Yes, it's correct.

The quote from LeMay was from an interview he gave in the 80's and is often cited. LeMay started World War II in Europe, flying bombing missions into Germany. In 1944, he went to the Pacific theater where he was the architect of the firebombing Japanese cities, including Tokyo. After the war, he rose to become the head of Strategic Air Command where he advocated the total destruction of the enemy to win a war. It was this combination that led to the Air Force's complete destruction of North Korea.

At the beginning of the Korean War, US fighters were outgunned in their F-80 Shooting Stars by the Soviet MiG-15. Once the F-86 Sabre came, the US was able to shoot down MiG's at a ratio of nearly 10:1 for every Sabre they lost. As a result, the MiG's, secretly piloted by Soviet pilots, stayed in the far north in an area known as "MiG Alley," lest they be shot down and Soviet direct involvement become known. Under these circumstances, American bombers had the freedom to bomb whatever they wanted south of Pyongyang in relative safety and with superior fighter escorts, targets under MiG Alley were also possible to attack.

As for targets under MiG Alley, the most important target was the Suhui Dam complex on the Yalu river. In the summer of 1952, in an effort to put more pressure on the Communists during peace negotiations, UN forces bombed the hydroelectric dams along the Chinese/Korean border. Allied forces lost a handful of planes while the Koreans and Chinese lost many more MiGs as well as AA guns. They also lost 90% of the generating capacity of the dam, cutting off power to most of North Korea as well as northeastern China for some time. They wouldn't rebuild that capacity until after the war was over.

Long story short, the US Air Force (along with Navy and Marine air assets, as well as other allied air power) had free reign to do what they wanted. They were able to outperform their MiG rivals, they dumped napalm on enemy forces, they bombed dams, farms, villages, fields, along with any other target of opportunity be it military or civilian in an effort to pressure the Communist forces to negotiate.

Hello! I'd like to take a stab at framing your question and provide some context for these statements. I'll be drawing on the work of Mark Clodfelter, specifically, The Limits of Air Power: The American Bombing of North Vietnam. The main focus of the text is the Vietnam war, obviously, but it spans all the theaters where the US utilized strategic bombing as a tool for victory. I will also be drawing on Bruce Cumings, The Korean War: A History (New York: Modern Library, 2010) and David Halberstam, The Coldest Winter: America and the Korean War (New York: Hyperion, 2008). I may also refer to some information found in Timothy Moy, War Machines: Transforming Technologies in the U.S Military, 1920-1940 (College Station: Texas A&M Press, 2001).

So, it's important to note that the Korean War was prosecuted shortly after the apparent success of strategic bombing in the allied victory over the axis-powers in World War II. This means that for US military leaders, strategic bombing was viewed as one of the most useful tools for applying the massive logistical advantage of the US.

As American political objectives vacillated during the [Korean] war, the results sought by strategic bombing to support those objectives changed as well. Until MacArthur's success at Inchon, the Far East Air Forces (FEAF) attempted to stymie the advance of the North Korean Army. Air commanders employed bombing as a tool to wreck North Korean political and military institutions during the UN effort to unify the peninsula.

Essentially, some of the active commanders of the FEAF viewed strategic bombing as a means to potentially win the war politically. This view was only reinforced by the counter-invasion of North Korea by China in the years following. As the two sides settled into the stalemate we see today, Strategic Bombing became the sole means to influence the North Koreans and Chinese.

General Bradley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, observed in November 1952 that air power "constitutes the most potent means, at present available to the United Nations Command, of maintaining the degree of military pressure which might impel the communists to agree, finally, to acceptable armistice terms."

Layered on top of this is the extreme risk associated with the escalation of the conflict outside of the Korean peninsula. Not only could the US not resort to using Nuclear Weapons, as it had in WWII, but it had to be careful to not antagonize the Chinese or the USSR even more. Instead of pursuing military targets outside of the North Korea, and following the "complete paralyzation" of North Korean Industry, US commanders turned to other targets. In 1951, the wholesale bombing of NK population centers began with strikes at Pyongyang, Wosan, Hamhung, Hungnam and other cities. On top of this, the FEAF command initiated a series of bombing campaigns known as the "Strangle", specifically targeted infrastructure throughout North Korea. The US targeted both highways and rail lines throughout the country.

Unfortunately, the destruction of this infrastructure didn't force the North Koreans/Chinese to the table to negotiate. So, in turn, the FEAF command selected new targets, a "shift in emphasis". During the early months of 1952, the FEAF targeted "Aircraft, airfields, electric generation facilities and distribution systems". Specifically, the FEAF command had decided that the new policy of the Strategic Bombing campaign was to switch to "inflicting maximum possible damage on military-related facilities perceived as essential to the civilian populace's well being."

Brigadier General Jacob Smart, Operations Deputy at FEAF issued the following statement regarding the purpose of the air pressure strategy: Whenever possible, attacks will be scheduled against targets of military significance so situated that their destruction will have a deleterious effect upon the moral of the civilian population actively engaged in the logisitic support of enemy forces.

