Korean War
The
Korean War began on
June 25 1950 and ended with an
armistice on
July 27 1953 (though no peace treaty has ever been signed). It started as a
civil war between
North Korea and
South Korea, both existing as provisional governments competing for control after the
division of Korea, but quickly escalated into a multi-national conflict. The principal combatants were North Korea, supported by an uncertain number of
Soviet combat advisors, aircraft pilots, and weapons, and later by the
People's Volunteer Army (PVA) of the People's Republic of China; and South Korea, supported principally by the United States (U.S.), the
United Kingdom (UK),
Canada,
Turkey, and the
Philippines, together with detachments from many other nations under the
aegis of the
United Nations (UN).
In South Korea, the war is often called, "yugio" (육이오) meaning "6·25" (the date of the start of the conflict), or, more formally,
Hanguk Jeonjaeng (한국전쟁) simply meaning, "Korean war". In North Korea it is formally called the "Fatherland Liberation War." In the United States, the conflict at the time was sometimes officially called a
police action, or the
Korean Conflict, under the aegis of the United Nations rather than a war. Because of the prominence of World War II and the Vietnam War in American popular memory, the Korean War is sometimes known as "The Forgotten War."
See also: Korea under Japanese rule, Division of KoreaKorea was invaded and ruled by
Japan from 1910 until the end of
World War II in 1945. On
August 6,
1945, the Soviet Union, in keeping with a commitment made to the United States government, declared war on the
Japanese Empire and on
August 8,
1945, liberated the northern part of the Korean peninsula, halting at the 38th parallel.
President Harry S Truman ordered the landing of U.S. troops in the south, who eventually arrived on September 8, 1945.
[Dankwart A. Rustow, The Changing Global Order and Its Implications for Korea's Reunification, Sino-Soviet Affairs, Vol. XVII, No. 4, Winter 1994/5, The Institute for Sino-Soviet Studies, Hanyang University]On
August 10 1945 with the
Japanese surrender imminent and following a plan drawn up earlier by the United States, the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to
divide Korea along the
38th parallel. Japanese forces north of that line would surrender to the Soviet Union; those to the south to the United States. Thus, without consulting the Korean people,
[ Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 1: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0691101132] the two major powers had divided the Korea peninsula into two occupation zones. Although its later policies and actions contributed to Korea's division, the United States did not envision this as a permanent partition.
[ Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 1: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0691101132]In December 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to administer the country temporarily. Both countries established governments in their respective halves favorable to their political ideology. In the process, U.S.-run elections supervised by the U.N. replaced an indigenous, left-wing government that had formed in June 1945 with one led by the right-wing politician and
anti-Communist Syngman Rhee.
[ Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 1: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0691101132] The southern partition's left-wing parties boycotted the elections. The Soviet Union, in turn, approved and furthered the rise of a
Communist government led by
Kim Il-Sung in the northern part. The Allies said that Korea would be a unified, independent country under an elected government but failed to specify the details or work to do so.
[ Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 1: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0691101132] In 1949, both Soviet and American forces withdrew.
South Korean President Syngman Rhee and North Korean
General Secretary Kim Il-sung competed to reunite the peninsula.
[Gregory Henderson, Korea: The Politics of the Vortex, Harvard University Press, 1968; Lee Chong-sik, Korean Workers' Party, Hoover Institute Press, 1978. ] To this end, throughout 1949 and early 1950, both sides conducted limited military attacks along the border. Partly because of Soviet tanks and heavy arms, the North Koreans were the ones able to fundamentally change the nature of the war from a border conflict to a war. The American government believed at the time that the
Communist bloc was a unified monolith, and that North Korea acted within this monolith as a pawn of the
Soviet Union (documents from the Soviet archives show that Kim Il-sung, operating with Soviet assistance and equipment, was responsible for the attack on the Southern regime, thus discrediting one theory from the 1960s and 1970s that the war was just as much caused by South Korean and Western provocation).
[ Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 1: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0691101132] The view that global communism was monolithic and that the North Koreans were little more than stooges of the Soviet Union prevented the United States and other nations from understanding the initial conflict as a civil war, wherein each side wished to reunite the peninsula, albeit under their own political system.
[ Bruce Cumings, The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 1: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0691101132]On
January 12 1950 United States Secretary of State Dean Acheson, repeating what General
Douglas MacArthur had said in March 1949, told the
National Press Club that America's Pacific defence perimeter was made up of the
Aleutians,
Ryukyu,
Japan, and the
Philippines implying that the US might not fight over Korea.
[Dean Acheson, , "THE THEME OF CHINA LOST", Present at the Creation: My Years at the State Department (New York: W.W. Norton, Inc., 1969), pp. 355-358.] This omission, though not deliberate, probably encouraged the North regime to choose that time to reunify the peninsula under their political system.
In early 1949, Kim Il-sung pressed his case with Soviet leader
Joseph Stalin that the time had come for a full-scale invasion and reunification of the Korean peninsula. Stalin refused permission, concerned about the relative unpreparedness of the North Korean armed forces and about possible U.S. involvement. In the course of the next year, the North Korean leadership built the North Korean army into a formidable offensive machine modeled partly after a Soviet mechanized force but strengthened primarily by an influx of Koreans who had been serving with the Chinese
People's Liberation Army since the 1930s. By 1950, the North Koreans, equipped with outdated Soviet weaponry, enjoyed substantial advantages over the South in every category of equipment. After another visit by Kim to Moscow in March"April 1950, Stalin approved an attack.
