31st Infantry Regiment History

The Roots of the Modern 31st Infantry Regiment are Grounded in Events that Happened over 100 Years Ago.

A thorough investigation of these events would easily consume the career of a dedicated scholar. However interesting such events might be, our time is mostly consumed by current events. Much of the current middle-eastern turmoil can be traced back to how the victorious Allied Powers following World War I drew the boundaries of the new middle-eastern nations following the defeat of the Ottoman empire. So, although "remote" in time, the events of a century ago echo down the decades to us in the present.

For those interested in "connections" here I provide a 5-page summary of the events that led to the establishment of the 31st Infantry Regiment and its first deployment and participation in the "Great Game" whose first players were the British and Russian empires of the 19th century, but which never really concluded and continues to this day.

Those Other Polar Bears! The 339th Regiment was created in June 1918, composed mainly of young draftees, for the purpose of fighting on the Western Front in France. Most of the 4,487 men were from Michigan, but some 500 draftees from Wisconsin were included. It was commonly referred to as "Detroit's Own". They were sent to fight the Bolsheviks in Northern Russia. Their Regiment's official 'nickname' is the "Polar Bear" (singular) because of their inaugural service in West Siberia.

A more complete history of the 339th Regiment is found at the link below:

In 1942, as Japanese forces advanced on Corregidor, soldiers from the US Army’s 31st Infantry Regiment burned the regimental battle standards and buried a silver bowl and cups. The bowl was a prized Army heirloom known as the Shanghai Bowl, and the soldiers didn’t want it to fall into enemy hands. When the war was over, a contingent, including one who helped bury the bowl, returned to Corregidor to retrieve it. It took two months of digging, but they eventually unearthed it. Today, the Shanghai Bowl remains a symbol of the heritage of the 31st Infantry Regiment and is housed at Fort Drum, New York.

A more complete history of the Shanghai Bowl is found at the link below:

The history of failure in war can almost be summed up to two words: too late.
Too late in comprehending the deadly purpose of a potential enemy;
too late in realizing the mortal danger; too late in preparedness;
too late in uniting all possible forces for resistance;
too late in standing with one’s friends.”

Gen. Douglas MacArthur in a statement to the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies, September 16, 1940.

We thank the creators of this "Special Exhibit Guide", The MacArthur Memorial Team: Amanda Williams, Corey Thornton, James Zobel, Jennifer Cottle, Ursula Miles, Ryan Petit, Jasmine Dunbar, Roseanne Delparto, Keyon Blowe, Theodore Combo, Gwen Brugess. We also thank the sponsors of the General Douglas MacArthur Foundation listed on the inside cover of the Guide.

This eight-part video is the detailed saga of Task Force MacLain/Faith including the laying of blame on the commanders who earned it. The 31st Regimental Combat Team got a "bad rap" that lasted for 50 years due to the misdescripton of their staunch determination to hold the enemy at bay until, at last, the very means to continue the defense was expended and the survivors had nothing left to fight with; they then exfiltrated the battlefield having held about 20,000 Chinese seeking to encirle the 1st Marine divison at bay for 5 days and nights, being decimated in the process.

Episode 1
Overview of the Korean War from its Causes to its Conclusion (except that it has never actually concluded)

Episode 2
Having been part of the landing at Inchon, the Regiment was withdrawn and redeployed in another amphibious landing at Iwon on the east coast of Korea, where they succeeded in pushing the North Korean army to the border with China, the Yalu river by Thanksgiving day, 1950. That was to be the a temporary success, as Mao’s Chinese People’s Liberation Army had infiltrated upwards of 500,000 men into the North Korean wilderness. The PLA began their offensive. 1st battalion of the 31st Infantry Regiment was among the Allied forces.

27 November. Task Forces Maclain and Faith deploy to the east side of Chosen Reservoir, screening the Marines at Hagaru-Ri. Defensive positions are established and, after dark, the Chinese attack begins.

Episode 3
28 November. Battalion visited by Core Commander Edward M. Almond, one of Macarther’s sycophants, and made an ass out of himself, underestimating Chinese strength, competence, and capability and handing out silver starts as if they were participation trophies.

Episode 4
29/30 November. Col. Maclain is KIA. Lt. Col. Faith assumes command. 2/31st ordered to join the Task Force but is unable to do so due to lack of transportation. The Task Force continues to resist Chinese attacks.

Episode 5
1 December. The battle continues. Details of the battle on the night of 30 November - 1 December. Breakout.

Episode 6.
2-5 December. The battle continues. The death of Task Force MacLean and Faith. Vehicle column is abandoned and some survivors take to the ice.

Episode 7
Beginning with a review of the basic strategy to defeat North Korea post-Inchon landing. Events are narrarated by soldiers who fought in the campaign to assult to the Yalu River border with China. MacArthur's role in the debacle mostly due to having surrounded himself with syncophants since the early days of World War II, and his failure to secure good intellegence regarding the Chinese intervention. As you may know, MacArthur was releived by President Harry Truman, formally for insubordination, but in reality because of his legendary arrogance.

