The Korean War: An International History by Wada Haruki (review)

Wada Haruki’s remarkable book is the most comprehensive and balanced single-volume history of the Korean War yet to be published. A senior scholar of international history in Japan, Wada draws on decades of research into the archives and scholarly literature of Russia, the United States, China, Korea, and Japan. The breadth of his scholarship is therefore extraordinary, but what most distinguishes this account is that Wada places the Korean War squarely in the context of the modern history of Northeast Asia rather than primarily of the Cold War. Suggesting that the conflict of 1950–53 could more accurately be called the Northeast Asia War, Wada presents the Korean War as a continuation of the Chinese Civil War. Throughout the book he maintains an impressive balance between local and international aspects, military and diplomatic components, and military events and local politics. Moreover, for the first time in a general history of the war, Wada fully incorporates Japan into the narrative.

In straightforward prose, as translated by Frank Baldwin, Wada begins by establishing in convincing detail that in 1949 North Korea and South Korea were symmetrical in their determination to reunify the country by military means, while their Soviet and American patrons were similarly joined in unwillingness to support military action on the peninsula that might damage their national interests. Closely examining the decision-making process that led Stalin to change his mind regarding the Korean venture in early 1950, Wada argues that the return of Korean soldiers from China, along with Stalin’s condemnation of the “peaceful revolution” line of the Japanese Communist Party, emboldened Kim Il-Sung (Kim Ilsŏng) to renew his request for permission to attack the South (p. 51). Wada concludes that Secretary of State Dean Acheson’s January 12, 1950, speech at the National Press Club persuaded Stalin that an attack on South Korea would not prompt the United States to intervene, a view reinforced by an intelligence report of remarks by Republic of Korea (ROK) prime minister Yi Pŏmsŏk at a cabinet meeting on January 6, 1950, that the United States would abandon South Korea as it had Taiwan. Relying on documents cited by Evgenii P. Bajanov and Natalia Bajanova, Wada details the explanation Stalin gave Kim Il-Sung and Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) foreign minister Pak Hŏnyŏng as to the changes in the international environment that made it possible for Moscow to support an attack on South Korea: the psychological impact of the victory of the Chinese Communists on the United States and the Soviet acquisition of nuclear weapons. Stalin nonetheless cautioned the North Korean leaders to consider carefully the possibility of American intervention, making it clear that if such an eventuality occurred, the DPRK would have to turn to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) for assistance. Kim Il-Sung thus had to secure Beijing’s support before the attack could begin.

Wada disputes earlier interpretations of a captured document from the cultural section of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) that outlines five stages of political work the KPA was to conduct during the period before the attack through the post-combat era. While Bruce Cumings argues that this document does not prove the KPA attacked first and Park Myung-lim regards it as the most definitive proof that the North did attack first, Wada argues persuasively that it was prepared for training purposes, not as an operational plan for the attack on South Korea (pp. 63–64). Wada reasonably views the telegram Soviet ambassador Shtykov sent to Moscow on June 26, 1950, reporting on the first day of the war, as definitive proof that “every aspect of the North Korean offensive was meticulously planned by the DPRK in conjunction with Soviet advisers” (pp. 76–77).

Regarding the heated debate over whether the United States knew of the impending attack on South Korea, Wada disagrees with the conclusions of...