Original subtitles

NARRATOR: The planet is more divided than ever.

It's the Cold War between the West, with the United States,

and the East, with the Soviet Union, who now has nuclear weapons,

and can trigger the Apocalypse.

(explosion)

("Cry Baby" playing)

NARRATOR: A virtual creation by American scientists,

the Doomsday Clock, is closer in 1950

to the fateful hour of midnight than it has ever been before.

(explosion)

With the crazed wave of atomic testing, and China's awakening, the world trembles.

("Cry Baby" continues playing)

The world trembles in Asia. In Korea. In Indochina.

In Indochina, the Communists have been fighting the French

for the past five years.

(explosions and gunshots)

In Korea, in only two months,

the UN forces count 24,000 dead, injured or imprisoned,

and still haven't been able to stop

Communist North Korea from invading South Korea.

In the North Korean capital, Pyongyang,

a young, smiling yet ruthless dictator reigns.

His name is Kim Il Sung.

He is the founder of what will be the first Communist dynasty in history.

His regime, imposed by Stalin when he invaded North Korea in 1945,

relies on an army that was trained and equipped by the Soviets.

The Soviet Ambassador, General Shtykov, is the country's true leader.

Along with Kim Il Sung, he has managed to convince Stalin

that the time is ripe to invade the South.

His ally, the head of the Chinese Communist party, Mao Zedong,

has given his okay.

He said,

"The Sino-Soviet alliance will be the triumph of peace."

At the United Nations, the Security Council has condemned

the North Korean aggression.

The United States has obtained a mandate

to lead military intervention by a symbolic coalition,

made up of 22 countries.

(explosion)

The UN forces have been dominated by the North Korean army

and have retreated to the port of Pusan, under siege for two months.

(explosion)

In early September 1950,

the coalition's Commander-in-Chief, American General Douglas MacArthur,

boards a battleship flying the colors of the UN.

MacArthur sees this as the last recourse.

To land on the tail of the North Koreans in Inchon, the port of Seoul.

September 15, 1950.

The allied fleet approaches Inchon

with 230 battleships, mostly American.

MacArthur has authorized the presence of a group of international journalists.

Among them is Henri de Turenne.

He writes,

"On the pink backdrop of the breaking dawn,

the American Marines lay out their strength,

to avenge the humiliation of the infantry.

The ships slide like pieces on a chess board."

(dramatic music playing)

(explosions continues)

MacArthur writes in his Reminiscences,

"The tension is extreme.

Forty thousand men are about to throw themselves into an audacious mission

to save 100,000 who are fighting in the South.

If we lose the war to Communism in Asia,

the fate of Europe will be gravely jeopardized.

Win it and Europe will stay free."

(gunfire)

(soldiers shouting)

(gunfire continues)

(anthem music playing)

After taking the port of Inchon, the Marines savor their victory.

The cameramen take stock of the human cost.

(somber music playing)

Survivors of the North Korean army have either fled or been captured.

As always, their clothes are removed so they can't conceal weapons.

This is MacArthur's triumph.

As usual, he is followed by a swarm of journalists.

From now on, he is nicknamed, "The Sorcerer of Inchon".

He pauses in front of the remains of a Soviet T-34 tank,

to provide proof of Moscow's involvement in the Korean conflict.

All the while, Stalin continues to position himself

as leading the fight for peace.

He has the big European Communist parties organize major protests,

with slogans like "Leave Korea to the Koreans!",

"Stop the American assault on Korea!"

"Hands off Korea!"

North Korean leader Kim Il Sung,

surprised by the American landing in Inchon, has a Stalinesque-reaction.

(speaking in Korean) Down with American imperialism!

Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!

NARRATOR: In South Korea, the UN forces' advance to liberate the country

has slowed down.

(gunshots)

Cameramen risk their lives to film the increasingly violent combats.

It takes ten days for the UN forces to reach Seoul,

merely 60 km from Inchon.

(gunshots)

Seoul, the Southern capital,

occupied and reoccupied, is devastated by fighting.

Amongst the ruins, a population of starving orphans struggles to survive.

(somber music playing)

The Americans discover a horrifying number of mass graves.

An investigative committee reveals that 30,000 South Korean prisoners

and 2000 American prisoners

were assassinated by the retreating North Koreans.

Seoul. September 26th, 1950.

The UN flag flies on the barely intact government palace.

(applause)

MacArthur reinstates the South Korean president,

Syngman Rhee, who declares,

"General MacArthur, we love you as the savior of our race!"

For Syngman Rhee, the return to peace

means his country will remain split in two.