The war begins (June 25, 1950)
|
Overview map of the Korean War |
In the pre-dawn hours of Sunday
June 25 1950 North Korea's army struck across the 38th parallel behind a thunderous artillery barrage and 135,000 troops crossed the border. The Northern government claimed that South Korean troops under the "bandit traitor"
Syngman Rhee had crossed the 38th parallel, and thus the South had started the war. While the Southern forces had most certainly launched military attacks across the 38th parallel in places such as Ongjin earlier, later research clearly shows that it was the North that commenced the civil war that day. Advised (but not directed) and equipped by the Soviets, with 150
T-34 tanks and huge reserves of manpower, their surprise attack was a devastating success. At least two-thirds of the
South Korean Army, who was advised (but not directed) and equipped by the United States, was a paper force of 38,000 and many of them were off duty at the time, leaving the country open to attack. North Korea attacked at many places, including Gaeseong, Chuncheon, Uijeongbu, and Ongjin. Within days South Korean forces, outnumbered, out-gunned, and often of dubious loyalty to the Southern regime, were in full retreat. As the ground attack continued, the North Korean Air Force bombed
Gimpo Airport in
Seoul. Seoul was captured by the North Koreans on the afternoon of
June 28, but the North Koreans had not accomplished their goal of a quick surrender by the
Rhee government, despite the large scale disintegration of the South Korean Army.
The attack on South Korea came as a surprise to the United States and the other western powers; in the preceding week,
Dean Acheson had told
Congress on
June 20 that no war was likely. Truman himself was contacted hours after the invasion had begun; he was convinced that this was the beginning of World War III.
Despite the post-World War II demobilization of U.S. and allied forces, which caused serious supply problems for American troops in the region (excluding the
United States Marines, the infantry divisions sent to Korea were at 40% of paper strength, and the majority of their equipment was found to be useless), the U.S. still had substantial forces in
Japan, under the command of General
Douglas MacArthur. Apart from
British Commonwealth units, no other nation could supply sizeable manpower. President
Harry S. Truman, on hearing of the invasion, ordered MacArthur to transfer munitions to the South Korean Army and to use air cover to protect the evacuation of US citizens. Truman did not agree with his advisors to employ unilateral U.S. airstrikes against the North Korean forces, but did order the
Seventh Fleet to protect
Taiwan, thereby ending the policy of the United States of acquiescing to the defeat of the forces of
Chiang Kai-shek. The
Chinese Nationalists government, now confined to Taiwan, asked to participate in the war, but their request was denied by the Americans who felt they would only encourage Communist Chinese intervention.
The other Western powers quickly agreed with the American actions and volunteered their support for the effort, but by August the South Korean forces and the U.S. Eighth Army, which had arrived to help South Korea resist the North Korean invasion, suffered a series of defeats and were driven into a small area in the southeastern corner of the Korean peninsula around the city of
Pusan. With the aid of American supplies, air support and additional reinforcements, the
US and
ROK forces managed to stabilize a line along the
Nakdong River. This became a desperate holding action called the
Pusan Perimeter by the Americans. Although more UN support arrived, the situation was dire for them, and it looked as though the North might succeed in uniting the entire peninsula.
In order to alleviate pressure on the Pusan Perimeter, MacArthur, as UN
commander-in-chief for Korea, ordered an
amphibious invasion far behind the North Korean troops at
Inch''n (Incheon 인천 仁川). This was an extremely risky operation, but once the American and other UN troops gained a foothold on the beach, it was extremely successful since the North Koreans had very few troops or defenses there at that time. Their troops were further south, engaged in fighting along the Pusan perimeter. UN troops landed at Incheon, faced only mild resistance and quickly moved to recapture
Seoul. The North Koreans, finding their supply lines cut, began a rapid retreat northwards and the ROK and UN forces that had been confined in the south, moved north, and joined those that had landed at Inchon.
The UN troops drove the North Koreans back past the 38th
parallel. The goal of saving South Korea had been achieved, but because of the success and the prospect of uniting all of Korea under the government of
Syngman Rhee, the Americans " with UN approval " continued into North Korea. This decision marks a crucial shift in US foreign policy at the time. Originally, the defense of South Korea was undertaken as part of a policy of containment. However, the move northwards marked the beginning of a policy known as roll-back. Other issues included the psychological effects of destroying a Communist nation and the liberation of
POWs. The UN troops then captured Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea, and drove to the Yalu River bordering China. This greatly concerned the Chinese, who worried that the UN forces would not stop at the
Yalu River, the border between the PRK and
China, and had warned Western leaders that such an action would not be tolerated. Many in the West, including General MacArthur, thought that spreading the war to China would be necessary. However, Truman and the other leaders disagreed, and MacArthur was ordered to be very cautious when approaching the Chinese border. Eventually, MacArthur disregarded these concerns, arguing that since the North Korean troops were being supplied by bases in China, those supply depots should be bombed. However, except on some rare occasions UN bombers remained out of
Northeastern China during the war.
The Chinese entry (October, 1950)
While the
People's Republic of China had issued warnings that they would intervene if any non-South Korean forces crossed the 38th parallel, citing national security interests. Truman regarded the warnings as "a bald attempt to blackmail the UN". On
October 8 1950, the day after American troops crossed the parallel, Chairman Mao issued the order for the
Chinese People's Volunteer Army (actually regulars in the Chinese
People's Liberation Army) to be moved to the
Yalu River, ready to cross. Mao sought Soviet aid and saw intervention as essentially defensive: "If we allow the U.S. to occupy all of Korea… we must be prepared for the US to declare… war with China", he told Stalin. Premier
Zhou Enlai was sent to
Moscow to add force to Mao's cabled arguments. Mao delayed his forces while waiting for Soviet help, and the planned attack was thus postponed from
13 October to
19 October. Soviet assistance was limited to providing air support no nearer than 60 miles (96 km) from the battlefront. The
MiG-15s in PRC colours would be an unpleasant surprise to the UN pilots; they would hold local air superiority against the
F-80 Shooting Stars until newer
F-86 Sabres were deployed. The Soviet role was known to the U.S. but they kept quiet to avoid any international and potential nuclear incidents. It has been alleged by the Chinese that the Soviets had agreed to full scale air support, which never transpired South of Pyongyang, and helped accelerate the
Sino-Soviet Split.
