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00:00The planet is more divided than ever.
00:13It's the Cold War between the West with the United States
00:17and the East with the Soviet Union, who now has nuclear weapons
00:21and can trigger the apocalypse.
00:30A virtual creation by American scientists,
00:57the Doomsday Clock is closer in 1950 to the fateful hour of midnight
01:02than it has ever been before.
01:06With the crazed wave of atomic testing and China's awakening,
01:11the world trembles.
01:12The world trembles in Asia, in Korea, in Indochina.
01:27In Indochina, the Communists have been fighting the French for the past five years.
01:32In Korea, in only two months, the UN forces count 24,000 dead, injured or imprisoned
01:44and still haven't been able to stop Communist North Korea from invading South Korea.
01:51In the North Korean capital Pyongyang, a young, smiling, yet ruthless dictator reigns.
01:57His name is Kim Il-sung.
02:02He is the founder of what will be the first Communist dynasty in history.
02:06His regime, imposed by Stalin when he invaded North Korea in 1945,
02:11relies on an army that was trained and equipped by the Soviets.
02:15The Soviet ambassador, General Shtikov, is the country's true leader.
02:26Along with Kim Il-sung, he has managed to convince Stalin
02:29that the time is ripe to invade the South.
02:32His ally, the head of the Chinese Communist Party,
02:38Mao Tse-tung, has given his okay.
02:40He said,
02:42the Sino-Soviet alliance will be the triumph of peace.
02:46At the United Nations, the Security Council has condemned the North Korean aggression.
02:58The United States has obtained a mandate to lead a military intervention
03:02by a symbolic coalition made up of 22 countries.
03:06The U.N. forces have been dominated by the North Korean army
03:17and have retreated to the port of Pusan, under siege for two months.
03:22In early September 1950, the coalition's Commander-in-Chief,
03:36American General Douglas MacArthur, boards a battleship flying the colors of the U.N.
03:47MacArthur sees this as the last recourse.
03:50to land on the tail of the North Koreans in Incheon, the port of Seoul.
03:58September 15, 1950.
04:01The Allied fleet approaches Incheon, with 230 battleships, mostly American.
04:10MacArthur has authorized the presence of a group of international journalists.
04:15Among them is Henri de Touraine.
04:18He writes,
04:20On the pink backdrop of the breaking dawn,
04:23the American marines lay out their strength
04:26to avenge the humiliation of the infantry.
04:31The ships slide like pieces on a chessboard.
04:34MacArthur writes in his reminiscences,
04:47The tension is extreme.
05:0440,000 men are about to throw themselves into an audacious mission to save 100,000 who are fighting in the South.
05:11If we lose the war to communism in Asia, the fate of Europe will be gravely jeopardized.
05:17Win it, and Europe will stay free.
05:19100,000 men are about to win a bit too many guys.
05:2721,000 men are about to put our weapons into his every nation,
05:28hopefully on the strength of the flag in order.
05:33Twelve мир?
05:33JuneI is about to do something to save number one.
05:36Maybe a better sentence...
05:38...
05:39Give me a shout!
05:39...
05:40to VMyo,
05:41let me move to the structure of the duel.
05:42The chip Matrix臨 is about to retire.
05:43artificially small ferret and крепвер depths,
05:44the liberated situation..
05:44Ok,
05:45it's about to go a minute.
05:45I'm gonna haveалась on them
05:46into our control cells.
05:47After taking the port of Inshan, the marines savor their victory.
06:04The cameramen take stock of the human cost.
06:17Survivors of the North Korean army have either fled or been captured.
06:24As always, their clothes are removed, so they can't conceal weapons.
06:35This is MacArthur's triumph.
06:38As usual, he is followed by a swarm of journalists.
06:41From now on, he is nicknamed the Sorcerer of Inshan.
06:50He pauses in front of the remains of a Soviet T-34 tank to provide proof of Moscow's involvement
06:56in the Korean conflict.
06:59All the while, Stalin continues to position himself as leading the fight for peace.
07:04He has the big European Communist parties organize major protests with slogans like,
07:10leave Korea to the Koreans, stop the American assault on Korea, hands off Korea.
07:23North Korean leader Kim Il-sung, surprised by the American landing in Inshan, has a Stalin-esque
07:30reaction.