This new phase of the war was characterized by the increased bombing of semi-military targets in order to force the North Koreans/Chinese to the negotiating table. This took the form of the destruction of nearly all of North Korea's hydroelectric facilities, and by 1953 has segued into something else entirely: the intentional destruction of food crops. While the FEAF Command was unwilling to actually sign off on the bombing of irrigation dams specifically to flood hundreds of square miles of rice farms, it happened anyway under slightly twisted auspices. In fact, the first bombing raid against farms was specifically masked: "some mode of deception [should] be utilized so that the enemy will not interpret the attack on the dam as being directed towards a program of subsequent destruction of their rice crops."

At a certain level, the FEAF was forced into these methods simply because they were politically restrained from reaching the true military targets in China. Without the ability to apply strategic bombing to the source of the enemy military strength, the FEAF was reduced to the wholesale destruction of every element of infrastructure from the Chinese Border to the DMZ.

The FEAF dropped 476,000 tons of ordnance during the conflict, the Navy and Marine aircraft together delivered 202,000 tons... FEAF's various campaigns destroyed 827 bridges, 116,839 buildings, 869 locomotives, 14,906 railroad cars, and 74,859 vehicles, and halted all but 4 or 5% of North Korea's prewar traffic... the 1952 attacks on hydroelectric plants rendered 11 of 13 completely destroyed... UN aircrews claimed to have killed approximately 184,808 enemy troops.

In comparison, approximately 2.7 million tons of conventional munitions were utilized by the Allies in World War 2. This represents the combined figure of all bombs dropped by across two different entire theaters of conflict. It's fair to say that the Strategic Bombing Campaign directed at North Korea dropped similar, if not more, weapons per capita (and certainly per area) than WWII. This, of course, should underline the veracity of the statements you've outlined. The US, and the UN, destroyed the entirety of North Korea with very scant regard for the civilian consequences. For better or worse, some of them believed that the North Korean populace wasn't an 'innocent' civilian populace, but rather a significant contributor to North Korean war making potential. Whatever the morals of that are, it's still true that the US obliterated North Korea from the air over several years with outstanding consequences for the civilian populace.

Hopefully this touches on your questions. Please feel free to ask any follow up questions. I will certainly do my best to clarify anything.

It seems that I might be a little late to this party and there’s been some good discussion already on some of the overarching aspects of the air war but it seems that there’s not been much discussion on the quotations themselves.

Bruce Cumings - “we carpet-bombed the north for three years”

It’s very difficult to put that statement into context in a way that we, as people who’ve not experienced something of a similar nature, can understand. The article does mention that more bombs were dropped during the korean war than during the entirety of the Pacific theatre of WW2. Obviously the reader will conclude that it’s a lot of bombs but it’s an abstract figure still.

Early on in the war air power (including B-29s that were not intended for tactical bombing) was mostly directed towards aiding the front lines, either via close-air support (i.e. bombing the enemy front lines) or short range interdiction (i.e. bombing enemy supply routes near the front lines). Generally speaking these types of attacks would affect soldiers, not civilians. After the Incheon landings air power would be directed mostly towards interdiction.

The amount of the total effort that was directed toward Interdiction, as opposed to close support, varied from time to time, depending upon the urgency of the front-line situation. During the first few months of the war, when the Eighth Army was almost overrun at Pusan, the majority of the mlssions were directed toward close support. Later on, after the Inchon landings, the majority of the sorties were devoted to Interdiction. Overall, Interdiction and armed reconnaissance accounted for 47.7 percent of the combat sorties flown by FEAF In the Korean War.

…

[On general purpose interdiction] The same crews were used continually to patrol given sectors daily so that they would be able to detect small day-by-day changes that might go unnoticed by someone less familiar with the area … the crews proceeded to their assigned areas and searched them In two-plane elements with the leader flying 100 to 300 ft above the terrain while his wingman flew cover at about 1000 ft. The technique was considered an outstanding success until the enemy Increased the flak coverage. This forced the reconnaissance crews to fly higher and resulted in decreased effectiveness.

SOME HISTORICAL NOTES ON AIR INTERDICTION IN KOREA - Gregory A. Carter, September 1966

This high proportion of interdiction (enabled in no small part by US air supremacy) is significant because there’s a large difference in accuracy between dropping bombs from strategic bombers at high altitude (e.g. high-altitude raids into germany during WW2) vs fighter-bombers attacking targets from low altitudes. The amount of tonnage dropped in korea, as high as it was even in comparison to WW2, belies the destruction caused by said tonnage.

Another critical factor in the effect of the bombing on the north korean population is that in November 1950 MacArthur made a declaration that effectively made anything beyond the UN front-lines a military target. Interdiction, initially applied to stopping the movement of enemy troops and supplies, was applied to anything north korean – houses, people, cattle, etc.

The combination of accurate and indiscriminate targeting made for particularly nasty and thorough results. I’d suggest that one needs to look at what impact it had on the people on the ground in order to understand what this means.