On
October 15 1950, Truman went to
Wake Island to discuss the possibility of Chinese intervention and his desire to limit the scope of the Korean conflict. MacArthur reassured Truman that "if the Chinese tried to get down to Pyongyang there would be the greatest slaughter."
On
October 19 1950,
Pyongyang, North Korea's capital, fell to UN forces.
The Chinese assault began on
October 25 1950, under the command of General
Peng Dehuai with 270,000 PVA troops (it was assumed at the time that
Lin Biao was in charge, but this notion has been disproven). The Chinese assault caught the UN troops by surprise, despite the capture of Chinese soldiers and other evidence of the entrance of the PLA into Korea. In addition, the Chinese, employing great skill and remarkable camouflage discipline, concealed their numeric and divisional strength after the first engagement with the UN. After these initial engagements, the Chinese withdrew into the mountains; UN forces ignored the stern warning delivered by the Chinese government and continued their advance to the Yalu. In fact, many UN leaders interpreted this withdrawl as a show of weakness; they thought the Chinese initial attack had been all they were capable of. In late November, the Chinese struck again. In the west, along the Chongchon River, the Chinese army overran several South Korean divisions and landed an extremely heavy blow into the flank of the remaining UN forces; the resulting withdrawal of the U.S.
Eighth Army was the longest retreat of an American unit in history. In the east, at the
Battle of Chosin Reservoir (
November 26"
December 13) a 3,000 man unit from the
US 7th Infantry Division,
Task Force Faith, inflicted heavy casualties on the Chinese brigades, but were soon surrounded. They fought their way out of the encirclement, but in so doing lost 2000 of their 3000 men killed or captured. They also lost all of their vehicles and most other equipment. This was considered to be one of the largest defeats of American military in history. The
Marines fared better; though surrounded and forced to retreat, they inflicted heavy casualties on the Chinese forces, who committed six divisions to trying to destroy the American Marines.
UN forces in northeast Korea withdrew to form a defensive perimeter around the port city of
Hungnam, where a
Dunkirk-style evacuation was carried out in late December 1950. Approximately 100,000 military personnel and material and another 100,000 North Korean civilians were loaded onto a variety of merchant and military transport ships, not always voluntarily as the South Korean military and police often conscripted military-age males, and were moved to ports in UN-held territory on the southern tip of Korea.
On
January 4 1951, Chinese and North Korean forces recaptured
Seoul. Both the 8th Army and the X Corps were forced to retreat. General
Walker was killed in an accident. He was replaced by Lieutenant General
Matthew Ridgway, who had led airborne troops in World War II. Ridgway took immediate steps to raise the morale and fighting spirit of the battered Eighth Army, which had fallen to low levels during its retreat from North Korea. In March 1951, in
Operation Ripper, a revitalized 8th Army " restored by Ridgway to fighting trim " expelled the North Korean and Chinese troops from Seoul, destroying much of the city with aerial and artillery bombardments in the process.
MacArthur was removed from command by President
Truman on
April 11 1951, due to a disagreement over policy. MacArthur was succeeded by Ridgway, who managed to regroup UN forces for an effective counter-offensive. A series of attacks managed to slowly drive back the opposing forces, inflicting heavy casualties on Chinese and North Korean units as UN forces advanced some miles north of the 38th parallel.
Historian and Korean War veteran
Bevin Alexander had this to say about Chinese tactics in his book
How Wars Are Won::
The Chinese had no air power and were armed only with rifles, machineguns, hand grenades, and mortars. Against the much more heavily armed Americans, they adapted a technique they had used against the Nationalists in the Chinese civil war of 1946"49. The Chinese generally attacked at night and tried to close in on a small troop position " generally a platoon " and then attacked it with local superiority in numbers. The usual method was to infiltrate small units, from a platoon of fifty men to a company of 200, split into separate detachments. While one team cut off the escape route of the Americans, the others struck both the front and the flanks in concerted assaults. The attacks continued on all sides until the defenders were destroyed or forced to withdraw. The Chinese then crept forward to the open flank of the next platoon position, and repeated the tactics.Historian Bruce Cumings noted that when Chinese soldiers and officers saw how Americans fought the war, they were surprised by how freely the Americans would resort to what they considered to be excessive and unnecessary force. One Chinese soldier stated that if the Americans encountered a single sniper hiding in a village or house, they would invariably call in massive artillery and air attacks, destroying the entire village and killing everyone in it. He asked, "Why do they do this instead of simply sending in soldiers to kill the sniper?" American superiority in military hardware had profound consequences for the Korean people on the peninsula as well as the soldiers fighting the war.
Stalemate (July, 1951)
|
Territory changed hands in the early part of the war until the front stabilised |
The rest of the war involved little territory change, large scale bombing of the Northern population, and lengthy peace negotiations (which started in
Kaesong on
July 10 of the same year). Even during the peace negotiations combat continued. For the South Korean and allied forces, the goal was to recapture all of what had been South Korea before an agreement was reached in order to avoid losing any territory. The Chinese did a similar operation at the battle of "The Hook" where they were repelled by British forces. A major issue of the negotiations was repatriation of POWs. The Communists agreed to voluntary repatriation, but only if the majority would return to China or North Korea. However, when polled the majority elected to not return. The war continued until the Communists eventually dropped this issue.
On
November 29 1952 U.S. President-elect
Dwight D. Eisenhower fulfilled a campaign promise by travelling to Korea to find out what could be done to end the conflict. With the
UN's acceptance of
India's proposal for a Korean
armistice, a
cease-fire was established on
July 27 1953, by which time the front line was back in the proximity of the 38th parallel, and so a
demilitarized zone (DMZ) was established around it, which is still defended today by North Korean troops on one side and South Korean and American troops on the other. The DMZ passes to the north of the parallel towards the east, and to the south as it travels west. The site of the peace talks, Kaesong, the old capital of Korea, was part of the South before hostilities broke out but is currently a special city of the North. No
peace treaty has been signed to date.