He wants to cross the 38th parallel

which has separated the two Koreas since 1945,

and continue to move forward, even without UN authorization,

to the Yalu, the great river that creates a natural border with China.

The Americans indulge the South Koreans

and display their crossing of the 38th parallel.

The reunification of the country is moving ahead, by force,

which scares the allies of the coalition, who fear an extension of the conflict.

In Seoul, organizations of young South Koreans

multiply their protests with slogans like,

"Give us arms to exterminate the Communists!"

"Commies are running away. Chase them, chase them!"

Despite UN reticence, MacArthur, secretly encouraged by his government,

gives the Army the order to cross the 38th parallel.

October 1st, 1950,

the Americans cross over into North Korea. Their message is clear,

Communist expansionism must come to an end.

Where there is a threat, there will be a reaction and destruction.

(distant gunshot)

Kim Il Sung is hiding in the mountains.

He has refused to fight because he knows that China will soon enter the conflict.

The American crossing of the 38th parallel is unacceptable

for the leader of the Chinese Communists, Mao Zedong.

Mao says, "If the U.S. imperialists won the war, they would threaten us.

We must not fail to assist the Koreans. We will send volunteers there!"

October 15th, 1950.

Two weeks after crossing the 38th parallel on an island in the Pacific,

American president Harry Truman, comes to meet General MacArthur.

Truman hasn't just come to pin another medal on MacArthur's chest.

Behind the smiles, Truman has come to express his concern.

The CIA is sending alarming reports on the threat of a Chinese intervention.

MacArthur is firm. The Chinese don't have the men or the resources.

His troops must occupy North Korean to re-establish peace.

It'll only take a few days, and the boys will be home for Christmas.

Truman returns to the US reassured.

In fact, Europe is his main concern.

He fears a Korean-style scenario in which Communist East Germany, the GDR,

might invade West Germany, the Federal Republic,

which must be armed immediately.

On the Soviet side, in East Berlin,

Hitler's ex-soldiers are also rearmed

under the misnomer, "National People's Army"

The poor East Germans, pawns of the Cold War.

Some understand that they must get out before it is too late,

before East Germany's political police, the feared Stasi, tightens the vise

for the next three decades.

Do the Westerners have any idea how lucky they are?

(lively music playing)

Every year in France, the Communists and their supporters

flock in numbers to a party organized by their newspaper, L'Humanité,

which celebrates those who torment the rest Europe

and demand the departure of the Americans who defend their freedom.

"It's better to remain in the dark", writes Françoise Giroud,

a famous journalist at the time, adding,

"The world's borders stop at those we love."

Other young Europeans get involved in the fight against Communism.

Eliette, a Lanvin model at the time, watched her fiancé,

a war reporter, leave with France's famous Korean battalion.

He writes to her,

"They are going to fight to liberate a country they don't even know,

like the young Americans who came here during the two World Wars."

Eliette replies,

"I can no longer stand the world of fashion, so vapid, so superficial."

She enlists, as a nurse, in Indochina.

Despite the protests of the Communist dockers,

acting on orders from unions and Moscow,

she is able to leave with other "colonialist nurses."

This is the term coined for the women who make the long trip to Indochina,

which Eliette considers French soil.

In five years, more than 30 nurses have died there.

The replacements need to quickly adapt.

One final elegant gesture, before they are plunged into a war

that is dragging on and on.

The French had looked for a political solution to break the stalemate.

One year earlier, they called back to power Bao Dai,

the former Emperor of Annam.

Annam, Tonkin and Cochinchina, now make up Vietnam.

French Indochina has left in its wake three officially sovereign countries.

Along with Cambodia and Laos, they form what is now called the Associated States.

The French army no longer carries the weight of defending a colony,

but an ally who will have its own army

and is accepted by a majority of the southern population.

The United States recognizes these new nations.

It dispatches a military mission and war materials,

which marks the beginning of a spiral it finds itself trapped in.

The vicious mechanism of the Cold War is set off.

The Communist countries recognize the Democratic Republic of Vietnam,

and its leader, the relentless Ho Chi Minh,

who merely controls a mountainous zone in the North,

on the border of Mao's China.

Once a small group of resistance fighters

has now grown into an army 100,000 men strong.

They are armed and often supervised by the Chinese,

even in the headquarters of their military leader, General Giap.

In the fall 1950, Giap and Ho Chi Minh want a decisive win.

They want to chase the French from the old Route Colonial route, or RC4,

that follows the Chinese border, crossing into Communist territory.

And take the strategic positions of Cao Bang, Dong Khe and Lang Son.

(explosion)

On September 16th, 1950,

the Viet Minh's 308th division attacks.

(explosions and gunfire)

The French were not expecting the war to take this turn.