The entire population was rendered homeless. Cities and towns were of course targeted but “the USAF started to burn even individual private houses in the deep mountains using incendiary bombs”. Any subsequent housing that resembled a human dwelling, no matter how scattered or isolated they were would be a target. Hence people were forced to live in makeshift bunkers that wouldn’t look out of place in WWI trenches.

The underground living conditions of civilians in North Korea from late 1950 to early 1951, when the scorched earth policy was executed by the USAF, was clearly shown in the report of the investigation team of the Women’s International Democratic Federation (WIDF) .. The investigation team sent to North Korea during the war was composed of 20 representatives from 18 countries in Europe, the Americas, Asia, and Africa, plus one observer. The team leader was Nora Rodd, a Canadian. Between May 16 and 27, 1951, the team visited several cities and villages, including Pyongyang, Sinuiju, Nampo, Wonsan and Haeju.

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“The overwhelming majority of the inhabitants” in Sinuiju [on the border with the PRC and therefore less subject to bombing] could only carry on with life while living in battered mud-huts. The investigation group visited one hut in person, that of Kwon Mun Su and his family. Kwon Mun Su lived with his wife and three children in a small hut divided into two rooms. One room was a kitchen measuring one-half by three meters, and the other room was a bedroom measuring three by two meters. Five family members lived in this small room measuring only six square meters. From the point of view of the investigation team members, daily life in that place was terrible. However, Kwon and his family were considered “lucky” and they were the envy of their neighbours. This was because they at least had a room to stay in and also one blanket, amenities that most other people did not have.

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[In Pyongyang] The team, which was divided into four groups to inspect each downtown area, could not find any houses having walls or ceilings during their inspection. They visited several families, including the family of Kang Bok Sen. This family consisted of five members including a three-year-old child and an eight-month-old infant. They were living in the air-raid shelter of the destroyed Women’s Federation office building, in a space that measured just one by two meters. Furthermore, the investigation team members had to crawl through a three-meter tunnel to enter the shelter. This small space was their sole living space. It was miraculous that five people, including two small children, were able to live in a small underground room measuring only two square meters.

…

“The earth walls [of a typical dugout shelter] are too low to enable an adult to stand upright.” In addition, “this shelter was typical rather than exceptional, and it would be possible to quote many more instances of families living in similar conditions”.

Extracts from “Overturned Time and Space: Drastic Changes in the Daily Lives of North Koreans during the Korean War”

Moving during daylight hours was suicidal. The indiscriminate targeting policy meant that anything moving was a target, be it a farmer working his crops, someone moving on the roads, etc. As described by a pilot:

During the Korean War, one pilot confided to a reporter that napalm had become the most valued of all the weapons at his disposal. “The first couple of times I went in on a napalm strike,” Federic Champlin told E.J. Kahn, “I had kind of an empty feeling. I thought afterward, Well, maybe I shouldn’t have done it. Maybe those people I set afire were innocent civilians. But you get conditioned, especially after you’ve hit what looks like a civilian and the A-frame on his back lights up like a Roman candle—a sure enough sign that he’s been carrying ammunition. Normally speaking, I have no qualms about my job. Besides, we don’t generally use napalm on people we can see. We use it on hill positions, or buildings. And one thing about napalm is that when you’ve hit a village and have seen it go up in flames, you know that you’ve accomplished something. Nothing makes a pilot feel worse than to work over an area and not see that he’s accomplished anything.”

Marilyn Young, "Bombing Civilians, an American Tradition" The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol. 16-1-09, April 19, 2009.

Effectively the entire country was reduced to subsistence levels:

According to DPRK figures, the war destroyed some 8,700 factories, 5,000 schools, 1,000 hospitals and 600,000 homes. Most of the destruction occurred in 1950 and 1951. To escape the bombing, entire factories were moved underground, along with schools, hospitals, government offices, and much of the population. Agriculture was devastated, and famine loomed. Peasants hid underground during the day and came out to farm at night. Destruction of livestock, shortages of seed, farm tools, and fertilizer, and loss of manpower reduced agricultural production to the level of bare subsistence at best. The Nodong Sinmun newspaper referred to 1951 as “the year of unbearable trials,” a phrase revived in the famine years of the 1990s. Worse was yet to come. By the fall of 1952, there were no effective targets left for US planes to hit. Every significant town, city and industrial area in North Korea had already been bombed. In the spring of 1953, the Air Force targeted irrigation dams on the Yalu River, both to destroy the North Korean rice crop and to pressure the Chinese, who would have to supply more food aid to the North. Five reservoirs were hit, flooding thousands of acres of farmland, inundating whole towns and laying waste to the essential food source for millions of North Koreans. Only emergency assistance from China, the USSR, and other socialist countries prevented widespread famine.

Charles Armstrong,The Destruction and Reconstruction of North Korea, 1950 - 1960, The Asia-Pacific Journal Vol 8, Issue 51 No 2, December 20, 2010.

Under those conditions, combined with winters that drop to -20 to -30 degrees Celsius, for someone on the ground it was simply a struggle to survive in a way that the term “carpet bombing” can’t convey.

Continued ..