Western reaction
American action was taken for a number of reasons. Truman, a Democratic president, was under severe domestic pressure for being too soft on communism (Republican senator
Joseph McCarthy stated that the State Department was "infested" with Communists). Especially vocal were those who accused the Democrats of having
"lost" China. The intervention was also an important implementation of the new
Truman Doctrine, which advocated the opposition of communism everywhere it tried to expand. The lessons of Munich in 1938 also influenced the American decision, believing that
appeasing communism would only encourage further expansion.
Instead of pressing for a congressional declaration of war, which he regarded as too alarmist and time-consuming when time was of the essence, Truman went to the UN for approval. Thanks to a temporary Soviet absence from the
Security Council — the Soviets were boycotting the
Security Council to protest the exclusion of
People's Republic of China (PRC) from the
UN — there was no veto by Stalin. The (
Nationalist-controlled)
Republic of China government held the
Chinese seat. Without the Soviet and Chinese veto and with only
Yugoslavia abstaining, the UN voted to aid South Korea on
June 27. U.S. forces were eventually joined during the conflict by troops from 15 other UN members:
Canada,
Australia,
New Zealand, the
United Kingdom,
France,
South Africa,
Turkey,
Thailand,
Greece, the
Netherlands,
Ethiopia,
Colombia, the
Philippines,
Belgium, and
Luxembourg. Although American opinion was solidly behind the venture, Truman would later take harsh criticism for not obtaining a declaration of war from Congress before sending troops. Thus, "Truman's War" was said by some to have violated the spirit, if not the letter, of the
United States Constitution.
 |
American soldiers in Korea |
The first significant American combat unit to arrive in South Korea was
Task Force Smith, part of the U.S. Army
24th Infantry Division based in Japan. On
July 5 it engaged in the first North Korean-U.S. clash of the war at
Osan. The regiment sized unit (1800 men) was vastly outnumbered and quickly defeated. The North Koreans had a few dozen Soviet made T-34/85 tanks. Task Force Smith had no tanks of their own. They managed to knock out several tanks firing anti-tank rounds from their 105mm howitzers, but they soon ran out of anti-tank ammunition. Their bazookas were useless against the T-34/85's thick front armor. The tanks then pierced Task Force Smith's defensive line and went into their rear. This forced Task Force Smith to retreat in order to avoid being annihilated. The rest of the half-strength 24th Division next confronted the North Koreans. Like Task Force Smith however, the half strength 24th Division had very little anti-tank capability and was also overwhelmed and forced to fall back to
Daejeon. The 24th Division also retreated from Daejon after leaving a rear guard element. This rear guard element knocked out several T-34/85's with bazooka shots to the thin side and rear armor of the tanks and inflicted heavy casualties on North Korean infantry, but they were all killed or captured in the end after they ran out of ammunition. At the Pusan Perimeter, American
Eighth Army commander Lieutenant General
Walton Walker was able to maneuver his forces to successfully confront the North Korean forces as they attempted a flanking maneuver instead of concentrating their forces which might have destroyed UN forces in the area. By September, the UN coalition still held the Pusan Perimeter with the vital port of Pusan. The port of Pusan would be the gateway for future UN reinforcements who would eventually drive deep into North Korea.
Air war
|
MiG-15 shot down by a F-86 over MiG Alley. |
The Korean War was the last major war where propeller-powered fighters such as the
P-51 Mustang,
F4U Corsair,
A-1 Skyraider (though used with distinction, in the eyes of Americans, in a ground-attack role in Vietnam), F4U-5N, and
aircraft carrier-based
Supermarine Seafire,
Fairey Firefly, and
Hawker Sea Fury, deployed by the British
Royal Navy and the
Royal Australian Navy, were used, as
turbojet fighter aircraft (
US Air Force F-80s, and
US Navy or
US Marine Corps Grumman F9F Panthers, and
McDonnell F2H Banshees) came to dominate the skies, overwhelming North Korea's propeller-driven
Yakovlev Yak-9s and
Lavochkin La-9s.
From 1950, North Koreans began flying the Soviet-made
MiG-15 jet fighters, some of which were piloted by experienced
Soviet Air Force pilots, a
casus belli deliberately overlooked by the UN allied forces who were reluctant to engage in open war with the Soviet Union and the PRC. At first UN jet fighters, which now included
Royal Australian Air Force Gloster Meteor Mk.8s, had some success, but the superior quality of the MiGs soon held sway over the first generation jets used by the UN early in the war.
[FEAF/UN Aircraft Used in Korea and Losses by Type at Korean-War.com]In 1951, the US airforce began using the
F-86 Sabre. This fighter was equal to the MiG-15 in ceiling, acceleration, and rate of climb. However, the F-86's armament of 6 Browning .50 cal machineguns were outranged and outgunned by the MiG-15's more powerful 2 23mm autocannons and 1 30mm autocannon. The MiG-15's overall speed and roll rate were slightly inferior to that of the F-86. The US led fighter pilots of the UN coalition gained a 4 to 1 kill ratio over the MiGs and their aggressiveness gave them an air superiority that lasted until the end of the war — a decisive factor in helping the UN hold the Pusan perimeter, retake Seoul, capture North Korea's capital Pyongyang, and then make a fighting retreat from the well trained and numerically superior Chinese army ground forces. The Chinese military also used MiG-15s but the UN fighter pilots retained their edge in the kill ratio due to their superior training and tactics.
Among other factors which helped tip the balance toward the U.N. jets were the F-86s' better
radar gunsight, which led to installation of the first
radar warning receiver on MiG fighters, better cockpit visibility, better stability and control at high speed and high altitudes, and the introduction of the first
G-suits. U.S. pilots achieved impressive success with the F-86 shooting down 792 MiG-15s and 108 other aircraft for the loss of 78 Sabres, a ratio in excess of 10:1.
