Korean War

The Korean War (in South Korean Hangul: 한국전쟁; Hanja: 韓國戰爭; RR: Hanguk Jeonjaeng, "Korean War"; in North Korean Chosŏn'gŭl: 조국해방전쟁; Hancha: 祖國解放戰爭; MR: Choguk haebang chǒnjaeng, "Fatherland: Liberation War"; 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953)[38][39][b] was a war between North Korea (with the support of China and the Soviet Union) and South Korea(with the principal support of the United States). The war began on 25 June 1950 when North Korea invaded South Korea[41][42]following a series of clashes along the border.[43][44] The United Nations, with the United States as the principal force, came to the aid of South Korea. China came to the aid of North Korea, and the Soviet Union also gave some assistance to the North.

As a product of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the United States, Korea was split into two regions with separate governments. Both claimed to be the legitimate government of all of Korea, and neither accepted the border as permanent. The conflict escalated into open warfare when North Korean forces—supported by the Soviet Union and China—moved into the south on 25 June 1950.[45] The United Nations Security Council authorized the formation and dispatch of UN forces to Korea[46]to repel what was recognized as a North Korean invasion.[47][48] Twenty-one countries of the United Nations eventually contributed to the UN force, with the United States providing around 90% of the military personnel.[49]

After the first two months of war, South Korean and U.S. forces rapidly dispatched to Korea were on the point of defeat, forced back to a small area in the south known as the Pusan Perimeter. In September 1950, an amphibious UN counter-offensive was launched at Incheon, and cut off many North Korean troops. Those who escaped envelopment and capture were forced back north. UN forces rapidly approached the Yalu River—the border with China—but in October 1950, mass Chinese forces crossed the Yalu and entered the war.[45] The surprise Chinese intervention triggered a retreat of UN forces which continued until mid-1951.

After these reversals of fortune, which saw Seoul change hands four times, the last two years of fighting became a war of attrition, with the front line close to the 38th parallel. The war in the air, however, was never a stalemate. North Korea was subject to a massive bombing campaign. Jet fighters confronted each other in air-to-air combat for the first time in history, and Soviet pilots covertly flew in defense of their communist allies.

The fighting ended on 27 July 1953, when an armistice was signed. The agreement created the Korean Demilitarized Zone to separate North and South Korea, and allowed the return of prisoners. However, no peace treaty has been signed, and according to some sources the two Koreas are technically still at war, engaged in a frozen conflict.[50][51] In April 2018, the leaders of North and South Korea met at the demilitarized zone[52] and agreed to sign a treaty by the end of the year to formally end the Korean War.[53]

As a war undeclared by all participants, the conflict helped bring the term "police action" into common use. It also led to the permanent alteration of the balance of power within the United Nations, where Resolution 377—passed in 1950 to allow a bypassing of the Security Council if that body could not reach an agreement—led to the General Assembly displacing the Security Council as the primary organ of the UN.[54]

Names
In South Korea, the war is usually referred to as "625" or the "6–2–5 Upheaval" (6.25 동란 (動亂), yook-i-o dongnan), reflecting the date of its commencement on 25 June.[55]

In North Korea, the war is officially referred to as the "Fatherland Liberation War" (Choguk haebang chǒnjaeng) or alternatively the "Chosǒn [Korean] War" (조선전쟁, Chosǒn chǒnjaeng).[56]

In China, the war is officially called the "War to Resist America and Aid Korea" (simplified Chinese: 抗美援朝战争; traditional Chinese: 抗美援朝戰爭; pinyin: Kàngměi Yuáncháo Zhànzhēng),[57][58] although the term "Chaoxian (Korean) War" (simplified Chinese: 朝鲜战争; traditional Chinese: 朝鮮戰爭; pinyin: Cháoxiǎn Zhànzhēng) is also used in unofficial contexts, along with the term "Han (Korean) War" (simplified Chinese: 韩战; traditional Chinese: 韓戰; pinyin: Hán Zhàn) more commonly used in regions such as Hong Kong and Macau.

In the U.S., the war was initially described by President Harry S. Truman as a "police action" as the United States never formally declared war on its opponents and the operation was conducted under the auspices of the United Nations.[59] It has been referred to in the English-speaking world as "The Forgotten War" or "The Unknown War" because of the lack of public attention it received both during and after the war, and in relation to the global scale of World War II, which preceded it, and the subsequent angst of the Vietnam War, which succeeded it.[60][61]

Imperial Japanese rule (1910-1945)
Imperial Japan destroyed the influence of China over Korea in the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–95), ushering in the short-lived Korean Empire.[62] A decade later, after defeating Imperial Russia in the Russo-Japanese War (1904–05), Japan made Korea its protectorate with the Eulsa Treaty in 1905, then annexed it with the Japan–Korea Annexation Treaty in 1910.[63]

Many Korean nationalists fled the country. A Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea was founded in 1919 in Nationalist China. It failed to achieve international recognition, failed to unite nationalist groups, and had a fractious relationship with its U.S.-based founding president, Syngman Rhee.[64] From 1919 to 1925 and beyond, Korean communists led internal and external warfare against the Japanese.[65][66]

In China, the Nationalist National Revolutionary Army and the communist People's Liberation Army helped organize Korean refugees against the Japanese military, which had also occupied parts of China. The Nationalist-backed Koreans, led by Yi Pom-Sok, fought in the Burma Campaign (December 1941 – August 1945). The communists, led by Kim Il-sung among others, fought the Japanese in Korea and Manchuria.[67]

At the Cairo Conference in November 1943, China, the United Kingdom, and the United States all decided that "in due course Korea shall become free and independent".[68]

Soviet-Japanese war (1945)
At the Tehran Conference in November 1943 and the Yalta Conference in February 1945, the Soviet Union promised to join its allies in the Pacific War within three months of the victory in Europe. Accordingly, it declared war on Japan on 9 August 1945, three days after the USA dropped the bomb on Hiroshima.[66][69] By 10 August, the Red Army had begun to occupy the northern part of the Korean peninsula.[70]

On the night of 10 August in Washington, U.S. colonels Dean Rusk and Charles H. Bonesteel III were tasked with dividing the Korean Peninsula into Soviet and U.S. occupation zones and proposed the 38th parallel. This was incorporated into the U.S. General Order No. 1 which responded to the Japanese surrender on 15 August. Explaining the choice of the 38th parallel, Rusk observed, "even though it was further north than could be realistically reached by U.S. forces, in the event of Soviet disagreement ... we felt it important to include the capital of Korea in the area of responsibility of American troops". He noted that he was "faced with the scarcity of US forces immediately available, and time and space factors, which would make it difficult to reach very far north, before Soviet troops could enter the area".[71] As Rusk's comments indicate, the U.S. doubted whether the Soviet government would agree to this.[72][73][74][75] Stalin, however, maintained his wartime policy of co-operation, and on 16 August the Red Army halted at the 38th parallel for three weeks to await the arrival of U.S. forces in the south.[70]

Korea divided (1945-1949)
On 8 September 1945, U.S. Lt. Gen. John R. Hodge arrived in Incheon to accept the Japanese surrender south of the 38th parallel.[73] Appointed as military governor, General Hodge directly controlled South Korea as head of the United States Army Military Government in Korea (USAMGIK 1945–48).[76] He attempted to establish control by restoring Japanese colonial administrators to power, but in the face of Korean protests quickly reversed this decision.[77] The USAMGIK refused to recognize the provisional government of the short-lived People's Republic of Korea (PRK) due to its suspected Communist sympathies.