07:47In South Korea, the UN forces advance to liberate the country has slowed down.
07:55It takes 10 days for the UN forces to reach Seoul, merely 60 kilometers from Inshan.
08:14Seoul, the southern capital, occupied and reoccupied, is devastated by fighting.
08:28Among the ruins, a population of starving orphans struggles to survive.
08:33The Americans discover a horrifying number of mass graves.
08:49An investigative committee reveals that 30,000 South Korean prisoners and 2,000 American prisoners
08:56were assassinated by the retreating North Koreans.
09:03Seoul, September 26, 1950.
09:08The UN flag flies on the barely intact government palace.
09:18General MacArthur reinstates the South Korean president, Singman Rhee, who declares,
09:24General MacArthur, we love you as the savior of our race.
09:31For Singman Rhee, the return to peace means his country will remain split in two.
09:37He wants to cross the 38th parallel which has separated the two Koreas since 1945 and continue
09:43to move forward even without UN authorization to the Yalu, the great river that creates a
09:49natural border with China.
09:54The Americans indulge the South Koreans and display their crossing of the 38th parallel.
10:03The reunification of the country is moving ahead by force, which scares the allies of the
10:08coalition who fear an extension of the conflict.
10:16In Seoul, organizations of young South Koreans multiply their protests with slogans like,
10:22Give us arms to exterminate the communists.
10:25Commies are running away.
10:27Chase them.
10:28Chase them.
10:31Despite UN reticence, MacArthur, secretly encouraged by his government, gives the army the order to
10:37cross the 38th parallel.
10:44October 1st, 1950.
10:47The Americans cross over into North Korea.
10:50Their message is clear.
10:52Communist expansionism must come to an end.
10:56Where there is a threat, there will be a reaction and destruction.
11:00Kim Il-sung is hiding in the mountains.
11:12He's refused to fight because he knows that China will soon enter the conflict.
11:17Kim Il-sung is hiding in the mountains.
11:21He's refused to fight because he knows that China will soon enter the conflict.
11:27The American crossing of the 38th parallel is unacceptable for the leader of the Chinese
11:32communists, Mao Tse-tung.
11:37Mao says,
11:39If the U.S. imperialists won the war, they would threaten us.
11:44We must not fail to assist the Koreans.
11:47We will send volunteers there.
11:54October 15th, 1950, two weeks after crossing the 38th parallel on an island in the Pacific,
12:02American President Harry Truman comes to meet General MacArthur.
12:09Truman hasn't just come to pin another medal on MacArthur's chest.
12:14Behind the smiles, Truman has come to express his concern.
12:19The CIA is sending alarming reports on the threat of a Chinese intervention.
12:25MacArthur is firm.
12:26The Chinese don't have the men or the resources.
12:29His troops must occupy North Korea to reestablish peace.
12:33It'll only take a few days and the boys will be home for Christmas.
12:40Truman returns to the U.S. reassured.
12:42In fact, Europe is his main concern.
12:50He fears a Korean-style scenario in which communist East Germany, the GDR, might invade West Germany,
12:57the Federal Republic, which must be armed immediately.
13:02On the Soviet side in East Berlin, Hitler's ex-soldiers are also rearmed under the misnomer National People's Army.
13:22The poor East Germans, pawns of the Cold War.
13:29Some understand that they must get out before it's too late.
13:33Before East Germany's political police, the feared Stasi, tightens the vice.
13:40For the next three decades.
13:49Do the Westerners have any idea how lucky they are?
14:02Every year in France, the communists and their supporters flock in numbers to a party organized by their newspaper, L'Humanité.
14:13Which celebrates those who torment the rest of Europe and demand the departure of the Americans who defend their freedom.
14:23It's better to remain in the dark, writes Françoise Giraud, a famous journalist at the time, adding...
14:33The world's borders stop at those we love.
14:40Other young Europeans get involved in the fight against communism.
14:43Elliot, a Long Vem model at the time, watched her fiancée, a war reporter, leave with France's famous Korean battalion.
14:51He writes to her,
14:54They're going to fight to liberate a country they don't even know, like the young Americans who came here during the two world wars.
15:02Elliot replies,
15:04I can no longer stand the world of fashion, so vapid, so superficial.
15:10She enlists as a nurse in Indochina.