The Soviets claimed at that time about 1300 victories and 335 MiG losses. China's official losses were 231 planes shot down in air-to-air combat (mostly MiG-15) and 168 other losses. The number of losses of the North Korean Air Force was not revealed. It is estimated that it lost about 200 aircraft in the first stage of the war, and another 70 aircraft since Chinese intervention. Soviet's claims of 650 victories over F-86s and China's claims of another 211 F-86s in air combats are regarded as exaggerated by the
USAF. A recent publication showed that the total number of USAF F-86s ever present in the Korean peninsula during the war was only 674 and the total F-86s losses due to all causes were about 230.
In May and June 1953 the USAF undertook missions to destroy several key
irrigation and
hydroelectric dams, and targeted the Korean civilian population as well as various
agriculture and
industry centers in the North. The Kus'ng/Guseong (구성), T'ksan/Deoksan (덕산) and Puj'n/Bujeon (부전) River dams were all destroyed, severely
flooding vast areas of land, drowning thousands of civilians, and ultimately starving many more. This destruction of life and property lessened the amount of food supplies available for the North Korean and Chinese troops in the area, but had no subtantial affect on the final outcome of the war.
An US intelligence report in 1953 noted that these floods would destroy enemy supplies and the villages where they were stored. The report also noted that the loss of rice - the staple food commodity for North Koreans - would result in "starvation and slow death." When the Nazis had used similar attacks on people's food supplies in Holland in 1944, it had been deemed a war crime at Nurenberg.
[ Jon Halliday and Bruce Cumings, Korea: The Unknown War, Viking Press, 1988, ISBN 0670819034]Atrocities
[[Image:Shootingkoreancivilians.jpg|thumb|right|Declassifed U.S. document: "The army has requested we strafe all civilian refugee parties approaching our positions. To date, we have complied with the army request in this respect".The document goes on to say that these actions are not right.]]
|
Civilians massacred by retreating Communist forces during the Korean War are packed into trenches in Daejeon, South Korea, October 1950. |
North Korean troops, South Koreans, Chinese and United States personnel targeted civilians and/or POWs in some cases. Specifically, there is extremely strong evidence to suggest:
* North Korean and Communist Chinese troops repeatedly violated the Geneva Convention through reported mistreatment of prisoners of war. North Korean forces also committed several massacres of captured US troops at places such as "Hill 312" on the Pusan perimeter, and in and around Taejon. This occurred particularly during the "fluid" phase of the war. During the periods when parts of South Korea were under North Korean control, political killings, reportedly into the tens of thousands, took place in cities across South Korea.
*POWs were mistreated by all sides. The UN side was ultimately responsible for more deaths and violence than the communists as there were more prisoners. As pointed out by Britain's former Chief of the Defense Staff, Field Marshal Lord Carver: 'The UN prisoners in Chinese hands, although subject to "reducation" processes of varying intensity...were certainly much better off in every way than any held by the Americans....'
[ Jon Halliday and Bruce Cumings, Korea: The Unknown War, Viking Press, 1988, ISBN 0670819034] * American troops were under orders to consider any Korean civilian on the battlefield approaching their position as hostile and to "neutralize" them. The reason for these orders was that Communist infiltrators had blended in among fleeing
refugees. This led to fears among American forces of a "fifth column", and to the indiscriminate killings of hundreds of South Korean civilians by the U.S. military during the war at places such as
No Gun Ri, where many defenseless refugees were shot at by the U.S. Army and may have been
strafed by the USAF. (The U.S. admitted having a policy of strafing civilians in other places and times, and sources confirm this. Research into events at No Gun Ri, however, demonstrated that this did not occur at that time and place.) Americans and their South Korean allies also blew up several bridges that were crowded with fleeing civilians when they could not clear the bridges before the enemy arrived.
* Korean forces on both sides routinely rounded up and forcibly
conscripted males and females in their area of operations. Regardless of whether they refused or not, thousands of them never returned home.
* South Korean military and police, often with US military knowledge, executed without trial tens of thousands of alleged "Communist sympathizers" during the
Daejeon Massacre and the
Jeju Massacre, among others. The bodies of these civilians were often dumped into mass graves.
The Korean War was the first armed confrontation of the
Cold War, and it set a model for many later conflicts. It created the idea of a
limited war, where the two
superpowers would fight without descending to an all out war that could involve
nuclear weapons. It also expanded the Cold War, which to that point had mostly been concerned with
Europe.
600,000 Korean soldiers died in the conflict according to US estimates. More than a million South Koreans were killed, 85% of them civilians. According to figures published in the Soviet Union, 11.1% of the total population of North Korea perished, which indicates that 1,130,000 people were killed. In total about 2,500,000 people were killed. More than 80% of the industrial and public facilities and transportation works, three-quarters of the government offices, and one-half of the houses were destroyed.
The war left the peninsula divided, with a garrisoned pro-Soviet, totalitarian Communist state in North Korea and a pro-American dictatorial republic (democratized in the late 1980s) in the South. American troops remain in Korea as part of the still-functioning UN Command, which commands all allied military forces in the ROK - American Air Forces, Korea, the Eighth U.S. Army, and the entire ROK military. The DMZ remains the most heavily-defended border in the world.
Many Korean families were divided by the war, most of whom have had no opportunity to contact each other or reunite.
''See also:
Division of Korea,
Korean Demilitarized Zone,
Korean reunification |
The first American war dead were brought home aboard the USS Randall, shown here departing Yokohama on March 23 1953 |
There has been some confusion over the previously reported number of 54,246 Korean War deaths. That number was divided by the Defense Department in 1993 into 33,686 battle deaths, 2,830 non-battle deaths, and 17,730 deaths of Defense Department personnel outside the Korean theatre.