They had been fighting against guerrilla troops,

not modern military units and multiple waves of attacks.

The French journalist, Lucien Bodard writes,

"Asian fanaticism pushes Giap's army to the brink of horror.

(explosion)

Soldiers are far more than mere volunteers for death.

When they jump out of their hole, they are already no longer alive.

Like walking dead, they throw themselves into the line of fire,

a pile of sacrificial bodies."

Lucien Bodard reveals that the French positions along the RC4

are falling one after the other.

The farmers and the tribes that remain loyal to France

are abandoned and have no choice but to flee.

The French military command the orders of retreat,

which will prove to be catastrophic.

On October 10th, 1950, the French are ambushed.

(gunshots)

(gunfire)

Between this ambush and the battle of the RC4,

five thousand men are killed, injured or missing on the French side.

The Viet Minh, in taking Dong Khe and the RC4 posts,

have taken nearly 4,000 prisoners

and recovered significant arms and materials.

The French prisoners walk days, even weeks, towards veritable death camps.

Along with his men, Lieutenant Jean-Jacques Beucler

is subjected to what the Viet Minh refer to as "re-education."

Continual brainwashing with never-ending self-evaluation sessions

and lessons on Marxism.

Lieutenant Beucler recalls, "The Viet Minh guards would scream,

'All of you are colonialists,

war criminals and enemies of the Vietnamese people.

Normally, we would eliminate you.

But thanks to President Ho Chi Minh's policy of leniency,

your life will be spared and you will become fighters for peace.'"

Many prisoners refuse to submit and sign appeals for "Peace in Vietnam".

They are left to starve to death.

For its propaganda, the Viet Minh compensates

those who seem to adhere to its ideology,

passing around pineapple slices.

Indoctrination is one of the key weapons in this Cold War conflict,

a symbol of the confrontation between East and West.

In Korea, these American prisoners have managed to escape

after having survived a different hell,

another Walk of Death imposed by the North Koreans.

The North Koreans filmed a parade, in Pyongyang,

of a column of American prisoners.

The UN troops, chasing the North Koreans, took Pyongyang, the North Korean capital,

on October 19th, 1950.

For these young Americans, conquering this symbol of Communism

is a sign that the war is over.

But MacArthur continues advancing,

because the Northern Dictator, Kim Il Sung, has refused to surrender,

despite a mediation attempt by the British.

The UN forces reach the Yalu,

the river that marks the border with Communist China.

Early November 1950,

MacArthur prepares his final offensive

against what remains of the North Korean army.

The boys just want to be home for Christmas.

These young Americans, many recalled after fighting in World War II,

had since started families. They feel like they are at Earth's end.

The cold is brutal in the north of Korea. -20 degrees Celsius.

On the other side of the frozen Yalu,

three hundred thousand Chinese soldiers prepare for combat.

Mao, like Stalin, advances under cover.

This is the trademark of the Cold War.

These soldiers are officially volunteers,

recruited to fight the imperialist enemy.

They wear no official army insignias.

Nor does their commander, General Peng Dehuai

or his officers,

including Mao Zedong's eldest son,

Lieutenant Mao Anying, 28 years old.

The date of the offensive was not chosen by chance.

November 25th, 1950.

This is a holiday for the Americans, who await the arrival by parachute

of their traditional turkey.

It's Thanksgiving, the day of thanks,

the day that America's first colonial settlers

gave thanks to God for His protection.

(explosions)

November 25th, 1950.

The Chinese rush to attack the American positions.

The UN's air force immediately gets involved.

(planes droning)

American, Australian and British fighter planes

drop tons of napalm, or gelled gasoline, on the Chinese.

(explosion)

(explosion)

Mao's son is killed in the bombing.

(explosion)

Nothing can stop the thundering advance of Mao's army

and its waves of sacrificed men.

(explosion continues)

(gunfire)

American war correspondent, Marguerite Higgins writes,

"Air power and artillery are not enough when you are vastly outnumbered.

Even the Marines could not cope with the masses of howling, bugle-blowing Chinese."

(indistinct screaming)

This is the first major defeat for the elite American military corps.

The death toll is mind-boggling.

Twenty thousand killed or injured in ten days.

Thus begins the UN forces' dreadful retreat,

through the chilling winter of North Korea's mountains.

The American press questions the US President.

Truman declares, "We will take whatever steps are necessary

to meet the military situation."

And to the question, "Will that include the atomic bomb?"

Truman answers, "That includes every weapon that we have."

The Doomsday Clock.

At the mere mention of using the atomic bomb,

shows the increasing fear of nuclear war.