In December 1945, Korea was administered by a U.S.-Soviet Union Joint Commission, as agreed at the Moscow Conference, with the aim of granting independence after a five-year trusteeship.[78][79] The idea was not popular among Koreans and riots broke out.[63] To contain them, the USAMGIK banned strikes on 8 December 1945 and outlawed the PRK Revolutionary Government and the PRK People's Committees on 12 December 1945.[80] Following further large-scale civilian unrest,[81] the USAMGIK declared martial law.

Citing the inability of the Joint Commission to make progress, the U.S. government decided to hold an election under United Nations auspices with the aim of creating an independent Korea. The Soviet authorities and the Korean Communists refused to co-operate on the grounds it would not be fair, and many South Korean politicians boycotted it.[82][83] A general election was held in the South on 10 May 1948.[84][85] North Korea held parliamentary elections three months later on 25 August.[86]

The resultant South Korean government promulgated a national political constitution on 17 July 1948, and elected Syngman Rhee as president on 20 July 1948. The Republic of Korea (South Korea) was established on 15 August 1948. In the Soviet Korean Zone of Occupation, the Soviet Union established a communist government[84] led by Kim Il-sung.[87]

The Soviet Union withdrew as agreed from Korea in 1948, and U.S. troops withdrew in 1949.

Chinese civil war (1945-1949)
Main article: Chinese Civil war

With the end of the war with Japan, the Chinese Civil War resumed in earnest between the Communists and Nationalists. While the Communists were struggling for supremacy in Manchuria, they were supported by the North Korean government with matériel and manpower.[88] According to Chinese sources, the North Koreans donated 2,000 railway cars worth of supplies while thousands of Koreans served in the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) during the war.[89] North Korea also provided the Chinese Communists in Manchuria with a safe refuge for non-combatants and communications with the rest of China.[88]

The North Korean contributions to the Chinese Communist victory were not forgotten after the creation of the People's Republic of China in 1949. As a token of gratitude, between 50,000 and 70,000 Korean veterans that served in the PLA were sent back along with their weapons, and they later played a significant role in the initial invasion of South Korea.[88]China promised to support the North Koreans in the event of a war against South Korea.[90]

After the formation of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the Chinese government named the Western nations, led by the United States, as the biggest threat to its national security.[91] Basing this judgment on China's century of humiliation beginning in the early 19th century,[92] U.S. support for the Nationalists during the Chinese Civil War,[93] and the ideological struggles between revolutionaries and reactionaries,[94] the Chinese leadership believed that China would become a critical battleground in the United States' crusade against Communism.[95] As a countermeasure and to elevate China's standing among the worldwide Communist movements, the Chinese leadership adopted a foreign policy that actively promoted Communist revolutions throughout territories on China's periphery.[96]

Prelude to war (1950)
By 1949, South Korean forces had reduced the active number of communist guerrillas in the South from 5,000 to 1,000. However, Kim Il-sung believed that the guerrillas weakened the South Korean military and that a North Korean invasion would be welcomed by much of the South Korean population. Kim began seeking Stalin's support for an invasion in March 1949, traveling to Moscow to attempt to persuade him.[97]

Serious border clashes between South and North occurred on August 4, 1949, when thousands of North Korean troops attacked South Korean troops occupying territory north of the 38th parallel. The 2nd and 18th infantry regiments of ROKA repulsed initial attacks in Kuksa-bong (above the 38th parallel)[98] and Ch'ungmu,[99] and at the end of the clashes ROKA troops were "completely routed".[100]

Stalin initially did not think the time was right for a war in Korea. Chinese Communist forces were still embroiled in the Chinese Civil War, while U.S. forces remained stationed in South Korea.[101] By spring 1950, he believed that the strategic situation had changed: Mao's Communist forces had secured final victory in China, U.S. forces had withdrawn from Korea, and the Soviets detonated their first nuclear bomb, breaking the U.S. atomic monopoly. As the U.S. had not directly intervened to stop the communist victory in China, Stalin calculated that they would be even less willing to fight in Korea, which had much less strategic significance. The Soviets had also cracked the codes used by the U.S. to communicate with their embassy in Moscow, and reading these dispatches convinced Stalin that Korea did not have the importance to the US that would warrant a nuclear confrontation.[102] Stalin began a more aggressive strategy in Asia based on these developments, including promising economic and military aid to China through the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance, and Mutual Assistance.[103]

In April 1950, Stalin gave Kim permission to invade the South under the condition that Mao would agree to send reinforcements if needed. Stalin made it clear that Soviet forces would not openly engage in combat, to avoid a direct war with the United States.[104] Kim met with Mao in May 1950. Mao was concerned the U.S. would intervene but agreed to support the North Korean invasion. China desperately needed the economic and military aid promised by the Soviets.[105] However, Mao sent more ethnic Korean PLA veterans to Korea and promised to move an army closer to the Korean border.[106] Once Mao's commitment was secured, preparations for war accelerated.[107][108]

Soviet generals with extensive combat experience from the Second World War were sent to North Korea as the Soviet Advisory Group. These generals completed the plans for the attack by May.[109] The original plans called for a skirmish to be initiated in the Ongjin Peninsula on the west coast of Korea. The North Koreans would then launch a counterattack that would capture Seoul and encircle and destroy the South Korean army. The final stage would involve destroying South Korean government remnants, capturing the rest of South Korea, including the ports.[110]

On 7 June 1950, Kim Il-sung called for a Korea-wide election on 5–8 August 1950 and a consultative conference in Haeju on 15–17 June 1950. On 11 June, the North sent three diplomats to the South as a peace overture that Rhee rejected outright.[104] On 21 June, Kim Il-Sung revised his war plan to involve a general attack across the 38th parallel, rather than a limited operation in the Ongjin peninsula. Kim was concerned that South Korean agents learned about the plans and South Korean forces were strengthening their defenses. Stalin agreed to this change of plan.[111]

While these preparations were underway in the North, there were frequent clashes along the 38th parallel, especially at Kaesong and Ongjin, many initiated by the South.[43][44] The Republic of Korea Army (ROK Army) was being trained by the U.S. Korean Military Advisory Group (KMAG). On the eve of war, KMAG's commander General William Lynn Roberts voiced utmost confidence in the ROK Army and boasted that any North Korean invasion would merely provide "target practice".[112] For his part, Syngman Rhee repeatedly expressed his desire to conquer the North, including when U.S. diplomat John Foster Dulles visited Korea on 18 June.[113]

Although some South Korean and U.S. intelligence officers predicted an attack from the North, similar predictions were made before and nothing happened.[114] The Central Intelligence Agency noted the southward movement by the Korean People's Army (KPA), but assessed this as a "defensive measure" and concluded an invasion was "unlikely".[115]On 23 June, UN observers inspected the border and did not detect that war was imminent.[116]

Comparison of forces
Throughout 1949 and 1950, the Soviets continued arming North Korea. After the Communist victory in the Chinese Civil War, ethnic Korean units in the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) were released to North Korea.[117] The combat veterans from China, the tanks, artillery and aircraft supplied by the Soviets, and rigorous training increased North Korea's military superiority over the South, armed by the US military with mostly small arms and given no heavy weaponry such as tanks.[118]

According to the first official census in 1949 the population of North Korea numbered 9,620,000,[119] and by mid-1950 North Korean forces numbered between 150,000 and 200,000 troops, organized into 10 infantry divisions, one tank division, and one air force division, with 210 fighter planes and 280 tanks, who captured scheduled objectives and territory, among them Kaesong, Chuncheon, Uijeongbu, and Ongjin. Their forces included 274 T-34-85 tanks, 200 artillery pieces, 110 attack bombers, and some 150 Yak fighter planes, and 35 reconnaissance aircraft. In addition to the invasion force, the North KPA had 114 fighters, 78 bombers, 105 T-34-85 tanks, and some 30,000 soldiers stationed in reserve in North Korea.[73] Although each navy consisted of only several small warships, the North and South Korean navies fought in the war as sea-borne artillery for their armies.