[Kathleen T. Rhem, Korean War Death Stats Highlight Modern DoD Safety Record, June 8, 2000] There were also 8,142 US personnel listed as
Missing In Action (MIA) during the war. US casualties in Korean war are fewer than in the
Vietnam War, but they occurred over three years as opposed to 13 years (1960-1973) in Vietnam. However, advances in medical services such as the
Mobile Army Surgical Hospital and the use of rapid transport of the wounded to them such as with
helicopters enabled the death rate for UN forces to be much lower than in previous wars. For service during the Korean War, the U.S. military issued the
Korean Service Medal.
Later neglect of remembrance of this war, in favor of the
Vietnam War,
World War I and
II and the
Gulf Wars, has caused the Korean War to be called the
Forgotten War or the
Unknown War. The
Korean War Veterans Memorial was built in
Washington, D.C. and dedicated to veterans of the war on
July 27 1995.
The U.S. military had been caught ill-prepared for the war. Accordingly, after the war, the American defense budget was boosted to $50 billion, the Army was doubled in size, as was the number of Air Groups, and they were deployed beyond American soil in Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere in Asia.
The war also changed America's view of the
Third World, most notably in
Indochina. Before 1950 the Americans had been very critical of French endeavours to reestablish its presence there against local resistance; after Korea they began to heavily support the French against the
Viet Minh and other nationalist-communist local parties, paying for up to 80% of the French military budget in Vietnam.
The Korean War also saw the beginning of racial integration efforts in the US military service, where
African Americans fought in integrated units. President Truman signed
Executive Order 9981 on
July 26 1948, calling on the armed forces to provide equal treatment and opportunity for black servicemen. The extent by which Truman's 1948 orders were carried out varied among the branches of the military, with segregated units still in deployment at the start of the conflict, and eventually integrating towards the end of the war. The last large segregated operational unit was the
U.S. 24th Infantry Regiment. It was deactivated on
October 1 1951.
The U.S. still maintains a heavy military presence in Korea, as part of the effort to uphold the
armistice between South and
North Korea. A special service decoration, known as the
Korea Defense Service Medal is authorized for U.S. service members who serve a tour of duty in Korea.
From official Chinese sources, PVA casualties during the Korean War were 390,000. This breaks down as follows: 110,400
KIA; 21,600 died of wounds; 13,000 died of sickness; 25,600 MIA/POW; and 260,000 more
WIA. However various Western and Eastern sources
[Death Tolls for the Major Wars and Atrocities of the Twentieth Century, November 2005] estimate that about 500,000 to 1 million Chinese soldiers were either killed in action or died of disease, starvation, exposure, and accidents out of 2 million deployed in the war. Overall total Chinese killed, wounded and missing equal about 1 million.
Mao Zedong (毛澤東)'s only healthy son,
Mao Anying (毛岸英), was also killed as a PVA officer during the war.
It also contributed to the
decline of Sino-Soviet relations. Although Chinese had their own reasons to enter the war (i.e. a strategic buffer zone in the Korean peninsula), the view that the Soviets had used them as proxies was shared in the Western bloc. China had to use the Soviet loan, which had been originally intended to rebuild their destroyed economy, to pay for the Soviet arms. However, the willingness of China to assist North Korea against the United States, and the show of force they engaged in, heralded that China was once again becoming a major
world power. By many Chinese the war is generally seen as an honour in
Chinese history as it was the first time in a century the
Chinese army stood up against a Western army in a major conflict.
After the war was over, 14,000 of the Chinese prisoners of war hostile to communists of the People's Republic of China defected to the
Republic of China (ROC) (in contrast, only 7,110 Chinese POWs opted to return to the PRC). The defectors arrived in Taiwan on
January 23 1954 and were referred to as "Anti-Communist volunteers"(反共義士).
January 23 was named World Freedom Day(自"日)
[Monique Chu,NGO celebrates World Freedom Day, Taipei Times, February 3, 2002][[1]] in their honour in Taiwan.
The Korean War also led to other long lasting effects. Until the conflict in Korea, the U.S. had largely abandoned the government of
Chiang Kai-Shek, which had retreated to
Taiwan, and had no plans to intervene in the
Chinese Civil War. The start of the Korean War rendered untenable any policy that would have caused Taiwan to fall under PRC control. Truman's decision to send American forces to the
Taiwan strait further deterred the PRC from making any cross-strait invasion of Taiwan. The anti-communist atmosphere in the West in response to the Korean War contributed to the unwillingness to diplomatically recognize the People's Republic of China by the West until the 1970s. Today, diplomacy between the Republic of China and mainland China remains strained, and mainland China continues to claim
the sovereignty of Taiwan.
Canada sent 26,791 troops to the war, with 7,000 more remaining to supervise the ceasefire until the end of 1955. Of these 1,558 became casualties, including 516 deaths, most due to combat.
[Canadians in Korea, 1950-1953 at Korean-War.com. Accessed 23 Jun 2006.] Canada's participation included a brigade of troops, eight naval vessels and 22 pilots for US jet squadrons. See also
History of the Canadian Army.
The Korean War was the last major conflict Canadian forces participated in until the 1991 Persian Gulf War, and the last major combat by ground troops until 2002 in
Afghanistan.
[Canada played a minor role in the fighting in Cyprus in 1974 and in the Balkans at Medak Pocket in the 1990s.]Canada's military was revitalized as a result of the Korean War. A planned changeover to U.S.-designed weapons equipment had been planned for the 1950s, but the emergency in Korea forced the use of war stocks of
World War II vintage British designed weapons. In the late 1950s, Canada adopted a variety of weapons of European, British and US design rather than proceeding with its planned Americanization.
Japan was politically disturbed both from the security threat to Japan because of the initial defeat of
South Korea and from left-wing activities in support of
North Korea aimed at bringing about a revolution in Japan. Additionally, as American occupation armies were dispatched to the Korean peninsula, Japan's security became problematic. Under United States' guidance, Japan established the
Reserved Police, later developed into the
Japan Self-Defense Forces (自衛隊). The signing of the
Treaty of Peace with Japan (日本国との平'条約; popularly known as the Treaty of San Francisco) was also hastened to return Japan back into international communities. In the eyes of some American policy makers, the
non-belligerency clause in the constitution was already being considered a "mistake" by 1953.
