to the front to relieve an entire Army company. The leathernecks were formed into Fire Brigades which were used to plug holes in the front lines.
It is said that the Pusan Perimeter was like a thousand Battles of the Bulge. The perimeter was threatened when the North Koreans crossed the Naktong River and almost took Miryang, where Task Force Hill spent days battling it out with the NKPA. These attacks occurred where the river was shallow and curved in a semicircle which earned the battles fought there the name First Battle of the Naktong (August 5- 19th). The eastern front was on the verge of collapse until the Marines showed up (Battle of P’ohand-dong August 5-20). The Marines also had a desperate fight at Obong-ni Ridge on August 18th. The communist offensive against the perimeter was finally broken at the Second Battle of the Naktong (September 1-15th) . A testament to the gallantry of the American forces is that a British observer compared the Marines to the rear guard, the Coldstreams, at Dunkirk.
The North Koreans the US forces faced were a brutal foe. Like the Japanese, the NKPA staged banzai attacks at night, but unlike the Imperial Japanese, they did not rely on the bayonet but would be firing their rifles and machine guns the entire time. They used infiltrators to wreak havoc behind American lines. When that didn’t work, they would drive Korean civilians before them as human shields. They would also torture and execute POWs. One infamous incident was The Hill 303 Massacre in which 42 United States Army prisoners of war were shot and killed. However, the communists soon learn to fear the Marines, whom they called Yellow Legs.
Soon the communist tidal wave came to an end. At the Battle of Kosong (August 11th), the North Koreans were forced to fall back for the first time, their retreating column becoming a turkey shoot for American air power (the “Kosong Turkey Shoot”). On August 16, the largest bombing raid by United States air forces since D-Day was carried out west of the Naktong River. Still, the Americans would have to hold on to the perimeter until the landing at Inchon had begun before they would begin their final push out of the perimeter.
The Inchon Landing and the following battle (September 15 – September 19, 1950) have been written about extensively. One of the greatest gambles in US military history, it was an amphibious landing into a harbor with extreme tides, an island in the middle, a high seawall, a pier, and a causeway similar to the one that helped give the World War II battle at Batio the name “Bloody Tarawa.” Plus, the allegiance of the city’s 200,000-strong civilian population was unknown. Inchon could have been a Stalingrad, but instead it became one of the greatest tactical decisions in US military history. The Marines cut into the supply line of the NKPA, forcing the communists to retreat from the Pusan Perimeter. The climactic scene in a movie would be when the American flag is raised on Radio Hill and General MacArthur lowers his binoculars, stands up from his chair on his observation ship, and says “That’s It. Let’s get a cup of coffee.”
With the enemy in their rear, the communists were forced to retreat. The Army pursued them until meeting up with the Marines at Seoul. The battle for Seoul (Sep 22, 1950 – Sep 25) was vicious, with every telephone pole in the city knocked down by American tanks in order to eliminate snipers. Yet because of this terrible liberation, South Korea survived to become one of the freest and most prosperous countries in Asia.
A major character in a film about these events would be Captain Fenton.
One name that continues to come up in nearly all the major battles of the Pusan Perimeter is Captain Francis I. “Ike” Fenton, Jr., a 27-year-old World War Two veteran. He was the executive officer of Baker Company, First Battalion of the First Provisional Marine Brigade who landed in the thick of the fighting without any refresher training. He would fight at Changwon, Changchon, and Chindong-ni. He battled heat exhaustion alongside his men on whom he had compassion when they fell asleep at the front lines. He commanded them as they filled in the gap at the Naktong Bulge and staged a desperate last stand at Obong-ni Ridge which they later had to retake in a desperate counterattack. His company, Baker, would suffer more battlefield combat deaths than any other Marine unit since the Battle of Okinawa during their August 12-13 stand on Hill 202. It would be one of the costliest 24 hours of the Korean War as twenty-four of his men paid the ultimate price. The order to abandon the hill was some of the worst news Fenton ever heard as nine of the men he left behind were MIA. They were later changed to KIA.
Fenton and Baker Company were pulled off the perimeter to participate in the landing at Inchon. There his men helped take Observatory Hill when they outflanked the North Koreans by shirking through the dark streets of the city and then charging up the hill against a maelstrom of fire, including artillery and machine guns. They secured the hilltop at the cost of only six wounded. Then he and B Company helped recapture Seoul by taking Hill 105-South and holding it off against a North Korean counterattack.
Fenton would be a good human-interest story to focus on because the iconic photo of him taken by Life Magazine reporter Dave Duncan was the only way his father, Marine Brigadier General Francis I. Fenton, Sr., learned his son was in combat in Korea. Since Ike’s only brother had been killed in Okinawa during World War II, his father immediately applied pressure to have him removed from combat and returned to the States. However, Fenton Jr. refused to be removed from the Inchon landing. General Craig told him it was a direction from the top and that Fenton had already done a fine job with courage and distinction. Still Fenton insisted on participating in the landing because he felt like he owed it to his men, Baker Company, to stay until the operation was through. Craig relented with the caveat that once the operation was through, Fenton would return stateside. Character like that of Captain Francis I. “Ike” Fenton, Jr. is what makes a true hero.