In contrast, the Republic of Korea population totaled 20,188,641,[citation needed]and its army was unprepared and ill-equipped. As of 25 June 1950 the ROK Army had 98,000 soldiers (65,000 combat, 33,000 support), no tanks (they had been requested from the U.S. military, but requests were denied), and a 22-piece air force comprising 12 liaison-type and 10 AT6 advanced-trainer airplanes. Large U.S. garrisons and air forces were in Japan,[120] but only 200–300 American troops were in Korea.[121]

Course of war
At dawn on Sunday, 25 June 1950, the Korean People's Army crossed the 38th parallel behind artillery fire.[122] The KPA justified its assault with the claim that ROK troops attacked first and that the KPA were aiming to arrest and execute the "bandit traitor Syngman Rhee".[123] Fighting began on the strategic Ongjinpeninsula in the west.[124][125] There were initial South Korean claims that they captured the city of Haeju, and this sequence of events has led some scholars to argue that the South Koreans fired first.[124][126]

Whoever fired the first shots in Ongjin, within an hour, North Korean forces attacked all along the 38th parallel. The North Koreans had a combined arms force including tanks supported by heavy artillery. The South Koreans had no tanks, anti-tank weapons or heavy artillery to stop such an attack. In addition, South Koreans committed their forces in a piecemeal fashion and these were routed in a few days.[127]

On 27 June, Rhee evacuated from Seoul with some of the government. On 28 June, at 2 am, the South Korean Army blew up the Hangang Bridge across the Han River in an attempt to stop the North Korean army. The bridge was detonated while 4,000 refugees were crossing it and hundreds were killed.[128][129] Destroying the bridge also trapped many South Korean military units north of the Han River.[127] In spite of such desperate measures, Seoul fell that same day. A number of South Korean National Assemblymen remained in Seoul when it fell, and forty-eight subsequently pledged allegiance to the North.[130]

On 28 June, Rhee ordered the massacre of suspected political opponents in his own country.[131]

In five days, the South Korean forces, which had 95,000 men on 25 June, was down to less than 22,000 men. In early July, when U.S. forces arrived, what was left of the South Korean forces were placed under U.S. operational command of the United Nations Command.[132]

Factors in U.S Intervention
The Truman administration was unprepared for the invasion. Korea was not included in the strategic Asian Defense Perimeter outlined by Secretary of State Dean Acheson.[133] Truman himself was at his home in Independence, Missouri.[134] Military strategists were more concerned with the security of Europe against the Soviet Union than East Asia. At the same time, the administration was worried that a war in Korea could quickly widen into another world war should the Chinese or Soviets decide to get involved.

One facet of the changing attitude toward Korea and whether to get involved was Japan. Especially after the fall of China to the Communists, U.S. experts on East Asia saw Japan as the critical counterweight to the Soviet Union and China in the region. While there was no United States policy dealing with South Korea directly as a national interest, its proximity to Japan increased the importance of South Korea. Said Kim: "The recognition that the security of Japan required a non-hostile Korea led directly to President Truman's decision to intervene ... The essential point ... is that the American response to the North Korean attack stemmed from considerations of U.S. policy toward Japan."[135]

Another major consideration was the possible Soviet reaction in the event that the U.S. intervened. The Truman administration was fearful that a war in Korea was a diversionary assault that would escalate to a general war in Europe once the United States committed in Korea. At the same time, "[t]here was no suggestion from anyone that the United Nations or the United States could back away from [the conflict]".[136] Yugoslavia—a possible Soviet target because of the Tito-Stalin Split—was vital to the defense of Italy and Greece, and the country was first on the list of the National Security Council's post-North Korea invasion list of "chief danger spots".[137] Truman believed if aggression went unchecked, a chain reaction would be initiated that would marginalize the United Nations and encourage Communist aggression elsewhere. The UN Security Council approved the use of force to help the South Koreans and the U.S. immediately began using what air and naval forces that were in the area to that end. The Truman administration still refrained from committing on the ground because some advisers believed the North Koreans could be stopped by air and naval power alone.[138]

The Truman administration was still uncertain if the attack was a ploy by the Soviet Union or just a test of U.S. resolve. The decision to commit ground troops became viable when a communiqué was received on 27 June indicating the Soviet Union would not move against U.S. forces in Korea.[139] The Truman administration now believed it could intervene in Korea without undermining its commitments elsewhere.

UN Security council resolutions
On 25 June 1950, the United Nations Security Council unanimously condemned the North Korean invasion of the Republic of Korea, with UN Security Council Resolution 82. The Soviet Union, a veto-wielding power, had boycotted the Council meetings since January 1950, protesting that the Taiwanese "Republic of China" and not the mainland "People's Republic of China" held a permanent seat in the UN Security Council.[140] After debating the matter, the Security Council, on 27 June 1950, published Resolution 83 recommending member states provide military assistance to the Republic of Korea. On 27 June President Truman ordered U.S. air and sea forces to help the South Korean regime. On 4 July the Soviet Deputy Foreign Minister accused the United States of starting armed intervention on behalf of South Korea.[141]

The Soviet Union challenged the legitimacy of the war for several reasons. The ROK Army intelligence upon which Resolution 83 was based came from U.S. Intelligence; North Korea was not invited as a sitting temporary member of the UN, which violated UN Charter Article 32; and the fighting was beyond the UN Charter's scope, because the initial north-south border fighting was classed as a civil war. Because the Soviet Union was boycotting the Security Council at the time, legal scholars posited that deciding upon an action of this type required the unanimous vote of all the five permanent members including the Soviet Union.[142][143]

Within days of the invasion, masses of ROK Army soldiers—of dubious loyalty to the Syngman Rhee regime—were retreating southwards or defecting en masse to the northern side, the KPA.[65]

UN Response
As soon as word of the attack was received,[144] U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson informed President Truman that the North Koreans had invaded South Korea.[145][146] Truman and Acheson discussed a U.S. invasion response and agreed that the United States was obligated to act, paralleling the North Korean invasion with Adolf Hitler's aggressions in the 1930s, with the conclusion being that the mistake of appeasement must not be repeated.[147] Several U.S. industries were mobilized to supply materials, labor, capital, production facilities, and other services necessary to support the military objectives of the Korean War.[148] However, President Truman later acknowledged that he believed fighting the invasion was essential to the U.S. goal of the global containment of communism as outlined in the National Security Council Report 68 (NSC 68) (declassified in 1975):

In August 1950, the President and the Secretary of State obtained the consent of Congress to appropriate $12 billion for military action in Korea.[146]

Because of the extensive defense cuts and the emphasis placed on building a nuclear bomber force, none of the services were in a position to make a robust response with conventional military strength. General Omar Bradley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was faced with re-organizing and deploying a U.S. military force that was a shadow of its World War II counterpart.[150][151]

Acting on State Secretary Acheson's recommendation, President Truman ordered General MacArthur to transfer matériel to the South Korean military while giving air cover to the evacuation of U.S. nationals. The President disagreed with advisers who recommended unilateral U.S. bombing of the North Korean forces, and ordered the U.S. Seventh Fleet to protect the Republic of China (Taiwan), whose government asked to fight in Korea. The United States denied ROC's request for combat, lest it provoke a communist Chinese retaliation.[152] Because the United States had sent the Seventh Fleet to "neutralize" the Taiwan Strait, Chinese premier Zhou Enlai criticized both the UN and U.S. initiatives as "armed aggression on Chinese territory".[153]

