Combat· Korean War
Operation Rugged
Operation RUGGED carried the United Nations advance to a new defensive line anchored across the waist of Korea, the Kansas Line, drawn along commanding ground north of the 38th Parallel.
For the Marines the operation meant recrossing the parallel and pushing to their assigned stretch of the new line, including a crossing of the swift Soyang-gang River that the troops approached warily but accomplished against only light, rear-guard resistance. The advance was comparatively quiet, a deliberate occupation of high ground rather than a pitched battle, as the enemy fell back ahead of the United Nations push. RUGGED's significance was positional: it placed the division on the Kansas Line, the base from which the next phase of operations would be launched and to which the front would repeatedly return. The relative calm proved brief, for the Chinese were massing for a spring offensive that would soon break against these very positions.
Record no. 627