Supporting characters could include
Lieutenant Hugh “Nick” Schryver who would be awarded the Silver Star for leading his men with fierce determination at the Naktong despite head and facial wounds from a grenade at Obong-ni Ridg. Lieutenant Francis W. Muetzel, who would win a Silver Star at the Pusan Perimeter, and at a pivotal moment in the battle for Inchon would show credible judgment and initiative by taking Cemetery Hill without a single casualty. Sergeant Albert T. Crowson who would be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for single-handedly wiping out two enemy machine guns Taebong-ni sector on August 17th. Charlie Company, 23rd Regiment, which held a key spot on the Naktong on the night of August 31st against overwhelming odds. They became known as the late Company C. The First and Second battalions of the 23rd alone would suffer 50 percent casualties.
General Edward A. Craig, commander of the 1st Provisional Marine Brigade, whose inspiring leadership was essential to the Pusan defense. He would oversee the first combat reconnaissance mission by helicopter. First helicopter casualty evacuations. First helicopter supply mission to forward troops. First helicopter to come under fire. And first U.S. helicopter to stage a rescue mission, earning him the nickname Helicopter Eddie.
Colonel Raymond L. Murray, who was ordered to Korea even though his father was dying, his wife had died while he was serving in the Pacific during World War II, where he commanded his regiment, 5th Marine Regiment, at the nucleus of Craig’s Brigade during the fight for Pusan. Marine legend Lewis B. Chesty Puller, who led the First Marines into battle at Inchon and during the liberation of Seoul. The West Point Class of 1949, most of whom went into the war with the most dangerous job, platoon commander, resulted in 60 percent becoming KIA.
The men of Dog Company and the Second Engineer Battalion of the Second Division. Under the command of Lee Beahler, they held off the North Koreans at Yongsan. Beahler would be awarded the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions there on 2 September 1950. First Lieutenant Baldomero Lopez, who led the charge over the seawall at Inchon before being hit by enemy fire that knocked the grenade out of his hand. He jumped on the grenade to shield his comrades from the blast, giving his life for his brothers. He would be awarded a posthumous Medal of Honor.
Navy Corpsman Hebert “Doc Rocket” Pearce, who accurately predicted that the Marines would land at Inchon and then be in Seoul within 10 days. Sergeant Fredrick Rusty Russell, Corporal Edward “Red” Martin, Corporal Morduch Ford, PFC Roy I. Walker, Captain John R. “Blackjack” Stevens, Sergeant Charlie Snow, General Bryghte Godbold, Colonel Robert D. Taplett, Sergeant Mackie Wheeler and many more unsung heroes.
Finally, the main character should be General Walton H. “Johnnie” Walker.
According to David Halberstam, author of The Coldest Winter, “If American military history has shortchanged any of this country’s wars in the past century, it is Korea, and if any aspect of that war has been overlooked, it is the series of smaller battles fought alongside the Naktong July, August, and September 1950, and if any one commander has not been given the credit he deserves, it is surely Walton Walker in those battles.” His pilot Mike Lynch called him “the Forgotten Commander of the Forgotten War.”
A veteran of George S. Patton’s campaigns in Europe, He was a Churchillian character who had to ask the impossible of the few men Washington would send him as he refused to give up hope for a miracle. He would fly over his lines just a few hundred feet above the ground and shout exhortations, commands, and rebukes to his men with a bullhorn from the window of his biplane. After the Marines were taken from under his command to take part in the Inchon landing, and were replaced with green infantry, he considered retreating from the Pusan Perimeter to a smaller defense called the Davidson Line. But after seeing his men wave at him from the ground, he decided to stay at the Naktong line and vowed to fight it out in the streets of Taegu. He told his men at the beginning of the battle for the Pusan Perimeter….
No more retreating, no more withdrawing or whatever you call it. There is no line behind us to which we can retreat. This isn’t going to be another Dunkirk or Bataan. A retreat to Pusan would result in one of the greatest butcheries in history. We must fight to the end. Capture by these people is worse than death itself. We will fight as a team. If some of us must die. We will die fighting together. I want everybody to understand we are going to hold this line. We are going to win!
Despite his limited resources, Walker held out and then led his troops in liberating South Korea. At a ceremony celebrating the liberation of Seoul, MacArthur refused to shake hands with him. Walker would be killed in December 1950 when his jeep overturned. His name should be as familiar to every American as those of Washington, Grant, Lee, Eisenhower, and, especially, MacArthur.
A film version of the Darkest Summer could focus primarily on the parallel stories of Walker and Fenton, paying homage to the courage and sacrifice of the both the Marines and the Army and shedding equal light on the battles of Inchon and Pusan. After an opening scene portraying the invasion, the desperate heroics and sacrifices of Task Force Smith, Martin, and Dean could be shown in sequences between the scenes introducing the audience to Walker and Fenton. Subplots could feature Murray, Craig, Beahler and the planning and debates surrounding Inchon. There should also be a character to representing the soldiers of The Republic of South Korea who died so their new nation should live. The final scene could be Walker’s forces meeting up with the Marines at Seoul, no doubt slightly embellished for cinematic purposes. I could see Nicolai Fuglsig, Mel Gibson, Clint Eastwood, Randall Wallace, Peter Berg, or Micheal Bay behind the director’s wheel.
Because it would bring before the American people the names of unsung heroes from the Korean War like Fenton and Walker who kept the Republic of South Korea from the bondage of communism, I believe that The Darkest Summer by Bill Sloan Should Be A Movie.
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