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Korea in the World

The Liberation Period and the Korean War

Photo-The March First Movement(left), Central figures of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea(right)
The peninsula was liberated on August 15, 1945 following Japan’s surrender in World War II. As the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Soviet Union declared war against Japan and advanced into Manchuria, North China, and the Korean Peninsula. American troops stationed in Okinawa moved to Korea after the war. The division of the peninsula at the 38th parallel occurred almost immediately when Soviet and American troops proceeded to demobilize the remnants of the Japanese army. Artificially divided, Korea was now a geopolitical victim squeezed between the two world superpowers.

On August 15, 1948, the southern half of the peninsula was reborn as the Republic of Korea, an independent nation with democratic principles and a free market economy. Under the supervision of the United Nations, the South Korean people elected a National Assembly. This assembly then appointed Dr. Rhee Syngman, a US-educated leader of the independence movement, as the country’s first president. Meanwhile, in the north was a communist government established with the Sovietbacked Kim Il-sung at the helm.

As previously classified documents have revealed, North Korea staged a sudden attack on South Korea on June 25, 1950, with the unofficial support of the Soviet Union. This marked the beginning of the Korean War, which quickly developed into an international conflict. Within three days, Seoul had fallen to North Korean troops. By August, all of South Korea was occupied by the North Korean army, with the exception of Busan, a port city in the southeast, and a few areas nearby.
Photo-The North Korean army entering into the streets of Seoul(left), The scene of the Battle of Incheon, where military personnel and equipment disembarked from landing crafts(right)
The United Nations Security Council decided to assist South Korea immediately after the outbreak of the war, sending troops and medical personnel from more than 21 member countries. Following Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s now-famous amphibious landing at Incheon in September, South Korean and US-led UN troops pushed the North Koreans back to the Chinese border.

As they arrived at the border, nearly completing the reunification of a democratic Korea, China entered the war to re-establish the North Korean regime, and the South Korean and UN troops were again pushed south, with terrible losses. In January 1951, Seoul once again fell into the hands of the North Koreans.

South Korean and the UN troops then pushed the North Koreans and Chinese back to around the 38th parallel at a great cost to both sides. In addition to the catastrophic loss of life and social upheaval, the peninsula had been reduced to rubble.

The fratricidal war was put on hold with an armistice agreement in July 1953. A peace agreement has yet to be reached due to the northern regime’s refusal to negotiate directly with the Republic of Korea. A border called the Military Demarcation Line (MDL) was agreed upon near the prewar border which the United States and the Soviet Union had established along the 38th parallel. It is surrounded by a 4-kilometer-wide demilitarized zone (DMZ), which serves as a buffer-zone for the heavily armed border region between the two Koreas. The Korean War did not officially end, but was rather put on hold with the Armistice Agreement.

The combined casualties of South and North Korea are estimated to be three million, or 10 percent of the total population. The United Nations sent about two million soldiers during the three years of war, of which some 40,000 died in combat and some 100,000 were wounded. The United States, which deployed the largest numbers of soldiers in the war, became one of the most important allies of South Korea after the war by offering both military and economic assistance through the 1950s and 1960s.
Photo-Kim Dae-jung and Kim Jong-il at the first South-North Korea summit
After the signing of the armistice, South Korea has made efforts to ease tensions with North Korea, establish a lasting peace on the Korean Peninsula, and set the stage for reunification. In July 1972, the two Koreas jointly announced the three principles of unification: independence, peace, and nation-wide unity. In December 1990, the two nations jointly declared the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. In June 2000, a summit of the two Koreas was held for the first time since their division. In the spirit of reconciliation, reunions of South and North Korean families, having been separated by war decades ago, were held and economic exchanges between the two Koreas were facilitated. This culminated in the establishment of the joint-venture Gaeseong Industrial District. Unfortunately, North Korea resumed development of its nuclear weapons program, which led to an increase in tensions on the peninsula and a halt to dialogue and exchanges between the two Koreas. Korea had been one homogenous country for 1,100 years, but for the last 70 years it has remained divided into North and South. We hope that the two nations will again become one and that there will be sustained peace on the peninsula.

Korea in the World
It is not easy to understand a foreign country in a short time. is a brief introduction of Korea for educators unfamiliar to Korea. The booklet collects and summarizes significant historical, cultural, and politico-economical traces of Korea. An essential material for educators who want to bring Korea in the textbook and to classroom.

Publication | The Academy of Korean Studies

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