15:17Despite the protests of the communist dockers, acting on orders from unions and Moscow,
15:24she is able to leave with other colonialist nurses.
15:28This is the term coined for the women who make the long trip to Indochina, which Elliot considers French soil.
15:37In five years, more than 30 nurses have died there.
15:46The replacements need to quickly adapt.
15:49One final elegant gesture before they are plunged into a war that is dragging on and on.
15:59The French had looked for a political solution to break the stalemate.
16:03One year earlier, they called back to power Bao Dai, the former emperor of Annam.
16:10Annam, Tonkin, and Cochin, China now make up Vietnam.
16:15French Indochina has left in its wake three officially sovereign countries.
16:20Along with Cambodia and Laos, they form what is now called the Associated States.
16:25The French army no longer carries the weight of defending a colony,
16:30but an ally who will have its own army and is accepted by a majority of the southern population.
16:36The United States recognizes these new nations.
16:40It dispatches a military mission and war materials, which marks the beginning of a spiral it finds itself trapped in.
16:47The vicious mechanism of the Cold War is set off.
17:00The communist countries recognize the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and its leader, the relentless Ho Chi Minh,
17:06who merely controls a mountainous zone in the north on the border of Mao's China.
17:17Once a small group of resistance fighters has now grown into an army 100,000 men strong.
17:23They are armed and often supervised by the Chinese, even in the headquarters of their military leader, General Jiap.
17:30In the fall of 1950, Jiap and Ho Chi Minh want a decisive win.
17:39They want to chase the French from the old Colonial Route 4, or RC4,
17:44that follows the Chinese border crossing into communist territory,
17:47and take the strategic positions of Cao Bang, Dong Khe, and Long Son.
17:55On September 16, 1950, the Viet Minh's 308th Division attacks.
18:10The French were not expecting the war to take this turn.
18:13They had been fighting against guerrilla troops, not modern military units and multiple waves of attacks.
18:20The French journalist Lucien Baudard writes,
18:23Asian fanaticism pushes Jiap's army to the brink of horror.
18:29Soldiers are far more than mere volunteers for death.
18:33When they jump out of their hole, they are already no longer alive.
18:37Like walking dead, they throw themselves into the line of fire, a pile of sacrificial bodies.
18:48Lucien Baudard reveals that the French positions along the RC4 are falling one after the other.
18:54The farmers and the tribes that remain loyal to France are abandoned and have no choice but to flee.
19:09The French military command orders a retreat, which will prove to be catastrophic.
19:13On October 10, 1950, the French are ambushed.
19:17On October 10, 1950, the French are ambushed.
19:21Between this ambush and the battle of the RC4, 5,000 men are killed, injured, or missing on the French side.
19:35Between this ambush and the battle of the RC4, 5,000 men are killed, injured, or missing on the French side.
19:39The Viet Minh, in taking Dong Khe and the RC4 posts, have taken nearly 4,000 prisoners and recovered significant arms and materials.
20:00The French prisoners walk days, even weeks, towards veritable death camps.
20:11Along with his men, Lieutenant Jean-Jacques Beauclair is subjected to what the Viet Minh refer to as re-education.
20:19Continual brainwashing, with never-ending self-evaluation sessions and lessons on Marxism.
20:26Lieutenant Beauclair recalls, the Viet Minh guards would scream,
20:34All of you are colonialists, war criminals, and enemies of the Vietnamese people.
20:39Normally, we would eliminate you.
20:42But thanks to President Ho Chi Minh's policy of leniency, your life will be spared, and you will become fighters for peace.
20:49Many prisoners refuse to submit and sign appeals for peace in Vietnam.
20:57They are left to starve to death.
21:02For its propaganda, the Viet Minh compensates those who seem to adhere to its ideology, passing around pineapple slices.
21:10Indoctrination is one of the key weapons in this Cold War conflict.
21:18A symbol of the confrontation between East and West.
21:22In Korea, these American prisoners have managed to escape after having survived a different hell.
21:37Another walk of death, imposed by the North Koreans.
21:40The North Koreans filmed a parade in Pyongyang of a column of American prisoners.
21:55The UN troops chasing the North Koreans took Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, on October 19, 1950.
22:02For these young Americans, conquering this symbol of communism is a sign that the war is over.
