The Korean War

Abstract

Few independent observers doubted that in the late 1940s the regime of Syngman Rhee in South Korea was an undemocratic tyranny, sustained solely by repression and US aid. The Republic of Korea (ROK) was constantly shaken by peasant uprisings and there were frequent clashes with the North Korean People’s Army (NKPA) along the 38th parallel. The mounting tensions, revolts, crises and dislocation merely served to intensify the scale of the repression: the US-promoted South Korean regime was emerging as a ‘fundamen­tally corrupt society’;⁴ despite massive American economic and mili­tary support, ‘an unstable creation’.⁵

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If I were in charge I would withdraw the United Nations troops to the coast and leave Syngman Rhee to the Chinese … Koreadoes not really matter now. I’d never heard of the bloody place till I was seventy-four.

Winston Churchill¹

Whatever might be the technical advantages of not ‘getting bogged down’ in Korea, I am sure that a moral defeat would mean the end of the white man’s position in the East …

Harold Macmillan²

Finally, to keep the attack from becoming overly costly, it was clear that we would have to use atomic weapons.

Dwight D. Eisenhower³