The Korean War began by interrupting the American adjustment to peace following World War Two, and ended not only without a victory but with a United States loss of life and suffering comparable to Vietnam. Even today, nearly four times as many American MIAs from the Korean War remain unaccounted for as from Vietnam. Ensign Charles F. Cole, graduated from Cornell University in 1950, and was also in the first Naval ROTC class to be commissioned. Cole and his classmates anticipated two years of peace-time duty to repay their obligation. Instead, within a few weeks of graduation, they were swept into the Navy's frantic preparation to re-equip a Navy whose war-time strength and proficiency had been decimated by military cutbacks. The skeleton Navy force on duty in both Atlantic and Pacific fleets was quickly augmented by those 1950 NROTC Ensigns and the recall of World War II Reservists. The former provided the large number of Ensigns needed by an expanded Navy. The latter, who still retained their World War II skills, provided the expertise needed to man the ships coming out of mothballs. Cole is unstinting in his praise for the returning Reservists. He and his fellow classmates are an emphatic affirmation of the value of the NROTC program envisioned by Dr. (Captain) Arthur Adams and named in honor of Admiral James Holloway. Without those NROTC Ensigns and the returning Reservists, the United States Navy's participation in the first year of the Korean War would have been minimal at best. Cole served eighteen months on the USS Ozbourn off the Korean coast. Underwater Demolition Teams began during world War II to help ensure the safety of forces landing on the various Atlantic and Pacific beaches. This type of unconventional warfare was in its infancy when Cole took his Navy demolition training in 1951.
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North Korea's invasion of South Korea in the summer of 1950 caught the United States by surprise. In the early months of the conflict, the Navy struggled to equip and man ships to support land troops and implement the blockade. Without the recalled Naval Reservists and the newly commissioned Class of 1950 Naval ROTC Ensigns, the Navy would have been hard pressed to send ships to Korea.
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"Cole chronicles the adventures of a Sumner-Gearing class ship, USS Ozbourn (DD 846), as seen through the eyes of a newly commissioned junior officer.... Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this book is Cole's description of the bonding ofmen at war, extending from the commanding officer to encompass the entire crew. The Korean conflict, small by world War II standards, was 'enough of a war' to those who fought it.
"The only criticism I have is the author's abrupt transition from destroyer duty to UDT, which took him away from the 'enough of a war.' On the whole, Cole's memoirs provide an excellent window into two branches of the Navy as they existed in the 1950s." -- Robert C. Whitten
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Drudgery of War,
By A Customer
This review is from: Korea Remembered: Enough of a War: The USS Ozbourn's First Korean Tour, 1950-1951 (Paperback)
Enough of a War is a fact filled account of life on a destroyer during the first six months of the Korean War. Cole gives all the monotonous details of standing four on four off watches, shipboard life in rough seas, support of aircraft carrier operations, and naval gunfire missions. There is no glamour and little glory in this tale. It is a straight forward rendering of the work involved in life at sea with the fact of a war being on giving a heightened sense of urgency. Students of naval history and readers concerned with the everyday aspects of history will enjoy this honest account of action in Korea.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Korea Remembered. Enough of War,
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This review is from: Korea Remembered: Enough of a War: The USS Ozbourn's First Korean Tour, 1950-1951 (Paperback)
I served on the USS McKean DD 784 and we were in the same
Destroyer Division 112 as the USS Ozbourn. Our ship and the other three ships in the Division saw most of the same duty areas. It is great to read about events that I had forgotten after all these years. As an elisted man on the McKean we did not have all the information that the officers had about current events at that time. We picked up scuttlebutt and some information while serving on the bridge at different times. Typhoon Clara is well described and that was a storm that none of us have forgotten. I have recommended the book to many of my shipmates that served on the McKean during our tour of duty in Korean waters in 1950-1951. Thank you for the memories and all the dates that I had forgotten. Richard Shaw FT3 USN 1949-53
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