Embedded Files
In the heat of the Cold War, the Korean War provided the first confrontation between two nuclear powers. The war broke out on June 25, 1950 when North Korean troops crossed the 38th parallel, invading South Korea.*
The United States reacted to the news of the invasion by immediately taking steps to convene the United Nations Security Council. On June 27th the Security Council asked UN members to provide military assistance to help South Korea repel the invasion. U.S. forces went in on June 30th, by which time the North Koreans had taken the South Korean capital of Seoul. On September 15th, a UN force landed at Inchon and by September 29th, the UN troops had returned Seoul to the South Korean President. But by the end of the year the Chinese had intervened on behalf of the North Koreans halting the UN advance.
The war ended up being a see-saw affair that saw the UN forces retreat from North Korea to the Pusan perimeter in southeastern Korean and then forge forward again across the 38th parallel only to be driven south once more by the Chinese forces. In July 1951 after 13 months of fighting the two sides began armistice talks, which dragged on for more than two years. After Stalin's death in March 1953, the new leadership in Moscow moved more rapidly towards reaching an agreement. The cease-fire was ultimately signed on July 27, 1953.
The human cost of the war was catastrophic. In the first month of their operation alone, the Strategic Air Command groups dropped 4,000 tons of bombs. Besides high explosives, the bombers used napalm. Estimates of the casualties vary widely, but there is reason to believe that besides the three and a half million military dead, wounded and missing on both sides including Laker William T. Haines, more than two million civilians died in North Korea. In the end, the border dividing the two countries remained exactly where it had been before the North Korean invasion.
Korean War Causality:
Conflicts in which Lakers Served & Sacrificed
World War I World War II Korean War Vietnam War Post-Vietnam
*Text from the PBS American Experience film, Race for the Super Bomb.
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse