Korean War's Most Brutal Day: The Last American Bayonet Charge

By FORGOTTEN HISTORY

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In February 1951, during the brutal winter of the Korean War, American troops from the 27th Infantry Regiment were pinned down on a frozen hillside by Chinese machine guns and mortars. Every attempt to advance failed. Ammunition was running low. Casualties were mounting. Then Captain Lewis Millett gave an order few soldiers expected to hear in modern warfare. "Fix bayonets." Standing up under heavy fire, Millett led his men in a full bayonet charge straight uphill into fortified Chinese positions on Hill 180 near Soam-ni, Korea. What followed was brutal close combat as American soldiers stormed bunkers, trenches, and machine gun nests with rifles, grenades, and cold steel. The assault broke the Chinese defenses and secured the hill. For his leadership and personal courage during the charge, Millett received the Medal of Honor. Historians often refer to the assault on Hill 180 as the last major American bayonet charge in modern warfare. But the story raises a deeper question. As techn

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