To improve the history for today's readers, the tables have been updated by adding ship hull numbers, supplying the full names of officers, and providing the meaning of abbreviations. Based on a wealth of primary source material, including previously classified action reports, staff studies, official correspondence, message traffic, and personal observations, the Field book should be the starting point for anyone wishing to investigate the naval conduct of the Korean War. No work published to date contains as much detail on U.S. Field's comprehensive history, History of United States Naval Operations: Korea, first released in 1962 but no longer in print. Sailors of all ranks came to understand that the worldwide effort to help threatened peoples defend their freedom against Marxist-Leninist attack would be long, often frustrating, and costly.įor these reasons, and to mark the 50th anniversary of the Korean War, the Naval Historical Center decided to make available once again James A. The men who led the fleet gained valuable insight into the political-military ('talk-fight') approach followed by their Communist Cold War adversaries.

Naval leaders had to learn how to carry on the battle when all-out victory was not the national objective, constrain their use of naval power, and maintain the morale and fighting strength of their sailors year after bloody year. The Korean War was also America's first 'limited war' of the modern age. The Korean War experience helped the Navy fight more effectively during the later conflict in Southeast Asia and elsewhere. The Seventh Fleet ensured that American ground forces got the men and supplies they needed to fight and win far from American shores. Fleet amphibious forces turned the tide of battle in 1950 at Inchon and threatened the enemy's vulnerable coastal flanks for the rest of the war.

Navy and Marine Corps aviation units executed the majority of UN close air support missions in the war, shot down numerous Communist MIG aircraft, and disrupted the enemy's resupply and reinforcement efforts. Freed by friendly control of the sea from the threat of hostile fleets, American carrier squadrons, shore bombardment ships, and amphibious units engaged North Korean and Chinese Communist forces on the Korean peninsula. naval forces conducted operations that maintained control of the world's oceans and brought sea power to bear against enemies ashore. During that conflict and for the next fifty years, U.S. The Korean War was a watershed in the 20th century history of the United States Navy.

Us navy korean war veterans