The drive south and Pusan (July-September 1950)
The Battle of Osan, the first significant U.S. engagement of the Korean War, involved the 540-soldier Task Force Smith, which was a small forward element of the 24th Infantry Division which had been flown in from Japan.[154] On 5 July 1950, Task Force Smith attacked the North Koreans at Osan but without weapons capable of destroying the North Koreans' tanks. They were unsuccessful; the result was 180 dead, wounded, or taken prisoner. The KPA progressed southwards, pushing back the U.S. force at Pyongtaek, Chonan, and Chochiwon, forcing the 24th Division's retreat to Taejeon, which the KPA captured in the Battle of Taejon; the 24th Division suffered 3,602 dead and wounded and 2,962 captured, including the Division's Commander, Major General William F. Dean.[155]

By August, the KPA steadily pushed back the ROK Army and the Eighth United States Army southwards.[156] The impact of the Truman administration's defense budget cutbacks were now keenly felt, as U.S. troops fought a series of costly rearguard actions. Lacking sufficient anti-tank weapons, artillery or armor, they were driven down the Korean peninsula.[157][158] During their advance, the KPA purged the Republic of Korea's intelligentsia by killing civil servants and intellectuals. On 20 August, General MacArthur warned North Korean leader Kim Il-sung he was responsible for the KPA's atrocities.[159] By September, UN forces were hemmed into a small corner of southeast Korea, near Pusan. This 140-mile perimeter enclosed about 10% of Korea, in a line partially defined by the Nakdong River.

Although Kim's early successes led him to predict he would end the war by the end of August, Chinese leaders were more pessimistic. To counter a possible U.S. deployment, Zhou Enlai secured a Soviet commitment to have the Soviet Union support Chinese forces with air cover, and deployed 260,000 soldiers along the Korean border, under the command of Gao Gang. Zhou commanded Chai Chengwen to conduct a topographical survey of Korea, and directed Lei Yingfu, Zhou's military advisor in Korea, to analyze the military situation in Korea. Lei concluded that MacArthur would most likely attempt a landing at Incheon.[citation needed] After conferring with Mao that this would be MacArthur's most likely strategy, Zhou briefed Soviet and North Korean advisers of Lei's findings, and issued orders to Chinese army commanders deployed on the Korean border to prepare for U.S. naval activity in the Korea Strait.[160]

In the resulting Battle of Pusan Perimeter (August–September 1950), the U.S. Army withstood KPA attacks meant to capture the city at the Naktong Bulge, P'ohang-dong, and Taegu. The United States Air Force (USAF) interrupted KPA logistics with 40 daily ground support sortiesthat destroyed 32 bridges, halting most daytime road and rail traffic. KPA forces were forced to hide in tunnels by day and move only at night.[161] To deny matériel to the KPA, the USAF destroyed logistics depots, petroleum refineries, and harbors, while the U.S. Navy air forces attacked transport hubs. Consequently, the over-extended KPA could not be supplied throughout the south.[162] On 27 August, 67th Fighter Squadron aircraft mistakenly attacked facilities in Chinese territory and the Soviet Union called the UN Security Council's attention to China's complaint about the incident.[163] The U.S. proposed that a commission of India and Sweden determine what the U.S. should pay in compensation but the Soviets vetoed the U.S. proposal.[164][165]

Meanwhile, U.S. garrisons in Japan continually dispatched soldiers and matériel to reinforce defenders in the Pusan Perimeter.[166] Tank battalions deployed to Korea directly from the U.S. mainland from the port of San Francisco to the port of Pusan, the largest Korean port. By late August, the Pusan Perimeter had some 500 medium tanks battle-ready.[167] In early September 1950, ROK Army and UN Command forces outnumbered the KPA 180,000 to 100,000 soldiers.[62][168]

Battle of Inchon (September 1950)
Against the rested and re-armed Pusan Perimeter defenders and their reinforcements, the KPA were undermanned and poorly supplied; unlike the UN Command, they lacked naval and air support.[169] To relieve the Pusan Perimeter, General MacArthur recommended an amphibious landing at Incheon, near Seoul and well over 160 km (100 mi) behind the KPA lines.[170] On 6 July, he ordered Major General Hobart R. Gay, Commander, 1st Cavalry Division, to plan the division's amphibious landing at Incheon; on 12–14 July, the 1st Cavalry Division embarked from Yokohama, Japan, to reinforce the 24th Infantry Division inside the Pusan Perimeter.[171]

Soon after the war began, General MacArthur began planning a landing at Incheon, but the Pentagon opposed him.[170] When authorized, he activated a combined U.S. Army and Marine Corps, and ROK Army force. The X Corps, led by General Edward Almond, Commander, consisted of 40,000 men of the 1st Marine Division, the 7th Infantry Division and around 8,600 ROK Army soldiers.[172] By 15 September, the amphibious assault force faced few KPA defenders at Incheon: military intelligence, psychological warfare, guerrilla reconnaissance, and protracted bombardment facilitated a relatively light battle. However, the bombardment destroyed most of the city of Incheon.[173]

After the Incheon landing, the 1st Cavalry Division began its northward advance from the Pusan Perimeter. "Task Force Lynch" (after Lieutenant Colonel James H. Lynch),[174] 3rd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, and two 70th Tank Battalion units (Charlie Company and the Intelligence–Reconnaissance Platoon) effected the "Pusan Perimeter Breakout" through 171.2 km (106.4 mi) of enemy territory to join the 7th Infantry Division at Osan.[171] The X Corps rapidly defeated the KPA defenders around Seoul, thus threatening to trap the main KPA force in Southern Korea.[175] On 18 September, Stalin dispatched General H. M. Zakharov to Korea to advise Kim Il-sung to halt his offensive around the Pusan perimeter and to redeploy his forces to defend Seoul. Chinese commanders were not briefed on North Korean troop numbers or operational plans. As the overall commander of Chinese forces, Zhou Enlai suggested that the North Koreans should attempt to eliminate the enemy forces at Incheon only if they had reserves of at least 100,000 men; otherwise, he advised the North Koreans to withdraw their forces north.[176]

On 25 September, Seoul was recaptured by South Korean forces. U.S. air raids caused heavy damage to the KPA, destroying most of its tanks and much of its artillery. North Korean troops in the south, instead of effectively withdrawing north, rapidly disintegrated, leaving Pyongyang vulnerable.[176] During the general retreat only 25,000 to 30,000 North Korean soldiers managed to reach the KPA lines.[177][178]On 27 September, Stalin convened an emergency session of the Politburo, in which he condemned the incompetence of the KPA command and held Soviet military advisers responsible for the defeat.[176]

UN Forces cross partition line (September-October 1950)
On 27 September, MacArthur received the top secret National Security Council Memorandum 81/1 from Truman reminding him that operations north of the 38th parallel were authorized only if "at the time of such operation there was no entry into North Korea by major Soviet or Chinese Communist forces, no announcements of intended entry, nor a threat to counter our operations militarily".[179] On 29 September MacArthur restored the government of the Republic of Korea under Syngman Rhee.[176] On 30 September, Defense Secretary George Marshall sent an eyes-only message to MacArthur: "We want you to feel unhampered tactically and strategically to proceed north of the 38th parallel."[179] During October, the ROK police executed people who were suspected to be sympathetic to North Korea,[180] and similar massacres were carried out until early 1951.[181]

On 30 September, Zhou Enlai warned the United States that China was prepared to intervene in Korea if the United States crossed the 38th parallel. Zhou attempted to advise North Korean commanders on how to conduct a general withdrawal by using the same tactics which allowed Chinese communist forces to successfully escape Chiang Kai-shek's Encirclement Campaigns in the 1930s, but by some accounts North Korean commanders did not use these tactics effectively.[182] Historian Bruce Cumings argues, however, the KPA's rapid withdrawal was strategic, with troops melting into the mountains from where they could launch guerrilla raids on the UN forces spread out on the coasts.[183]