The United States feels increasingly attacked on two fronts,

certain hotspots in Korea and Indochina,

and in Europe, under threat from the Soviet Union.

Does Truman really intend to drop the atomic bomb on the Chinese

who are chasing the Americans from Korea?

The American government is divided.

Secretary of State Dean Acheson, while in favor of such a decision,

reports pressure from the British.

To avoid an escalation, the Allies want the A-bomb

to remain a weapon of dissuasion.

Without the atomic bomb, MacArthur in Korea

has no other option than to retreat.

On December 8th, 1950, the Americans, South Koreans and their allies,

retreat over the 38th parallel that they had crossed three months earlier,

and abandon North Korea.

The North Korean population,

faced with the return of Kim Il Sung's regime, is in a panic.

One million civilians manage to escape to South Korea,

where they're not even sure they'll be safe.

Further south, in Indochina, civilians are also prisoners of war.

During the same month of December 1950,

in blood-drenched Indochina, they run from the fighting.

The situation seems desperate.

As a last-ditch effort,

the French government dispatches one of its most renowned generals

to Indochina, Jean de Lattre de Tassigny.

De Lattre arrives in Saigon on December 17th, 1950.

He looks like a star in his beautiful white uniform,

but his cane is a sign of his fragile health.

At 60, he has a glorious past.

On May 8th, 1945, in the name of France,

he signed the Third Reich's official surrender in Berlin.

All civil and military powers in Indochina have been bestowed on him.

First, he speaks to the Vietnamese.

DE LATTRE: (speaking in French) If you are Communists, join the Viet Minh.

But if you are patriots, fight for your country!

This is your war.

NARRATOR: In this civil war, Bao Dai's soldiers

are the brothers and cousins of the Viet Minh's Communist fighters,

progressively more indoctrinated by the Chinese Maoists,

the most radical faction.

Their leader, General Giap, along with his Chinese advisors,

plans to leave no time for De Lattre to act.

They will draw him into a trap

and "beat up some Frenchies."

The objective is to pursue the attacks towards the town of Vinh Yen,

on the edge of the Viet Minh zone.

January 13th, 1951, Giap attacks with his power divisions

308 and 312.

From the outset of this new Viet Minh offensive,

De Lattre himself commands his troops.

He mobilizes all available air transport,

with the North African regiments and paratrooper units.

Ten thousand men are thrown into combat.

Artillery Lieutenant Robert Jambon writes,

"Gone is the notion of losing! We finally have a leader. A real one

who will bring us to victory!

I feel like I am living a historical moment.

Never could I have imagined that King de Lattre's panache

would have such an effect on the morale of the troops!"

De Lattre doesn't hesitate

to use large quantities of napalm supplied by the United States.

(explosion)

(explosion)

In four days, the Viet Minh is defeated,

leaving behind 1500 dead, 6000 injured and 500 prisoners.

Losses on the French side are also considerable.

Eight hundred men are out of commission.

De Lattre does not celebrate victory.

He explains to journalist Lucien Bodard that the battle isn't over

as long as China continues to support, finance and arm the Viet Minh.

De Lattre seeks to stop the spread of Communism in Asia.

He sees himself leading the southern front, in Indochina,

with MacArthur in the north, in Korea.

MacArthur manages to contain the Chinese advance

and push them back beyond the 38th parallel into Northern Korea.

Seoul, March 14th, 1951,

the unfortunate capital of South Korea

conquered and re-conquered four times in eight months

is now under UN control again.

The front is more or less stable, at the expense of bloody combat.

MacArthur comes to congratulate and decorate the French soldiers.

These are some of the last images of MacArthur in Korea,

taken by Corporal Chief Bérerd,

who filmed his friends and the social worker known

as Pépita.

One of them wrote,

"Soldiers lost far from home,

volunteers from the French battalion in Korea were able, thanks to their courage,

to gain the admiration of the other contingents.

Anti-Communism crusaders or simply warriors,

they died in the mud and cold, like our doctor,

Commander Jean-Louis, shot while going to care for South Korean soldiers."

A forgotten testimony about an increasingly brutal and cruel fight.

While trying to conquer or defend the hills and valleys,

one quarter of the French battalion is lost

in man-to-man combat with bayonets.

MacArthur raises his glass to the French, as per the tradition.

He sees no other solution than resorting to the atomic bomb.

He petitions Washington for 34 of these bombs.

An undisclosed number are delivered,

but without nuclear warheads.

Truman is of the opinion that MacArthur is too uncontrollable

to be given such weapons.

Pretexting insubordination, he relieves MacArthur of his command.

April 16th, 1951,

MacArthur boards his personal plane saying,

"I was fired like a housekeeper."

