As the forward battalion of the division reserve, 3/1 (Lieutenant Colonel Altman) had prepared counterattack plans for critical locations in the division sector and had previously made a reconnaissance of the Hook area. The battalion immediately displaced from its bivouac site north of the Imjin (Camp Rose) to an assembly area behind the 7th Marines on the MLR. [Illustration: MAP 17 K. White HOOK PENETRATIONS 26–27 October 1952] All possible support for 1/7 was made available, since the critical situation resulting from the major enemy assault automatically suspended previous restrictions on use of artillery and mortar allowances. At Warsaw, 2/11 blanketed the position with a continuous barrage in order to limit the enemy’s ability to effectively hold and consolidate the captured COP. Lieutenant Colonel Davis’ cannoneers also blasted enemy formations in response to fire missions from forward observers. Artillery rounds fell on Chinese outposts supporting the attack, on approach routes to the battleground, on assembly areas, and on known and suspected Chinese artillery locations. Marine aviation and tanks were employed as part of the plan to first limit the penetration made by the enemy before the counterattack to expel him. A section of tanks had been firing since 1930 against the enemy main line; a second section joined the direct fire assault a half hour later. At 2113, one F7F, with 1,300 pounds of bombs, hit a portion of the enemy’s MSR. At 2306, another twin-engine Grumman Tigercat blasted the same area, about three-quarters of a mile west of the Hook. These initial one-plane strikes in support of the defense of the salient were flown by Captain Leon C. Cheek, Jr. and Major Laurel M. Mickelson, respectively, of VMF(N)-513. _Reno Demonstration_[280] [280] The material in this section has been derived from 7thMar, “Summary of Action, 26 Oct-1 Nov 52, Hook, Reno, Ronson”; 2/7 ComdD, Oct 52. At 0030 on the 27th, Major Mickelson, returning from his MPQ attack, touched his Tigercat down at K-8 (Kunsan). At the very moment that the plane set down on the Kunsan runway, the Chinese launched another assault against the 7th Marines, the second in less than six hours. This later action, in Lieutenant Colonel Caputo’s 2/7 sector, nearly two miles west of the Hook, was not a surprise move either. In fact, an attack against the Carson-Reno-Vegas area had been anticipated for some time, and it was this state of preparedness that throttled the enemy’s attempt to seize an outpost here.