By 1 October 1950, the UN Command repelled the KPA northwards past the 38th parallel; the ROK Army crossed after them, into North Korea.[184] MacArthur made a statement demanding the KPA's unconditional surrender.[185] Six days later, on 7 October, with UN authorization, the UN Command forces followed the ROK forces northwards.[186] The X Corps landed at Wonsan (in southeastern North Korea) and Riwon (in northeastern North Korea), already captured by ROK forces.[187] The Eighth U.S. Army and the ROK Army drove up western Korea and captured Pyongyang city, the North Korean capital, on 19 October 1950.[188] The 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team made their first of two combat jumps during the Korean War on 20 October 1950 at Sunchon and Sukchon. The missions of the 187th were to cut the road north going to China, preventing North Korean leaders from escaping from Pyongyang; and to rescue U.S. prisoners of war. At month's end, UN forces held 135,000 KPA prisoners of war. As they neared the Sino-Korean border, the UN forces in the west were divided from those in the east by 50–100 miles of mountainous terrain.[189]

Taking advantage of the UN Command's strategic momentum against the communists, General MacArthur believed it necessary to extend the Korean War into China to destroy depots supplying the North Korean war effort. President Truman disagreed, and ordered caution at the Sino-Korean border.[190]

China intervenes (October-December 1950)
On 20 August 1950, Premier Zhou Enlai informed the UN that "Korea is China's neighbor ... The Chinese people cannot but be concerned about a solution of the Korean question". Thus, through neutral-country diplomats, China warned that in safeguarding Chinese national security, they would intervene against the UN Command in Korea.[190] President Truman interpreted the communication as "a bald attempt to blackmail the UN", and dismissed it.[191]

On 1 October 1950, the day that UN troops crossed the 38th parallel, the Soviet ambassador forwarded a telegram from Stalin to Mao and Zhou requesting that China send five to six divisions into Korea, and Kim Il-sung sent frantic appeals to Mao for Chinese military intervention. At the same time, Stalin made it clear that Soviet forces themselves would not directly intervene.[185]

In a series of emergency meetings that lasted from 2 to 5 October, Chinese leaders debated whether to send Chinese troops into Korea. There was considerable resistance among many leaders, including senior military leaders, to confronting the U.S. in Korea.[192] Mao strongly supported intervention, and Zhou was one of the few Chinese leaders who firmly supported him. After Lin Biao politely refused Mao's offer to command Chinese forces in Korea (citing his upcoming medical treatment),[193] Mao decided that Peng Dehuai would be the commander of the Chinese forces in Korea after Peng agreed to support Mao's position.[193] Mao then asked Peng to speak in favor of intervention to the rest of the Chinese leaders. After Peng made the case that if U.S. troops conquered Korea and reached the Yalu they might cross it and invade China the Politburo agreed to intervene in Korea.[194] On 4 August 1950, with a planned invasion of Taiwan aborted due to the heavy U.S. naval presence, Mao Zedongreported to the Politburo that he would intervene in Korea when the People's Liberation Army's (PLA) Taiwan invasion force was reorganized into the PLA North East Frontier Force.[195] On 8 October 1950, Mao Zedong redesignated the PLA North East Frontier Force as the Chinese People's Volunteer Army (PVA).[196]

To enlist Stalin's support, Zhou and a Chinese delegation arrived in Moscow on 10 October, at which point they flew to Stalin's home at the Black Sea.[197] There they conferred with the top Soviet leadership which included Joseph Stalin as well as Vyacheslav Molotov, Lavrentiy Beria and Georgi Malenkov. Stalin initially agreed to send military equipment and ammunition, but warned Zhou that the Soviet Union's air force would need two or three months to prepare any operations. In a subsequent meeting, Stalin told Zhou that he would only provide China with equipment on a credit basis, and that the Soviet air force would only operate over Chinese airspace, and only after an undisclosed period of time. Stalin did not agree to send either military equipment or air support until March 1951.[198] Mao did not find Soviet air support especially useful, as the fighting was going to take place on the south side of the Yalu.[199] Soviet shipments of matériel, when they did arrive, were limited to small quantities of trucks, grenades, machine guns, and the like.[200]

Immediately on his return to Beijing on 18 October 1950, Zhou met with Mao Zedong, Peng Dehuai, and Gao Gang, and the group ordered two hundred thousand Chinese troops to enter North Korea, which they did on 25 October.[201] UN aerial reconnaissance had difficulty sighting PVA units in daytime, because their march and bivouac discipline minimized aerial detection.[202] The PVA marched "dark-to-dark" (19:00–03:00), and aerial camouflage (concealing soldiers, pack animals, and equipment) was deployed by 05:30. Meanwhile, daylight advance parties scouted for the next bivouac site. During daylight activity or marching, soldiers were to remain motionless if an aircraft appeared, until it flew away;[202] PVA officers were under order to shoot security violators. Such battlefield discipline allowed a three-division army to march the 460 km (286 mi) from An-tung, Manchuria, to the combat zone in some 19 days. Another division night-marched a circuitous mountain route, averaging 29 km (18 mi) daily for 18 days.[73]

Meanwhile, on 15 October 1950, President Truman and General MacArthur met at Wake Island in the mid-Pacific Ocean. This meeting was much publicized because of the General's discourteous refusal to meet the President on the continental United States.[203] To President Truman, MacArthur speculated there was little risk of Chinese intervention in Korea,[204] and that the PRC's opportunity for aiding the KPA had lapsed. He believed the PRC had some 300,000 soldiers in Manchuria, and some 100,000–125,000 soldiers at the Yalu River. He further concluded that, although half of those forces might cross south, "if the Chinese tried to get down to Pyongyang, there would be the greatest slaughter" without air force protection.[177][205]

After secretly crossing the Yalu River on 19 October, the PVA 13th Army Group launched the First Phase Offensive on 25 October, attacking the advancing UN forces near the Sino-Korean border. This military decision made solely by China changed the attitude of the Soviet Union. Twelve days after Chinese troops entered the war, Stalin allowed the Soviet Air Force to provide air cover, and supported more aid to China.[206] After inflicting heavy losses on the ROK II Corps at the Battle of Onjong, the first confrontation between Chinese and U.S. military occurred on 1 November 1950; deep in North Korea, thousands of soldiers from the PVA 39th Army encircled and attacked the U.S. 8th Cavalry Regiment with three-prong assaults—from the north, northwest, and west—and overran the defensive position flanks in the Battle of Unsan.[207] The surprise assault resulted in the UN forces retreating back to the Ch'ongch'on River, while the Chinese unexpectedly disappeared into mountain hideouts following victory. It is unclear why the Chinese did not press the attack and follow up their victory.

The UN Command, however, were unconvinced that the Chinese had openly intervened because of the sudden Chinese withdrawal. On 24 November, the Home-by-Christmas Offensive was launched with the U.S. Eighth Army advancing in northwest Korea, while the US X Corps attacked along the Korean east coast. But the Chinese were waiting in ambush with their Second Phase Offensive.