22:19But MacArthur continues advancing, because the Northern dictator Kim Il-sung has refused to surrender, despite a mediation attempt by the British.
22:34The UN forces reach the Yalu, the river that marks the border with communist China.
22:40Early November 1950, MacArthur prepares his final offensive against what remains of the North Korean army.
22:51The boys just want to be home for Christmas.
22:58These young Americans, many recalled after fighting in World War II, had since started families.
23:05They feel like they're at Earth's end.
23:07The cold is brutal in North Korea, minus 20 degrees Celsius.
23:19On the other side of the frozen Yalu, 300,000 Chinese soldiers prepare for combat.
23:25Mao, like Stalin, advances undercover.
23:29This is the trademark of the Cold War.
23:32These soldiers are officially volunteers, recruited to fight the imperialist enemy.
23:37They wear no official army insignias.
23:44Nor does their commander, General Peng Duwei, or his officers, including Mao Tse Tung's eldest son, Lieutenant Mao Anying, 28 years old.
23:56The date of the offensive was not chosen by chance.
24:03November 25, 1950.
24:05This is a holiday for the Americans, who await the arrival by parachute of their traditional Turkey.
24:14It's Thanksgiving.
24:15It's Thanksgiving.
24:16The day of thanks.
24:17The day that America's first colonial settlers gave thanks to God for his protection.
24:21November 25, 1950.
24:22The Chinese rush to attack the American positions.
24:24The UN's Air Force immediately gets involved.
24:28American, Australian, and British fighter planes drop tons of napalm, or gelled gasoline, on the Chinese.
24:35On the Chinese.
24:36On the Chinese.
24:37On the Chinese.
24:38On the Chinese.
24:39On the Chinese.
24:40The men inns.
24:41The men inns.
24:42American, Australian and British fighter planes drop tons of napalm or gelled gasoline on the Chinese.
25:08Mao's son is killed in the bombing.
25:12Nothing can stop the thundering advance of Mao's army and its waves of sacrificed men.
25:37American war correspondent Margaret Higgins writes,
25:40Air power and artillery are not enough when you are vastly outnumbered.
25:46Even the marines could not cope with the masses of howling bugle blowing Chinese.
25:53This is the first major defeat for the elite American military corps.
26:05The death toll is mind boggling.
26:07Twenty thousand killed or injured in ten days.
26:13Thus begins the UN forces' dreadful retreat through the chilling winter of North Korea's mountains.
26:19The American press questions the U.S. President.
26:25Truman declares,
26:27We will take whatever steps are necessary to meet the military situation.
26:31And to the question, will that include the atomic bomb?
26:35Truman answers,
26:37That includes every weapon that we have.
26:39The doomsday clock.
26:43The doomsday clock.
26:45At the mere mention of using the atomic bomb.
26:49Shows the increasing fear of nuclear war.
26:50The United States feels increasingly attacked on two fronts.
26:54Certain hot spots in Korea and Indochina and in Europe under threat from the Soviet Union.
27:08fear of nuclear war.
27:11The United States feels increasingly attacked on two fronts, certain hot spots in Korea
27:17and Indochina, and in Europe under threat from the Soviet Union.
27:27Does Truman really intend to drop the atomic bomb on the Chinese, who are chasing the Americans
27:32from Korea?
27:35The American government is divided.
27:38Secretary of State Dean Acheson, while in favor of such a decision, reports pressure from
27:43the British.
27:45To avoid an escalation, the Allies want the A-bomb to remain a weapon of dissuasion.
27:52Without the atomic bomb, MacArthur in Korea has no other option than to retreat.
28:05On December 8, 1950, the Americans, South Koreans, and their allies retreat over the
28:1338th parallel that they had crossed three months earlier and abandon North Korea.
28:20The North Korean population faced with the return of Kim Il-sung's regime is in a panic.
28:26One million civilians managed to escape to South Korea, where they're not even sure they'll
28:30be safe.
28:36The North Korean population faced with the U.S.
28:39Further south, in Indochina, civilians are also prisoners of war.
28:51During the same month of December 1950, in blood-drenched Indochina, they run from the fighting.
29:04The situation seems desperate.
29:06As a last-ditch effort, the French government dispatches one of its most renowned generals
29:12to Indochina, Jean Delattre de Tassigny.
29:18Delattre arrives in Saigon on December 17, 1950.
