The Korean War after Fifty Years: Challenges for Peace and Prosperity
Author: George H, Quester
The Korean War, as a model for the possibilities of limited war which hovered in the background for the entire Cold War, has inevitably drawn conflicting interpretations. Now that the Cold War is over, now that a half-century has passed since the Korean War, we ought to be able to sort and evaluate these interpretations. We will begin with some general issues of interpretation, and then turn to some stages in time when greater optimism or pessimism seemed to take hold.
(Pages 1 – 10)
The North Korean War Plan and the Opening Phase of the Korean War
Author: Kwang-Soo Kim
No war in modern history is so obscure about its beginning as the Korean War. From the very first day of the war, both the North Korean and the South Korean governments accused the opponent of being guilty of an invasion. In the early morning of June 25, 1950, the North Korean government charged that the South Korean Army had made a surprise attack into its territory by 1-2 km across the 38th parallel at four points, the west of Haeju (Ongjin), the direction of Kumchon (Kaesong), the direction of Chorwon (Yonchon and Pochon), and Yangyang, and announced a counterattack to repulse the attack.
(Pages 11 – 34)
The South Korean Military and the Korean War
Author: Chang-Il Ohn
Immediately before the Japanese surrender in the Pacific War (1941-5), there was one Korea, though it had been under Japanese colonial rule for 36 years. The 38th parallel, which the American policymakers hastily picked out as the operational boundary between U.S. and Soviet troops in the Far East at the last stage of the Pacific War, divided one Korea into the two, North and South. Soviet troops occupied North Korea, Americans entered the South, and the two sides began military occupation in the two Koreas. The latitude, which Washington policymakers conceived to be a temporary line to halt the further southward advance of Soviet troops and thereby physically eliminate the possibility of Soviet participation in the Japanese occupation, and to facilitate the process of establishing a Korean government “in due course,” however, began to embrace new political and military connotations.
(Pages 35 -54)
Strategic Errors of the Korean War from the Origin to the Armistice: A U.S. Perspectives
Author: William Stueck
“By strategy,” John Lewis Gaddis wrote in his seminal book Strategies of Containment, “I mean quite simply the process by which ends are related to means, intentions to capabilities, objectives to resources.” My intention here is to employ this definition in examining the American course in Korea from the origin of the war there in the country’s division in 1945 to the aftermath of fighting in 1953. My approach is to analyze a series of key US decisions, from the one to divide the peninsula at the 38th parallel in August 1945 to the ones to conclude a military pact with the Republic of Korea and to issue a “greater sanctions” statement immediately following an armistice in July 1953.
(Pages 55 – 70)
China’s Conflict Behavior in Korea Revisited: Implications for East Asian Security
Author: Bin Yu
In the past decade or two, China’s military operation during the Korean War (1950-1953) has been extensively documented in both English and Chinese literatures.” There is, however, little agreement regarding the lessons, if any, that China learned from the Korean War. Part of the “non-learning” school in English language literature is that the PRC’s conflict behavior in general and its operation in Korea in particular is determined by its persistent communist ideology, or by a highly “romantic” and certainly irresponsible attitude toward the threat and use of force.
(Pages 71 – 96)
The Impact of the Korean War on the Korean Economy
Author: Jong Won Lee
The three-year long Korean War (June 25, 1950 – July 27, 1953) devastated both South and North Korean economies. It broke out when the two Koreas barely managed to maintain socio-economic stability and restore pre-WWII industry production capability to some extent. The distorted and exploited economy by Imperial Japan was demolished by the brutal war. It started out as the appearance of a civil war, but in effect was carried out as an international war. Thus, it was a severe and hard-fought one between UN forces (including South Korea and 16 other nations) and North Korea and its allies (China and USSR). Although it took place in a small country in Far-Eastern Asia, it developed into a crash between world powers, East and West, and left treacherous and incurable wounds to both Koreas.
(Pages 97 – 118)
Theorizing The Untheorizable: The Korean War and Its Impact on Korean Politics
Author: Thong Whan Park
Like all major wars of attrition, the Korean War brought devastation to the natural and human landscapes of the entire Korean peninsula. Not only did the individuals suffer, but also the social fabric that had held the nation together was irreparably damaged. Not exempt from the ravages of the war, politics also had to undergo transition. It hence makes sense to ask the question of what impact the war made on Korean politics. Seen from a short-term perspective, the war forced each side to taste the governing style of the opposite side—albeit with a strong military touch in both. During the first three months of the war, for instance, the South was occupied by the northern forces and ruled in “people’s democracy.” In the subsequent few months of northward march after the Inchon landing, the allied forces controlled the restored areas under “liberal democracy.”
(Pages 119 – 132)
Effects of the Korean War on Social Structures of the Republic of Korea
Author: Eui Hang Shin
The Korean War was among the world’s most destructive wars, in proportion to the population. During the war, the population of South Korea declined by nearly two million, excluding an influx of nearly 650,000 North Korean refugees. During the same period, about 290,000 South Koreans migrated to North Korea, either by force or by choice. Redistribution of the South Korean population continued on a large scale even into the immediate post-war years. Mortality. Changes in demographic processes serve as important indicators of the impact of the Korean War on the population of South Korea. Mortality is the most obvious demographic footprint left by a war, but its effects may also be observed in patterns of fertility and migration for the period of the actual conflict and the period immediately following the war.
(Pages 133 – 158)
The Impact of the Korean War on the Korean Military
Author: Choong Nam Kim
The South Korean military was a victim as well as a beneficiary of the Korean War. By the time of the outbreak of the war, the military was a fledgling force, dreadfully inferior in equipment and training. The military was almost crushed within a few days of the war. Ironically, the war transformed and strengthened the military; the infantile and immature Korean military became trained, equipped, and combat-experienced. Quantitatively, the military grew to be one of the largest militaries in the world; qualitatively, the third-rate “police reserve” became a modern professional military. Within the society, the military became the most Westernized and influential institution. In other words, the Korean War was a painful catalyst for the development of a strong Korean military.
(Pages 159 – 182)