After consulting with Stalin, on 13 November, Mao appointed Zhou Enlai the overall commander and coordinator of the war effort, with Peng as field commander.[201] On 25 November at the Korean western front, the PVA 13th Army Group attacked and overran the ROK II Corps at the Battle of the Ch'ongch'on River, and then inflicted heavy losses on the US 2nd Infantry Division on the UN forces' right flank.[208] The UN Command retreated; the U.S. Eighth Army's retreat (the longest in US Army history)[209] was made possible because of the Turkish Brigade's successful, but very costly, rear-guard delaying action near Kunuri that slowed the PVA attack for two days (27–29 November). On 27 November at the Korean eastern front, a U.S. 7th Infantry Division Regimental Combat Team (3,000 soldiers) and the U.S. 1st Marine Division (12,000–15,000 marines) were unprepared for the PVA 9th Army Group's three-pronged encirclement tactics at the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, but escaped under Air Force and X Corps support fire—albeit with some 15,000 collective casualties.[210]

By 30 November, the PVA 13th Army Group managed to expel the U.S. Eighth Army from northwest Korea. Retreating from the north faster than they had counter-invaded, the Eighth Army crossed the 38th parallel border in mid December.[211] UN morale hit rock bottom when commanding General Walton Walker of the U.S. Eighth Army was killed on 23 December 1950 in an automobile accident.[212] In northeast Korea by 11 December, the U.S. X Corps managed to cripple[213] the PVA 9th Army Group while establishing a defensive perimeter at the port city of Hungnam. The X Corps were forced to evacuate by 24 December in order to reinforce the badly depleted U.S. Eighth Army to the south.[214][215]

During the Hungnam evacuation, about 193 shiploads of UN Command forces and matériel (approximately 105,000 soldiers, 98,000 civilians, 17,500 vehicles, and 350,000 tons of supplies) were evacuated to Pusan.[216] The SS Meredith Victory was noted for evacuating 14,000 refugees, the largest rescue operation by a single ship, even though it was designed to hold 12 passengers. Before escaping, the UN Command forces razed most of Hungnam city, especially the port facilities;[177][217] and on 16 December 1950, President Truman declared a national emergency with Presidential Proclamation No. 2914, 3 C.F.R. 99 (1953),[218] which remained in force until 14 September 1978.[c] The next day (17 December 1950) Kim Il-sung was deprived of the right of command of KPA by China.[219]

China justified its entry into the war as a response to "American aggression in the guise of the UN".[195] Later, the Chinese claimed that U.S. bombers had violated PRC national airspace on three separate occasions and attacked Chinese targets before China intervened.[220][221]

Fighting around the 38th parallel (January-June 1951)
With Lieutenant-General Matthew Ridgway assuming the command of the U.S. Eighth Army on 26 December, the PVA and the KPA launched their Third Phase Offensive (also known as the "Chinese New Year's Offensive") on New Year's Eve of 1950. Utilizing night attacks in which UN Command fighting positions were encircled and then assaulted by numerically superior troops who had the element of surprise, the attacks were accompanied by loud trumpets and gongs, which fulfilled the double purpose of facilitating tactical communication and mentally disorienting the enemy. UN forces initially had no familiarity with this tactic, and as a result some soldiers panicked, abandoning their weapons and retreating to the south.[222] The Chinese New Year's Offensive overwhelmed UN forces, allowing the PVA and KPA to conquer Seoul for the second time on 4 January 1951.

hese setbacks prompted General MacArthur to consider using nuclear weapons against the Chinese or North Korean interiors, with the intention that radioactive fallout zones would interrupt the Chinese supply chains.[223] However, upon the arrival of the charismatic General Ridgway, the esprit de corps of the bloodied Eighth Army immediately began to revive.[224]

UN forces retreated to Suwon in the west, Wonju in the center, and the territory north of Samcheok in the east, where the battlefront stabilized and held.[222] The PVA had outrun its logistics capability and thus were unable to press on beyond Seoul as food, ammunition, and matériel were carried nightly, on foot and bicycle, from the border at the Yalu River to the three battle lines.[225] In late January, upon finding that the PVA had abandoned their battle lines, General Ridgway ordered a reconnaissance-in-force, which became Operation Roundup (5 February 1951).[226] A full-scale X Corps advance proceeded, which fully exploited the UN Command's air superiority,[227] concluding with the UN reaching the Han River and recapturing Wonju.[226]

Following the failure of ceasefire negotiations in January, the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 498 on 1 February, condemning PRC as an aggressor, and called upon its forces to withdraw from Korea.[228][229]

In early February, the South Korean 11th Division ran the operation to destroy the guerrillas and their sympathizer citizens in Southern Korea.[230] During the operation, the division and police conducted the Geochang massacre and Sancheong-Hamyang massacre.[230] In mid-February, the PVA counterattacked with the Fourth Phase Offensive and achieved initial victory at Hoengseong. But the offensive was soon blunted by the IX Corps positions at Chipyong-ni in the center.[226] The U.S. 2nd Infantry "Warrior" Division's 23rd Regimental Combat Team and the French Battalion fought a short but desperate battle that broke the attack's momentum.[226] The battle is sometimes known as the "Gettysburg of the Korean War". 5,600 South Korean, U.S., and French troops were surrounded on all sides by 25,000 Chinese. United Nations forces had previously retreated in the face of large Communist forces instead of getting cut off, but this time they stood and fought, and won.[231]

n the last two weeks of February 1951, Operation Roundup was followed by Operation Killer, carried out by the revitalized Eighth Army. It was a full-scale, battlefront-length attack staged for maximum exploitation of firepower to kill as many KPA and PVA troops as possible.[226] Operation Killerconcluded with I Corps re-occupying the territory south of the Han River, and IX Corps capturing Hoengseong.[232] On 7 March 1951, the Eighth Army attacked with Operation Ripper, expelling the PVA and the KPA from Seoul on 14 March 1951. This was the city's fourth conquest in a year's time, leaving it a ruin; the 1.5 million pre-war population was down to 200,000, and people were suffering from severe food shortages.[232][178]

On 1 March 1951, Mao sent a cable to Stalin, in which he emphasized the difficulties faced by Chinese forces and the need for air cover, especially over supply lines. Apparently impressed by the Chinese war effort, Stalin agreed to supply two air force divisions, three anti-aircraft divisions, and six thousand trucks. PVA troops in Korea continued to suffer severe logistical problems throughout the war. In late April Peng Dehuai sent his deputy, Hong Xuezhi, to brief Zhou Enlai in Beijing. What Chinese soldiers feared, Hong said, was not the enemy, but having no food, bullets, or trucks to transport them to the rear when they were wounded. Zhou attempted to respond to the PVA's logistical concerns by increasing Chinese production and improving supply methods, but these efforts were never sufficient. At the same time, large-scale air defense training programs were carried out, and the Chinese Air Force began participating in the war from September 1951 onward.[233]

On 11 April 1951, Commander-in-Chief Truman relieved the controversial General MacArthur, the Supreme Commander in Korea.[234] There were several reasons for the dismissal. MacArthur crossed the 38th parallel in the mistaken belief that the Chinese would not enter the war, leading to major allied losses. He believed that whether to use nuclear weapons should be his decision, not the president's.[235] MacArthur threatened to destroy China unless it surrendered. While MacArthur felt total victory was the only honorable outcome, Truman was more pessimistic about his chances once involved in a land war in Asia, and felt a truce and orderly withdrawal from Korea could be a valid solution.[236] MacArthur was the subject of congressional hearings in May and June 1951, which determined that he had defied the orders of the president and thus had violated the U.S. Constitution.[237] A popular criticism of MacArthur was that he never spent a night in Korea, and directed the war from the safety of Tokyo.[238]

MacArthur was relieved primarily due to his determination to expand the war into China, which other officials believed would needlessly escalate a limited war and consume too many already overstretched resources. Despite MacArthur's claims that he was restricted to fighting a limited war when China was fighting all-out, congressional testimony revealed China was using restraint as much as the U.S. was, as they were not using air power against front-line troops, communication lines, ports, naval air forces, or staging bases in Japan, which had been crucial to the survival of UN forces in Korea. Simply fighting on the peninsula had already tied down significant portions of U.S. airpower; as Air Force chief of staff Hoyt Vandenberg said, 80–85% the tactical capacity, one-fourth of the strategic portion, and 20% of air defense forces of the United States were engaged in a single country. There was also fear that crossing into China would provoke the Soviet Union into entering the war; General Omar Bradley testified that there were 35 Russian divisions totaling some 500,000 troops in the Far East, which if sent into action with the approximately 85 Russian submarines in the vicinity of Korea, could overwhelm U.S. forces and cut supply lines, as well as potentially assist China in taking over territory in Southeast Asia.[239]

