The Korean War in World History (review)

In this book's introduction, William Stueck reviews each author's topic as first presented during a symposium on the Korean War at Texas A & M University. The introduction should make it clear the book is meant for scholars, not for those unfamiliar with the Korean War.

My brief review of each essay begins with Allan R. Millett's essay on the "Korean People: Missing in Action in the Misunderstood War." Millett starts with an explanation of the Russo-Japanese War, which began in 1904 and concluded after U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt mediated the Portsmouth (New Hampshire) Peace Treaty between the two warring parties. Millett gives details about various Korean resistance movements against Japan after the 1904 war that were too weak to succeed until World War II ended. Late in 1945, the Koreans began what Millett calls the "People's War" with U.S. army forces backing Syngman Rhee's nationalist militants while Moscow and Beijing helped Kim Il Sung's communist forces advance south to the 38th parallel. Finally, in June 1950, North Korean forces aided by the Soviet Union's aircraft attacked South Korea. Immediately, President Harry Truman obtained United Nations support before ordering U.S.-led United Nations forces to help South Koreans defend their homes. The conflict was further internationalized when Chinese "volunteers" entered the war on October 24, 1950. Following China's intervention, the war became a strategic stalemate that led to a cease-fire and demilitarized zone in July 1953.

Kathryn Weathersby's essay describes the "Soviet Role in the Korean War." She uses data from Soviet archives that became available after the Cold War ended in December 1991. The new material from Russian archives and the works of other scholars gave Weathersby essential information for scholars to analyze relations between Moscow, Beijing, and Pyongyang. She explains many important Soviet matters such as Stalin's "requesting Chinese intervention" (p. 74) soon after U.S. Marines landed at Inchon to recapture Seoul. Weathersby also found Russian documents to confirm that Stalin's death in March 1953 was a major reason for the Communists to accept an armistice.

Chen Jian's essay on "China's Road to the Korean War Revisited" demonstrates that China had three major reasons for intervening in the Korean War. First was the Chinese Communist Party's belief in revolutionary nationalism. Second was China's sense of responsibility for Asia-wide or world-wide revolution that included Indochina (Vietnam) as well as Korea. Third was Mao Zedong's desire "to maintain the inner dynamics of the Chinese revolution after its nationwide victory" (p. 94) in 1949. Chen uses Chinese and Russian sources to verify that Mao and Stalin formed their Sino-Soviet alliance of friendship and security during Mao's visit to Moscow from December 1949 to February 1950. Previously, Mao had made an agreement to help North Korean troops because Kim II Sung helped Mao win the civil war against Chiang Kai-Shek in early 1948. When the Korean war ended in 1953, Chen finds that all organized Chinese resistance to Mao ended, the landlord class was destroyed, Communists controlled the nationalist middle class, and Chinese intellectuals had experienced their first round of reeducation. This enabled China to emerge "as a revolutionary country in East Asia and the world" (p. 115).

Lloyd Gardner's article on "Korean Borderlands: Imaginary Frontiers of the Cold War" deals with borders that U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson and President Harry Truman hoped to secure for Japan, Korea, and Taiwan (Formosa). Gardner refers to the Truman administration's problems with Mc-Carthyism at home, with the Soviet Union in Berlin and Austria, and the Soviets' making an atomic bomb in 1949. Referring to Acheson's January 1950 National Press Club speech, Gardner believes that, unlike critics who saw the speech as bypassing the security of South Korea, Acheson "spoke directly to American concerns about preserving American influence there and elsewhere" (p. 134).

In...