After his departure, Truman has nine nuclear warheads delivered.

He now has the means to back his threats, but he is the one controlling them.

TRUMAN: To prevent a Third World War,

I have therefore considered it essential to relieve General MacArthur

so that there would be no doubt or confusion

as to the real purpose and aim of our policy.

NARRATOR: Still, New York honors MacArthur with a huge parade down Broadway.

The General finds the words to make America cry.

MACARTHUR: The world has turned over many times

but I still remember the refrain

of one of the most popular barrack ballads of that day,

"Old soldiers never die,

they just fade away."

♪ Old soldiers never die ♪

♪ They just fade away ♪

NARRATOR: Public opinion believes that MacArthur's dismissal

weakens America's position.

The Los Angeles Times' reads, "It's Stalin's Victory."

On American television, the fearsome Republican Senator, Joseph McCarthy,

sees this as a sign of Communist influence at the highest levels of government.

Many American mothers who have lost sons will now wonder

why we didn't follow General Douglas MacArthur's

sensible theory of hitting back.

That is the suicidal, Kremlin directed foreign policy.

The extent to which it's controlled by communist in our government.

(airplane engines whirring)

NARRATOR: Washington, September 1951.

As always, Jean de Lattre de Tassigny makes a dramatic entrance.

MacArthur has left the stage.

The French general considers himself obligated to uphold MacArthur's mission.

He wears a mourner's armband and his wife behind him, is in black.

Their only son, a young officer, has just been killed in Indochina.

(soldiers shouting instructions)

De Lattre wants to use his prestige to exhort the Americans

to keep up their efforts in Asia.

If not, there will be a tidal wave of what he refers to as "Red Colonialism".

In Korea and in Indochina, there is the same war.

There is one war, in Asia.

And, we know,

and I am here, everywhere, explaining, making the demonstration of the truth

that Korea and Indochina are the same battlefield,

for liberty and against Communism.

NARRATOR: At the same time, the symbolic French ocean liner Liberté

glides past the Statue of Liberty.

In New York, at the UN Security Council,

the American delegate shows a Soviet weapon seized in Korea.

This is to denounce Stalin's increasing involvement in the conflict.

But Stalin doesn't only supply the North Koreans and Chinese

with light artillery.

He sends them hundreds of fighter jets.

The most recent product of Soviet industry,

the Mikoyan-Gurevich model 15, also known as MiG 15.

The Soviet planes are painted with North Korean colors.

Propaganda focuses on the faces of the North Korean pilots,

of which there are few in reality.

Most of the pilots are Soviets,

who are also supposedly volunteers.

They go head to head with the Americans in the first jet plane combat in history.

(pilots speaking Russian in radio)

The Americans hear their adversaries in their headphones, speaking Russian.

For the Americans, these Soviet MiG15s are a disturbing discovery.

Their F-86 Sabre is outperformed.

The MiG flies faster and higher.

The Soviets now master very advanced technology.

Yet the American pilots take the lead, because they are better trained.

(gunfire)

One of the rare North Korean pilots deserts

and manages to land, with his MiG 15,

on an American base in South Korea.

The pilot's name is No Kum Sok.

He receives the $100,000 reward

offered to any pilot who will hand over his MiG with its secrets.

His first words upon arriving,

"We were overjoyed that MacArthur had been recalled,

because we feared him most of all."

Since MacArthur's departure, the front has stabilized.

A trench war begins.

(gunfire)

Men keep dying.

(explosion)

(soldiers shouting)

Men keep suffering.

An emergency units otherwise known as MASH, a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital,

which inspires a movie, MASH,

and 250 episodes of a very successful American sitcom

that lasts for 11 seasons.

July 1951. In Kaesong, North Korea,

war correspondents are called in for an initial meeting with UN representatives,

North Koreans and Chinese,

who thus far have lost nearly 200,000 men

and are looking for a solution to the conflict.

The Russian secret service has also alerted them

to the presence of American atomic bombs.

The cease-fire negotiations drag on.

To pass the time, a cameraman films Americans

communicating for the first time with North Koreans,

who are taking great risks to play this game.

Negotiations fail after three months of discussion.

In fact, it is a maneuver by Stalin

to stop an offensive led by the UN forces.

Stalin is the main obstacle to peace.

(crowd applause)

In Moscow, for the big military parade

of May 1st 1952, he looks well...

despite the rumors regarding his health.

These images are scrutinized by a tortured population

and two million deportees in the gulag concentration camps.

They all wish him dead, but he is very much alive.

He films his super bomber,

capable of carrying his atomic bomb.

At the commands is an air force general, Vasily Stalin, his son.

Will Stalin conquer the world?