General Ridgway was appointed Supreme Commander, Korea; he regrouped the UN forces for successful counterattacks,[240] while General James Van Fleet assumed command of the U.S. Eighth Army.[241] Further attacks slowly depleted the PVA and KPA forces; Operations Courageous (23–28 March 1951) and Tomahawk (23 March 1951) were a joint ground and airborne infilltration meant to trap Chinese forces between Kaesong and Seoul. UN forces advanced to "Line Kansas", north of the 38th parallel.[242] The 187th Airborne Regimental Combat Team's ("Rakkasans") second of two combat jumps was on Easter Sunday, 1951, at Munsan-ni, South Korea, codenamed Operation Tomahawk. The mission was to get behind Chinese forces and block their movement north. The 60th Indian Parachute Field Ambulance provided the medical cover for the operations, dropping an ADS and a surgical team and treating over 400 battle casualties apart from the civilian casualties that formed the core of their objective as the unit was on a humanitarian mission.

The Chinese counterattacked in April 1951, with the Fifth Phase Offensive, also known as the Chinese Spring Offensive, with three field armies (approximately 700,000 men).[243] The offensive's first thrust fell upon I Corps, which fiercely resisted in the Battle of the Imjin River(22–25 April 1951) and the Battle of Kapyong (22–25 April 1951), blunting the impetus of the offensive, which was halted at the "No-name Line" north of Seoul.[244] On 15 May 1951, the Chinese commenced the second impulse of the Spring Offensive and attacked the ROK Army and the U.S. X Corps in the east at the Soyang River. After initial success, they were halted by 20 May.[245] At month's end, the U.S. Eighth Army counterattacked and regained "Line Kansas", just north of the 38th parallel.[246] The UN's "Line Kansas" halt and subsequent offensive action stand-down began the stalemate that lasted until the armistice of 1953.

Stalemate (July 1951-July 1953)
For the remainder of the Korean War the UN Command and the PVA fought, but exchanged little territory; the stalemate held. Large-scale bombing of North Korea continued, and protracted armistice negotiations began 10 July 1951 at Kaesong.[247] On the Chinese side, Zhou Enlai directed peace talks, and Li Kenong and Qiao Guanghua headed the negotiation team.[233]Combat continued while the belligerents negotiated; the UN Command forces' goal was to recapture all of South Korea and to avoid losing territory.[248] The PVA and the KPA attempted similar operations, and later effected military and psychological operations in order to test the UN Command's resolve to continue the war.

The principal battles of the stalemate include the Battle of Bloody Ridge (18 August–15 September 1951),[249] the Battle of the Punchbowl (31 August-21 September 1951), the Battle of Heartbreak Ridge (13 September–15 October 1951),[250] the Battle of Old Baldy (26 June–4 August 1952), the Battle of White Horse (6–15 October 1952), the Battle of Triangle Hill (14 October–25 November 1952), the Battle of Hill Eerie (21 March–21 June 1952), the sieges of Outpost Harry (10–18 June 1953), the Battle of the Hook (28–29 May 1953), the Battle of Pork Chop Hill (23 March–16 July 1953), and the Battle of Kumsong (13–27 July 1953).

Chinese troops suffered from deficient military equipment, serious logistical problems, overextended communication and supply lines, and the constant threat of UN bombers. All of these factors generally led to a rate of Chinese casualties that was far greater than the casualties suffered by UN troops. The situation became so serious that, in November 1951, Zhou Enlai called a conference in Shenyang to discuss the PVA's logistical problems. At the meeting it was decided to accelerate the construction of railways and airfields in the area, to increase the number of trucks available to the army, and to improve air defense by any means possible. These commitments did little to directly address the problems confronting PVA troops.[251]

In the months after the Shenyang conference Peng Dehuai went to Beijing several times to brief Mao and Zhou about the heavy casualties suffered by Chinese troops and the increasing difficulty of keeping the front lines supplied with basic necessities. Peng was convinced that the war would be protracted, and that neither side would be able to achieve victory in the near future. On 24 February 1952, the Military Commission, presided over by Zhou, discussed the PVA's logistical problems with members of various government agencies involved in the war effort. After the government representatives emphasized their inability to meet the demands of the war, Peng, in an angry outburst, shouted: "You have this and that problem... You should go to the front and see with your own eyes what food and clothing the soldiers have! Not to speak of the casualties! For what are they giving their lives? We have no aircraft. We have only a few guns. Transports are not protected. More and more soldiers are dying of starvation. Can't you overcome some of your difficulties?" The atmosphere became so tense that Zhou was forced to adjourn the conference. Zhou subsequently called a series of meetings, where it was agreed that the PVA would be divided into three groups, to be dispatched to Korea in shifts; to accelerate the training of Chinese pilots; to provide more anti-aircraft guns to the front lines; to purchase more military equipment and ammunition from the Soviet Union; to provide the army with more food and clothing; and, to transfer the responsibility of logistics to the central government.[252]

Armistice (July 1953-November 1954)
The on-again, off-again armistice negotiations continued for two years,[253] first at Kaesong, on the border between North and South Korea, and then at the neighboring village of Panmunjom.[254] A major, problematic negotiation point was prisoner of war (POW) repatriation.[255]The PVA, KPA, and UN Command could not agree on a system of repatriation because many PVA and KPA soldiers refused to be repatriated back to the north,[256] which was unacceptable to the Chinese and North Koreans.[257] In the final armistice agreement, signed on 27 July 1953, a Neutral Nations Repatriation Commission, under the chairman Indian General K. S. Thimayya, was set up to handle the matter.[258]

In 1952, the United States elected a new president, and on 29 November 1952, the president-elect, Dwight D. Eisenhower, went to Korea to learn what might end the Korean War.[259] With the United Nations' acceptance of India's proposed Korean War armistice,[260] the KPA, the PVA, and the UN Command ceased fire with the battle line approximately at the 38th parallel. Upon agreeing to the armistice, the belligerents established the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), which has since been patrolled by the KPA and ROKA, United States, and Joint UN Commands.

The Demilitarized Zone runs northeast of the 38th parallel; to the south, it travels west. The old Korean capital city of Kaesong, site of the armistice negotiations, originally was in pre-war South Korea, but now is part of North Korea. The United Nations Command, supported by the United States, the North Korean People's Army, and the Chinese People's Volunteers, signed the Armistice Agreement on 27 July 1953 to end the fighting. The Armistice also called upon the governments of South Korea, North Korea, China and the United States to participate in continued peace talks. The war is considered to have ended at this point, even though there was no peace treaty.[38] North Korea nevertheless claims that it won the Korean War.[261][262]

After the war, Operation Glory was conducted from July to November 1954, to allow combatant countries to exchange their dead. The remains of 4,167 U.S. Army and U.S. Marine Corps dead were exchanged for 13,528 KPA and PVA dead, and 546 civilians dead in UN prisoner-of-war camps were delivered to the South Korean government.[263] After Operation Glory, 416 Korean War unknown soldiers were buried in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (The Punchbowl), on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO) records indicate that the PRC and the DPRK transmitted 1,394 names, of which 858 were correct. From 4,167 containers of returned remains, forensic examination identified 4,219 individuals. Of these, 2,944 were identified as from the U.S., and all but 416 were identified by name.[264] From 1996 to 2006, the DPRK recovered 220 remains near the Sino-Korean border.[265]

Division of Korea (1954-present)
The Korean Armistice Agreement provided for monitoring by an international commission. Since 1953, the Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission (NNSC), composed of members from the Swiss[266] and Swedish[267] Armed Forces, has been stationed near the DMZ.