29:23He looks like a star in his beautiful white uniform, but his cane is a sign of his fragile
29:28health.
29:30At 60, he has a glorious past.
29:33On May 8, 1945, in the name of France, he signed the Third Reich's official surrender
29:39in Berlin.
29:42All civil and military powers in Indochina have been bestowed on him.
29:47First he speaks to the Vietnamese.
30:03In this civil war, Bao Dai soldiers are the brothers and cousins of the Viet Minh's communist
30:12fighters, progressively more indoctrinated by the Chinese Maoists, the most radical faction.
30:20Their leader, General Giap, along with his Chinese advisers, plans to leave no time for Delattre
30:26to act.
30:27They will draw him into a trap and beat up some Frenchies.
30:32The objective is to pursue the attacks towards the town of Vinh Yen, on the edge of the Viet
30:38Minh zone.
30:43On January 13, 1951, Giap attacks with his power divisions 308 and 312.
31:00From the outset of this new Viet Minh offensive, Delattre himself commands his troops.
31:07He mobilizes all available air transport, with the North African regiments and paratrooper
31:12units.
31:1510,000 men are thrown into combat.
31:25Artillery Lieutenant Robert Jambon writes,
31:28Gone is the notion of losing.
31:31We finally have a leader, a real one, who will bring us to victory.
31:35I feel like I'm living a historical moment.
31:38Never could I have imagined that King Delattre's panache would have such an effect on the morale
31:43of the troops.
31:44Delattre doesn't hesitate to use large quantities of napalm supplied by the United States.
31:54In four days, the Viet Minh is defeated, leaving behind 1,500 dead, 6,000 injured, and 500 prisoners.
32:23Losses on the French side are also considerable.
32:26800 men are out of commission.
32:36Delattre does not celebrate victory.
32:41He explains to journalist Lucien Baudard that the battle isn't over as long as China continues
32:46to support, finance, and arm the Viet Minh.
32:49Delattre seeks to stop the spread of communism in Asia.
32:54He sees himself leading the southern front in Indochina, with MacArthur in the north in Korea.
33:05MacArthur manages to contain the Chinese advance, and push them back beyond the 38th parallel into
33:12northern Korea.
33:19Seoul, March 14th, 1951.
33:23The unfortunate capital of South Korea conquered and reconquered four times in eight months is
33:28now under UN control again.
33:33The front is more or less stable at the expense of bloody combat.
33:39MacArthur comes to congratulate and decorate the French soldiers.
33:43These are some of the last images of MacArthur in Korea.
33:50MacArthur is taken by Corporal Chief Berraire, who filmed his friends and the social worker
33:56known as Pepita.
34:04One of them wrote,
34:05Soldiers lost far from home, volunteers from the French battalion in Korea were able, thanks
34:13to their courage, to gain the admiration of the other contingents.
34:18Anti-communism crusaders, or simply warriors, they died in the mud and cold, like our doctor,
34:26Commander Jean-Louis, shot while going to care for South Korean soldiers.
34:30A forgotten testimony about an increasingly brutal and cruel fight.
34:39While trying to conquer or defend the hills and valleys, one quarter of the French battalion
34:44is lost in man-to-man combat with bayonets.
34:53MacArthur raises his glass to the French as per the tradition.
34:59He sees no other solution than resorting to the atomic bomb.
35:05He petitions Washington for 34 of these bombs.
35:10An undisclosed number are delivered, but without nuclear warheads.
35:18Truman is of the opinion that MacArthur is too uncontrollable to be given such weapons.
35:23Pretexting insubordination, he relieves MacArthur of his command.
35:34April 16th 1951, MacArthur boards his personal plane saying, I was fired like a housekeeper.
35:46After his departure, Truman has nine nuclear warheads delivered.
35:52He now has the means to back his threats, but he is the one controlling them.
35:57To prevent a third world war.
36:01I have therefore considered it essential to relieve General MacArthur so that there would
36:06be no doubt or confusion as to the real purpose and aim of our policy.
36:12Still, New York honors MacArthur with a huge parade down Broadway.
36:17The General finds the words to make America cry.
36:21The world has turned over many times, but I still remember the refrain of one of the most popular
36:34barrack ballads of that day, that old soldier never died.
36:41They just fade away.
