Kurt Chew-Een Lee led preparations in December 1950 for 500 Marines to embark on a daring rescue mission. The first lieutenant’s engagement took place during the vicious Battle of Chosin Reservoir, as tens of thousands of Chinese troops poured in from North Korea and threatened to cut off an American unit.
Traveling five miles through treacherous mountainous terrain, the Marines battled blizzard conditions that reduced visibility to almost zero. Temperatures often dropped to -30 degrees.
Despite gunshot wounds and a broken arm suffered in a previous engagement, Lee and his unit continued to relentlessly engage the enemy under intense fire. In the end, their exploits would help preserve a crucial escape route for American troops fighting as part of United Nations forces. About 8,000 men were saved from certain death or imprisonment at the hands of the Chinese.
Born Jan. 21, 1926, in San Francisco, the diminutive Lee — all 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighing about 130 pounds — is considered the first Asian-American officer in Marine Corps history. Yet Lee “brought an inordinate determination to the battlefield,” according to a New York Times account.
Lee, who enlisted in the Marines at the end of World War II, told the Los Angeles Times in 2010 that he identified most with the Corps because of its reputation for being first into battle.
“I wanted to dispel the notion that the Chinese are meek, bland and obsequious,” he said.
Lee was assigned during World War II as a Japanese teacher in San Diego. Swallowing his disappointment at not being sent to the Pacific, he chose to remain in the Marine Corps after the war and was commissioned as an officer in 1946.
When the United States entered the Korean War in June 1950, Lee was put in charge of a machine gun platoon tasked with advancing deep into North Korean territory.
Before the fighting began, many of Lee’s fellow Marines wondered if he was capable of killing Chinese soldiers. Behind his back, some even used racial epithets, calling him a “Chinese laundryman.”
For Lee to question his dedication to his nation was ridiculous.
“I would have… done whatever was necessary,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “For me, it didn’t matter if they were Chinese, Korean, Mongolian or whatever: they were the enemy.”
Lee’s Chinese ancestry, however, proved a boon on the night of November 2, 1950. Leading a solo reconnaissance mission amid heavy snow, he began throwing grenades and firing bullets at the the enemy in order to reveal the location of the Chinese soldiers who were shooting at his men.
Undetected, Lee slipped onto the enemy outpost and used his working knowledge of Mandarin to confuse the enemy fighters, who hesitated briefly when Lee shouted in their native language: “Don’t shoot, I’m Chinese. »
This pause gave Lee’s unit just enough time to reposition itself and push back the Chinese. For this, Lee was awarded the Navy Cross, the second highest honor a Marine can receive.
“Despite serious injuries sustained while advancing, First Lieutenant Lee charged directly into the face of enemy fire and, through his fearless fighting spirit and ingenuity, inspired the rest of his platoon to heroic efforts to launch a counterattack. -determined attack and lead hostile forces from the sector,” his quote reads.
Less than a month later, while Lee was still recovering in a field hospital from a gunshot wound to the arm he had suffered during the fighting in early November, the Chinese launched their second phase offensive – aimed to drive the United Nations out of North Korea. Tens of thousands of Chinese forces converged on the mountainous region near the Chosin Reservoir, surpassing the nearly 8,000 U.S. troops stationed there.
Undeterred by his injuries, Lee “and a sergeant left the hospital against orders, commandeered an Army Jeep and returned to the front” to join the 1st Marine Battalion, according to the New York Times. Lee’s arm was still in a sling.
Using only a compass to navigate the snowy mountainous terrain, Lee and his 500 Marines managed to find and reinforce the surrounded Americans, repeatedly pushing back the Chinese soldiers, according to the Times, and ensuring that “the vastly outnumbered Americans digital, can retreat towards the sea. .”
The fighting was so heavy that approximately 90 percent of Lee’s rifle company was killed or wounded, but thanks to Lee’s tireless efforts the escape route remained open.
“Of course, I was never afraid,” Lee told the Washington Post in 2010. “Maybe the Chinese are all fatalists. I never thought I would survive the war. So I was adamant that my death be honorable, spectacular.
Lee survived the war and retired from the Marines in 1968 after serving in Vietnam as an intelligence officer. In addition to the Navy Cross, Lee received a Silver Star and two Purple Hearts.
The men he commanded never forgot their officer.
“I didn’t care what color it was,” Ronald Burbridge, a rifleman in his unit in Korea, said in an interview for a 2010 Smithsonian documentary.
“I told him several times, thank God we got him.”
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