Economically, Japan was able to benefit from the war. American material requirements were organized through a Special Procurements system, which allowed for local purchasing without the complex
Pentagon procurement system. Over $3.5 billion was spent with Japanese companies, peaking at $809 million in 1953. The
zaibatsu (財閥) went from being distrusted to being encouraged "
Mitsui (三井),
Mitsubishi (三菱), and
Sumitomo (住友) were amongst the ones that thrived, not only on orders from the military but through American industrial experts, including
W. Edwards Deming. Japanese manufacturing grew by 50% between March 1950 and 1951. By 1952, pre-war standards of living were regained and output was twice the level of 1949. Becoming an independent country due to the
Treaty of San Francisco also saved Japan from the burden of expense of the occupation forces.
Europe
The outbreak of the war convinced Western leaders of the growing threat of international communism. The United States began to encourage
Western European countries,
West Germany included, to contribute to their own defense.
German rearmament, however, was perceived as a threat by its neighbours, especially
France. As the war continued, however, opposition to rearmament lessened and China's entry in the war caused France to revise its position towards German rearmament. To contain a newly-armed Germany, French officials proposed the creation of the European Defense Community (EDC), a supranational organisation, under the
aegis of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (
NATO).
The end of the war reduced the perceived Communist threat, and thus it reduced the necessity of such an organisation. The French Parliament postponed the ratification of the EDC Treaty
sine die (i.e. without a clear date). This rejection in the French Parliament was caused by
Gaullist fears that the creation of the EDC threatened France's national
sovereignty. The EDC was never ratified, and the initiative collapsed in August, 1954.
''See also
British Commonwealth Forces KoreaThe war was a political disaster for the Soviet Union. Its central objective, the unification of the Korean peninsula under the Kim Il-sung regime was not achieved. Boundaries of both parts of Korea remained practically unchanged. Furthermore, relations with the
People's Republic of China was seriously spoiled, while the war united the countries within the capitalist bloc: the Korean war accelerated the conclusion of a peace agreement between the USA and Japan, the warming of
Germany's relations with other western countries, creation of military and political blocs
ANZUS (1951) and
SEATO (1954). However, the war was not without their pluses: the authority of the Soviet State seriously grew, which showed in its readiness to arrive in the aid of developing states in the countries of the
third world, many of which after Korean war embarked on the
socialist path of development, after selecting the Soviet Union as their
patron.
The war was a heavy burden on the national economy of the Soviet Union, which was still suffering from the effects of World War II. Expenditures for defense grew sharply. But the war allowed the USSR to test several new weapons, in particular the
MiG-15 combat aircraft. Furthermore, numerous models of American military equipment were seized, which Soviet engineers and scientists used to develop new weapons.
Artistic depiction
|
Pablo Picasso's 'Massacre in Korea' (1951; in the Musée Picasso, Paris). |
Artist
Pablo Picasso's painting
Massacre in Korea (1951) depicted violence against civilians during the Korean War. By some account, civilian killings committed by U.S. forces in Shinchun,
Hwanghae Province was the motive of the painting. In South Korea, the painting was deemed
anti-American, a longtime taboo in the South, and was prohibited for public display until the 1990s. Pablo Picasso's paintings made no allusions to Communist atrocities.
In the U.S. far and away the most famous artistic depiction of the war is
M*A*S*H, originally a novel by
Richard Hooker (pseudonym for H. Richard Hornberger) that was later turned into a successful
movie and
television series. All three versions depict the misadventures of the staff of a
Mobile Army Surgical Hospital as they struggle to keep their sanity through the war's absurdities through ribald humour and hijinks when not treating wounded.
Film
Fixed Bayonets (1951). U.S. soldiers in Korea surviving the harsh winter of 1951. Directed by
Samuel Fuller.
The Steel Helmet (1951). A squad of U.S. soldiers holds up in a
Buddhist temple. Directed by
Samuel Fuller.
Battle Circus (1951). A love story of a hard-bitten surgeon and a new nurse at a M.A.S.H. unit. It stared
Humphrey Bogart and
June Allyson and directed by
Richard Brooks.
The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954). A U.S. Navy Reserve pilot flying attack missions over North Korea, from the novel by
James Michener. Directed by
Mark Robson and starring
William Holden.
Shangganling Battle (Shanggan Ling, Chinese: 上"岭, BW-1956)，in the Korean war in early 1950s, a group of Chinese People's Volunteer soldiers are blocked in Shangganling mountain area for several days. Short of both food and water, they hold their ground till the relief troops arrive. d: Meng Sha, Lin Shan; C: Gao Baocheng, XuLIinge, Liu Yuru; M: changchun.
Pork Chop Hill (1957). A true story about US soldiers attempting to retake the top of a hill. Directed by
Lewis Milestone and starring
Gregory Peck.
The Manchurian Candidate (1962). The principal characters in the film are captured and brainwashed during the war. (The
2004 remake of the movie used the
Persian Gulf War of 1991 instead ).
MASH (1970), about the staff of a U.S. Army field hospital who use humor and hijinks to keep their sanity in the face of the horror of war. Directed by
Robert Altman.
M*A*S*H (1972-1983) was also a long-running television sitcom, inspired by the movie, featuring
Alan Alda. The television series lasted several times longer than the war.
Inchon (1981). The movie portrays the
Battle of Incheon, a turning point in the war. Controversially, the film was partially financed by
Sun Myung Moon's
Unification Movement. It became a notorious financial and critical failure, losing an estimated $40 million of its $46 million budget, and remains the last mainstream Hollywood film to use the war as its backdrop. The film was directed by
Terence Young, and starred an elderly
Laurence Olivier as General Douglas MacArthur. According to press materials from the film, psychics hired by Moon's church contacted MacArthur in heaven and secured his posthumous approval of the casting.