In April 1975, South Vietnam's capital was captured by the North Vietnamese army. Encouraged by the success of Communist revolution in Indochina, Kim Il-sung saw it as an opportunity to invade the South. Kim visited China in April of that year, and met with Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai to ask for military aid. Despite Pyongyang's expectations, however, Beijing refused to help North Korea for another war in Korea.[268]

Since the armistice, there have been numerous incursions and acts of aggression by North Korea. In 1976, the axe murder incident was widely publicized. Since 1974, four incursion tunnels leading to Seoul have been uncovered. In 2010, a North Korean submarine torpedoed and sank the South Korean corvette ROKS Cheonan, resulting in the deaths of 46 sailors.[269] Again in 2010, North Korea fired artillery shells on Yeonpyeong island, killing two military personnel and two civilians.[270]

After a new wave of UN sanctions, on 11 March 2013, North Korea claimed that the armistice had become invalid.[271] On 13 March 2013, North Korea confirmed it ended the 1953 Armistice and declared North Korea "is not restrained by the North-South declaration on non-aggression".[272] On 30 March 2013, North Korea stated that it entered a "state of war" with South Korea and declared that "The long-standing situation of the Korean peninsula being neither at peace nor at war is finally over".[39] Speaking on 4 April 2013, the U.S. Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel, informed the press that Pyongyang "formally informed" the Pentagon that it "ratified" the potential use of a nuclear weapon against South Korea, Japan and the United States of America, including Guam and Hawaii.[273] Hagel also stated the United States would deploy the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense anti-ballistic missile system to Guam, because of a credible and realistic nuclear threat from North Korea.[274]

In 2016, it was revealed that North Korea approached the United States about conducting formal peace talks to formally end the war. While the White House agreed to secret peace talks, the plan was rejected due to North Korea's refusal to discuss nuclear disarmament as part of the terms of the treaty.[275]

On 27 April 2018, it was announced that North Korea and South Korea agreed to talks to end the ongoing 65 year conflict. They committed themselves to the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.[276] However, on May 15, 2018, North Korea cancelled a high-level meeting due to military drills South Korea and the US conducted.[277]

Aftermath
Postwar recovery was different in the two Koreas. South Korea stagnated in the first postwar decade. In 1953, South Korea and the United States signed a Mutual Defense Treaty. In 1960, the April Revolutionoccurred and students joined an anti-Syngman Rhee demonstration; 142 were killed by police; in consequence Syngman Rhee resigned and left for exile in the United States.[400] Park Chung-hee's May 16 coup enabled social stability. In the 1960s, prostitution and related services represented 25 percent of South Korean GNP.[401] From 1965 to 1973, South Korea dispatched troops to Vietnam and received $235,560,000 in allowance and military procurement from the United States.[402] GNPincreased fivefold during the Vietnam War.[402] South Korea industrialized and modernized. Contemporary North Korea remains underdeveloped.[403][404] South Korea had one of the world's fastest-growing economies from the early 1960s to the late 1990s. In 1957 South Korea had a lower per capita GDP than Ghana,[405] and by 2010 it was ranked thirteenth in the world (Ghana was 86th).[406]

Following extensive USAF bombing, North Korea "had been virtually destroyed as an industrial society." After the armistice, Kim Il-Sung requested Soviet economic and industrial assistance. In September 1953, the Soviet government agreed to "cancel or postpone repayment for all ... outstanding debts", and promised to grant North Korea one billion rubles in monetary aid, industrial equipment and consumer goods. Eastern European members of the Soviet Bloc also contributed with "logistical support, technical aid, [and] medical supplies." China canceled North Korea's war debts, provided 800 million yuan, promised trade cooperation, and sent in thousands of troops to rebuild damaged infrastructure.[326]

Postwar, about 100,000 North Koreans were executed in purges.[407] According to Rummel, forced labor and concentration camps were responsible for over one million deaths in North Korea from 1945 to 1987;[33] others have estimated 400,000 deaths in concentration camps alone.[408] Estimates based on the most recent North Korean census suggest that 240,000 to 420,000 people died as a result of the 1990s North Korean famine and that there were 600,000 to 850,000 unnatural deaths in North Korea from 1993 to 2008.[409] A study by South Korean anthropologists of North Korean children who had defected to China found that 18-year-old males were 13 centimetres (5 in) shorter than South Koreans their age because of malnutrition.[410]

South Korean anti-Americanism after the war was fueled by the presence and behavior of U.S. military personnel (USFK) and U.S. support for the authoritarian regime, a fact still evident during the country's democratic transition in the 1980s.[411] However, anti-Americanism has declined significantly in South Korea in recent years, from 46% favorable in 2003 to 74% favorable in 2011,[412] making South Korea one of the most pro-U.S. countries in the world.[413]

In addition, a large number of mixed-race "G.I. babies" (offspring of U.S. and other UN soldiers and Korean women) were filling up the country's orphanages. Because Korean traditional society places significant weight on paternal family ties, bloodlines, and purity of race, children of mixed race or those without fathers are not easily accepted in South Korean society. International adoption of Korean children began in 1954.[414] The U.S. Immigration Act of 1952 legalized the naturalization of non-blacks and non-whites as U.S. citizens, and made possible the entry of military spouses and children from South Korea after the Korean War. With the passage of the Immigration Act of 1965, which substantially changed U.S. immigration policy toward non-Europeans, Koreans became one of the fastest-growing Asian groups in the United States.[415]

Mao Zedong's decision to take on the United States in the Korean War was a direct attempt to confront what the Communist bloc viewed as the strongest anti-Communist power in the world, undertaken at a time when the Chinese Communist regime was still consolidating its own power after winning the Chinese Civil War. Mao supported intervention not to save North Korea, but because he believed that a military conflict with the United States was inevitable after the United States entered the Korean War, and to appease the Soviet Union to secure military dispensation and achieve Mao's goal of making China a major world military power. Mao was equally ambitious in improving his own prestige inside the communist international community by demonstrating that his Marxist concerns were international. In his later years Mao believed that Stalin only gained a positive opinion of him after China's entrance into the Korean War. Inside mainland China, the war improved the long-term prestige of Mao, Zhou, and Peng, allowing the Chinese Communist Party to increase its legitimacy while weakening anti-Communist dissent.[416]

The Chinese government have encouraged the point of view that the war was initiated by the United States and South Korea, though ComIntern documents have shown that Mao sought approval from Joseph Stalin to enter the war. In Chinese media, the Chinese war effort is considered as an example of China's engaging the strongest power in the world with an under-equipped army, forcing it to retreat, and fighting it to a military stalemate. These successes were contrasted with China's historical humiliations by Japan and by Western powers over the previous hundred years, highlighting the abilities of the People's Liberation Army and the Chinese Communist Party. The most significant negative long-term consequence of the war for China was that it led the United States to guarantee the safety of Chiang Kai-shek's regime in Taiwan, effectively ensuring that Taiwan would remain outside of PRC control through the present day.[416] Mao had also discovered the usefulness of large-scale mass movements in the war while implementing them among most of his ruling measures over PRC.[417] Finally, anti-U.S. sentiments, which were already a significant factor during the Chinese Civil War, was ingrained into Chinese culture during the Communist propaganda campaigns of the Korean War.[418]

The Korean War affected other participant combatants. Turkey, for example, entered NATO in 1952,[419] and the foundation was laid for bilateral diplomatic and trade relations with South Korea.[420]