The 6th Infantry Division () is a military formation of the

Republic of Korea Army The Republic of Korea Army (ROKA; ), also known as the ROK Army or South Korean Army, is the army of South Korea, responsible for ground-based warfare. It is the largest of the military branches of the Republic of Korea Armed Forces with 365,0 ...

Structure

*Headquarters: **Headquarters Company **DMZ Patrol Company **Air Defense Company **Anti-Tank Company **Armor Battalion **Signal Battalion **Reconnaissance Battalion **Engineer Battalion **Support Battalion **Military Police Battalion **Medical Battalion **Chemical Battalion *2nd Infantry Brigade * 7th Infantry Brigade *19th Infantry Brigade *Artillery Brigade

History

The Division initially consisted of the 2nd, 7th, and 19th Brigade.

Korean War

The 2nd Infantry Regiment was originally activated as the 2nd Regiment on February 28, 1946, at Taejon and was first commanded by Lt. Col. Lee Hyong Kun. The unit was initially assigned to the 1st Brigade in December 1947 and was later reassigned to the 6th Division when it was activated in May 1949. On June 25, 1950, the 6th Division took part in the Battle of Chuncheon during the North Korean attack. The division became part of II Corps after the first fall of

Seoul Seoul, officially Seoul Special Metropolitan City, is the capital city, capital and largest city of South Korea. The broader Seoul Metropolitan Area, encompassing Seoul, Gyeonggi Province and Incheon, emerged as the world's List of cities b ...

. It was part of the defensive line to slow the North Korean advance from

to Taejon. Fought in the

Battle of Pusan Perimeter The Battle of the Pusan Perimeter, known in Korean as the Battle of the Naktong River Defense Line (), was a large-scale battle between United Nations Command (UN) and North Korean forces lasting from August 4 to September 18, 1950. It was one ...

. The 6th Division, meeting little opposition and traveling fast up the

Chongchon River The Ch'ŏngch'ŏn is a river in North Korea having its source in the Rangrim Mountains of Chagang Province and emptying into the Yellow Sea at Sinanju. The river flows past Myohyang-san and through the city of Anju, South P'yŏngan Provi ...

valley, reached Huichon, nearly sixteen miles north of Kujang-dong, on the night of October 23, 1950. Passing through Onjong, twenty-six miles from Huich'on, during the night of the twenty-fourth, the 7th Regiment, 6th Division, turned north and advanced toward Chosan, fifty miles away on the

Yalu River The Yalu River () or Amnok River () is a river on the border between China and North Korea. Together with the Tumen River to its east, and a small portion of Paektu Mountain, the Yalu forms the border between China and North Korea. Its valle ...

. A reinforced reconnaissance platoon from the 7th Regiment entered Chosan the next morning and found the North Koreans retreating across the Yalu into China over a narrow floating footbridge. On October 25, in the ROK II Corps sector, the 3d Battalion, 2d Regiment, 6th Division, started northwest from Onjong, about fifty miles from

, toward Pukchin. Eight miles west of Onjong the 3d Battalion encountered what was thought to be a small force of North Koreans but was, in reality, a Communist Chinese forces (CCF) trap, in which CCF troops destroyed the 3d Battalion as an organized force. On the evening of the next day the division ordered its 7th Regiment to withdraw south. Before it could do so, however, it needed supplies, which were airdropped on the twenty-eighth. As the 7th Regiment headed south the following morning, it ran into an enemy roadblock about twenty miles south of Kojang. On 26 November 1950, a column of retreating South Korean soldiers of the ROKA 6th and 7th Divisions from

Tokchon Tŏkch'ŏn () is a ''si'', or city, in northern South P'yŏngan province, North Korea. It is bordered by Nyŏngwŏn and Maengsan to the east, Kujang county in North P'yŏngan province to the north, Kaech'ŏn to the west and Pukch'ang to th ...

was attacked by a battalion of the

Turkish Brigade The Turkish Brigade, codenamed North Star ( or ''Kutup Yıldızı – Kore Savaşı'nın 50. Yıldönümü'' (''"North Star: the 50th Anniversary of the Korean War"'', TRT İzmir, Director: Ismail Ragıp Geçmen, 2000)), was a military formati ...

who were the first to arrive at Wawon, after the Turks mistook the South Koreans for Chinese. 125 South Koreans were taken prisoner and many of them were slaughtered by the Turks. The event was wrongly reported in U.S. and European media as a Turkish victory over the Chinese and even after news leaked out about the truth to the Americans, no efforts were made by the media to retract the story. After the Chinese intervention and attacks in November 1950, the U.S. 2nd Infantry Division, the

, and the ROK 6th, 7th, and

8th Eighth is ordinal form of the number eight. Eighth may refer to: * One eighth, , a fraction, one of eight equal parts of a whole * Eighth note (quaver), a musical note played for half the value of a quarter note (crotchet) * Octave, an interval b ...

Infantry Divisions were shattered units that would need extensive rest and refitting to recover combat effectiveness.

References

Sources

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External links