36:58Public opinion believes that MacArthur's dismissal weakens America's position.
37:03The Los Angeles Times reads, it's Stalin's victory.
37:07On American television, the fearsome Republican Senator, Joseph McCarthy, sees this as a sign
37:13of communist influence at the highest levels of government.
37:17Many American mothers have lost sons and now wonder why we didn't follow General Douglas
37:21MacArthur's sensible theory of hitting bikes.
37:24That is the suicidal Kremlin-directed foreign policy, the extent to which it's controlled by
37:29communists in our government.
37:34Washington, September 1951.
37:37As always, Jean Delattre de Tassigny makes a dramatic entrance.
37:41MacArthur has left the stage.
37:43The French general considers himself obligated to uphold MacArthur's mission.
37:49He wears a mourner's armband, and his wife behind him is in black.
37:54Their only son, a young officer, has just been killed in Indochina.
37:58De Lattre wants to use his prestige to exhort the Americans to keep up their efforts in Asia.
38:09If not, there will be a tidal wave of what he refers to as red colonialism.
38:13In Korea and Indochina, there is the same war, there is one war in Asia, and we know, and
38:24I am here everywhere explaining, making the demonstration of the truth, that Korea and Indochina are the
38:34same battlefield for liberty against communism.
38:38At the same time, the symbolic French ocean liner, Liberté, glides past the Statue of Liberty.
38:48In New York, at the UN Security Council, the American delegate shows a Soviet weapon seized
38:54in Korea.
38:56This is to denounce Stalin's increasing involvement in the conflict.
39:05But Stalin doesn't only supply the North Koreans and Chinese with light artillery, he sends
39:10them hundreds of fighter jets.
39:24The most recent product of Soviet industry, the Mikoyan Gurevich Model 15, also known as
39:29MiG-15.
39:31The Soviet planes are painted with North Korean colors.
39:34Propaganda focuses on the faces of the North Korean pilots, of which there are few in reality.
39:43Most of the pilots are Soviets, who are also supposedly volunteers.
39:50They go head to head with the Americans in the first jet plane combat in history.
39:59The Americans hear their adversaries in their headphones, speaking Russian.
40:07For the Americans, these Soviet MiG-15s are a disturbing discovery.
40:12Their F-86 Sabre is outperformed.
40:16The MiG flies faster and higher.
40:21The Soviets now master very advanced technology.
40:25Yet the American pilots take the lead because they are better trained.
40:39One of the rare North Korean pilots deserts and manages to land with his MiG-15 on an American
40:46base in South Korea.
40:50The pilot's name is Nokom Sok.
40:56He receives the $100,000 reward offered to any pilot who will hand over his MiG with
41:01its secrets.
41:03His first words upon arriving, we were overjoyed that MacArthur had been recalled, because we
41:08feared him most of all.
41:14Since MacArthur's departure, the front has stabilized.
41:17A trench war begins.
41:35Men keep dying.
41:50Men keep suffering.
41:53In emergency units otherwise known as MASH.
41:56Mobile Army surgical hospitals, which inspire a movie, MASH, and 250 episodes of a very successful
42:03American sitcom that lasts for 11 seasons.
42:12July 1951, in Kaesong, North Korea.
42:16War correspondents are called in for an initial meeting with UN representatives, North Koreans,
42:24and Chinese, who thus far have lost nearly 200,000 men and are looking for a solution to the conflict.
42:32The Russian Secret Service has also alerted them to the presence of American atomic bombs.
42:38The ceasefire negotiations drag on.
42:44To pass the time, a cameraman films Americans communicating for the first time with North
42:49Koreans, who are taking great risks to play this game.
42:59Negotiations fail after three months of discussion.
43:05In fact, it's a maneuver by Stalin to stop an offensive led by the UN forces.
43:12Stalin is the main obstacle to peace.
43:17In Moscow, for the big military parade of May 1, 1952, he looks well.
43:28Despite the rumors regarding his health.
43:32These images are scrutinized by a tortured population and two million deportees in the Gulag concentration
43:39camps.
43:40They all wish him dead, but he is very much alive.
43:44He films his superbomber, capable of carrying his atomic bomb, at the commands as an Air Force
43:55General, Vasily Stalin, his son.
44:03Kill Stalin.
44:04Conquer the world.