North Korea preoccupies the headlines as two American journalists are sentenced to hard labor for “illegal entry”, and the US considers blocking shipments into North Korea. One of the thorniest of foreign policy problems facing the US, the conflict with North Korea began during the Cold War, with fighting that began in June 1950 and continued until an armistice was signed in 1953.
Here’s a quick refresher on the war that ever really ended —
Late in June 1950, after a large-scale artillery barrage, the sound of bugles signaled the massed charge of North Koreans who came down out of the mountains to roll over an American-sponsored government in South Korea. Armed and trained by the Soviets, this was the most efficient fighting force in Asia after the Soviet Red Army.
This was the onset of the Korean War, a “hot war” in the midst of the Cold War maneuvering, and one that cost more than two million Korean lives as well as 100,000 American casualties, including more than 54,000 deaths.
As the diplomatic strife with Communist North Korea continues today, that war is still not really over. The armistice signed in July 1953 ended the fighting, creating a Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) that divided North and South Korea. After three years of fighting, the situation in Korea was almost exactly what it had been when the North Koreans first attacked.
Most contemporary American perceptions of the Korean War come from the TV series “M*A*S*H*.” The Korean conflict remains something of an ambiguity, unlike the “people’s war” that preceded it or the unpopular war in Vietnam that followed it.
The United States actually fought in Korea under a United Nations flag. In Korea, the fighting started out against the North Koreans, but it quickly escalated into a much deadlier and more dangerous war against the massive armies of Red China. The possibility of the use of an atomic bomb was seriously considered.
The war in Korea did become unpopular and helped end the presidency of a Democratic President—Harry S. Truman, in this case, who chose not tun again — and opened the way for a Republican, Dwight D. Eisenhower, the hero of World War II, who campaigned on a promise to end the war.
Read more about the Korean conflict and the Cold War era in Don’t Know Much About History.