Tae Guk Gi: The Brotherhood of War (2004). When two Korean brothers are drafted into the military to fight in the war, the older brother tries to protect the younger by risking his own life in hopes of sending his brother home. This results in an emotional conflict that wears away at his own humanity. Epic in scope, the movie has a touching family story backdropped by a brutal war. Directed by
Je-Kyu Kang or
Kang Je-gyu.
Welcome to Dongmakgol (2005). During the height of the war, three North Korean soldiers, two South Korean soldiers and a U.S. Navy pilot accidentally get stranded together in a remote and peaceful mountain village paradise called Dongmakgol. All three wayward factions learn that the village is naively oblivious to the raging war outside. These newcomers must somehow find a way to coexist with each other for the sake and preservation of the village they all learn to love and respect. Directed by
Park, Gwang-hyeon.
*
Joint Security Area (film) (Gongdong gyeongbi guyeok JSA) (2000). In the DMZ (
Korean Demilitarized Zone) separating North and South Korea, two North Korean soldiers have been killed, supposedly by one South Korean soldier. The investigating Swiss/Swedish team from the neutral countries overseeing the DMZ (
Korean Demilitarized Zone) suspects from evidence at the crime scene that another, unknown party was involved. Major Sophie E. Jean, the investigating officer, suspects a cover-up is taking place, but the truth is much simpler and much more tragic. It unravels as the story follows the development of a relationship between two North Korean and two South Korean soldiers that hang out together in an empty building in the
Joint Security Area. Starring
Lee Young Ae,
Lee Byung-Hun,
Song Kang-ho, Tae-woo Kim, and
Shin Ha-kyun. Directed by
Park Chan-wook.
Names
The most common English term for the war is "Korean War".
The following are terms used by the participants of the Korean War:
*
Australia:*Korean War
*
Canada:*Korean War
*
United Kingdom:*Korean War
*
United States:*Korean Conflict:*Korean War:*President Truman referred to the conflict as a "Police Action", but the term is seldom used in military or official circles.
*
North Korea:*Fatherland Liberation War (조국해방전쟁; 祖國解"戰爭)
*
South Korea:*
June 25 Incident (육이오 사변; 六二" 事變) :*Korean War (한국전쟁; "國戰爭)
*
People's Republic of China :*The War To Resist America And Aid (North) Korea (抗美援朝; kàng měi yuán cháo)
usually used colloquially:*War of Korea or "Korean War" (朝鲜战争; 朝鮮戰爭; cháoxiǎn zhànzh"ng)
usually used officially*
Other Chinese-speaking communities:*Korean War(韩战; "戰; hán zhàn)
abbreviation of Korean WarBooks
Breakout : The Chosin Reservoir Campaign, Korea 1950, Martin Russ, Penguin, 2000, hardcover 464 pages, ISBN 0140292594
The British Part in the Korean War, General Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley, HMSO, 1995, hardcover 528 pages, ISBN 0116309628
Fire & Ice: The Korean War, 1950-1953,
Michael J. Varhola, Savas, 2000, ISBN 1882810449.
The Forgotten War, Clay Blair, Times Books, NY, 1987
History of United States Naval Operations: Korea, James A. Field Jr., University Press of the Pacific, 2001, paperback 520 pages, ISBN 0898756758
*translated by Bin Yu and Xiaobing Li,
Mao's Generals Remember Korea, University Press of Kansas, 2001, hardcover 328 pages, ISBN 0700610952
Korea: The First War We Lost, Bevin Alexander, 1993, Reed Business Information, Inc. , ISBN 0781810191
Korea: The Limited War, David Rees. MacMillan and Company, 1964, hardcover 511 pages
MiG Alley: Sabres vs. MiGs Over Korea, Warren E. Thompson and David R. McLaren, Specialty Press, MN, 2002, ISBN 1-58007-058-2.
The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 1: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947, Bruce Cumings, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0691101132
The Origins of the Korean War, Vol. 2: The Roaring of the Cataract, 1947-1950, Bruce Cumings, Princeton University Press, 1990, ISBN 0691078432
This Kind of War: The Classic Korean War History, T.R. Fehrenbach, Potomac Books, 50th Anniversary edition, 2001, paperback 512 pages, ISBN 1574883348.
Truckbusters From Dogpatch, the Combat Diary of the 18th Fighter-Bomber Wing in the Korean War, 1950-1953, Tracy D. Connors, BelleAire Press, 2006, soft bound, 712 pages, +1,000 photographs, ISBN 0-9640138-2-7.
Uncertain Partners: Stalin, Mao, and the Korean War, Sergei N. Goncharov; John W. Lewis; and Xue Litai, Stanford University Press, 1993, ISBN 0-8047-2521-7
See also
*
Korean War order of battle*
:Category:Korean War people*
List of Korean War weapons*
:Category:Korean War veterans*
Cold War*
Battles of the Korean War
*
Pres. Truman Library documents on his Wake Island meeting with Gen. MacArthur*
Calvin College on the Impact of the War on the Korean People*
Facts and texts on the War*
BBC: American Military Conduct in the Korean War*
Atrocities against Americans in the Korean War*
Atrocities by Americans in the Korean War*
Quicktime sequence of 27 maps adapted from the West Point Atlas of American Wars showing the dynamics of the front.
*
A Korean War Stat Lingers Long After It Was Corrected*
Animation for opérations in 1950*
Animation for opérations in 1951*
Korean War FAQ from an alternative POV*
POW films, brainwashing and the Korean War*
Maps of the Korean War from the US Military Academy West Point*
CBC Digital Archives - Forgotten Heroes: Canada and the Korean War*http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/united_nations_korean_war.htm]