MacArthur, however, did give us a bit of military wisdom, ignored by our civilian leadership since WWII. MacArthur said in his farewell speech to the cadets at West Point in 1962. "In war, there is no substitute for victory." You will note with me that the American military has won every conflict that its civilian leaders have committed it to since WWII, and that very same civilian leadership has given away every victory since that war.

Episode 8
Douglas MacArthur was a controversial figure and remains so to this day.

His supporters in his own time and now were prone to hagiographic praise, including for his reconstruction of Japan following WWII and his brilliant outflanking of the North Korean invading army at Inchon in 1950.

His detractors will point to his lapses in judgement ranging from his unnecessary appearance at the WWI veterans Bonus March on Washington during the depression in 1932, to his tactical and strategic errors against Japan in WWII, to his rush to the Yalu in Korea, eventually leading to his relief from command and forced retirement from the Army.

Speaking for myself (your webmaster, Dave Kennedy) I have read enough to pick a side; I won't say which one. I'll leave it you to do your own research and form your own opinion. He was a great man, larger than life; loved and hated by his countrymen.

The Grunts and Co. is a four-part written account of the events leading up to, and actions during, the battle on the east side of the Chosin Reservoir. The nom-de-guerre of the author is Yankee Papa; in Part 1 Yankee Papa covers the political events that led the North Koreans to invade the South.

General Douglas MacArthur's brilliant surprise amphibious assault caused the switft collapse of the North Korean invading force. However, there was a lack of vision as to what should have been done in the event of such success. This led to ad hoc plans made "on the fly" without sufficient strategic analysis led to tactical disaster. Leadership at every level from Washington D. C. to the Corps level failed their soldiers, leading to a desparte withdrawal.

It seems that every generation of leadership must learn anew the lesson of not under-estimating the capabilites and determination of the enemy. You would have thought that Douglas MacArthur, of all people, would have appreciated the fighting skills of oriental soldiers.

During the final phase of the battle, with medial supplies, ammunition, rations in short supply, and many of the leadership having become KIA, the remnants of the Regiment lost cohesion and individually infiltrated to the frozen lake and made toward the Marine position on the west side of the reservoir. Of the initial RCT strength of 3300 men including 700 Korean KATUSA soldiers, 385 members were able to continue the fight. The Regiment had held a reinforced Chinese division at bay for five days, after which 1,392 men were MIA. LTC Faith received the Medal of Honor posthumorously. His remains were found decades later; he was finally interred at Arlington Cemetery April 17, 2013.

Pork Chop Hill is a 1959 American Korean War film starring Gregory Peck, Woody Strode, Rip Torn, and George Peppard. The film, which was the final war film directed by Lewis Milestone, is based upon the book by U.S. military historian Brigadier General S. L. A. Marshall. It depicts the first fierce Battle of Pork Chop Hill between the U.S. Army's 7th Infantry Division and Chinese and North Korean forces in April 1953.

The film features numerous actors who would go on to become movie and television stars in the 1960s and the 1970s such as Woody Strode, Harry Guardino, Robert Blake, George Peppard, Norman Fell, Abel Fernandez, Gavin MacLeod, Harry Dean Stanton, and Clarence Williams III. It is also the screen debut of Martin Landau and George Shibata, who was a West Point classmate of Lieutenant Joe Clemons, who also acted as technical adviser on the film.

It is sad. Wars are fought by boys, often conscripted, at the direction of older men whose motives the boys do not know or likely share. Our perspective is American. The Chinese boys in Korea would have seen us as the "bad guys". They had their victories and defeats; they suffered, swealtered or froze, no different than our side. On both sides were human beings, and on both sides men scrificed for their counties, but mainly for their buddies, exemplified by rare by extraordinary acts of heroism. Their loss was felt by mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters, sweethearts, and especially young wives and children.

Wars are actively going on in this world as I write these words. Would that it were not so!

This is a movie about the two boys in the Chinese infantry units that faced Task Force MacLean and Faith from the Chinese side. It has English subtitles if you're inclined to watch it. The Japanese called it "Chosin Reservoir" and so did we Americans. To the Koreans and Chinese it is Lake Changjin. The Chinese title of the movie (translated of course) is The Battle at Lake Changjin. The U.K. release of the same movie is The Battle at Water Gate Bridge.

Bataan is a 1943 American black-and-white World War II film drama from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, produced by Irving Starr (with Dore Schary as executive producer), directed by Tay Garnett, that stars Robert Taylor, George Murphy, Lloyd Nolan, Thomas Mitchell, Desi Arnaz and Robert Walker. It follows the fates of a group of men charged with destroying a bridge during the doomed defense of the Bataan Peninsula by American forces in the Philippines against the invading Japanese.