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Suggested material for nuclear weapons section. According to historian Bruce Cumings, Truman publicly threatened the use of the atomic bomb when the People's Republic of China entered the war (following MacArthur's crossing of the 38th parallel). This was a possibility that had been discussed and included in contingency plans. On the day Truman threatened use of atomic bomb, Air Force General Stratemeyer sent order to General Hoyt Vandenberg that the Strategic Air Command augment its capacities and that this should include “atomic capabilities”. MacArthur requested use of atomic bombs in 24 Dec 1950, although it was not approved, and a subsequent request by his successor General Ridgeway for the same in May 1951 was refused. The main reason the weapons were not used was because of a disinclination by the USSR and PRC to escalate. See Bruce Cumings, Korea's Place in the Sun: A History, WW Norton & Company, 1997, pp 289-92 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.153.125.92 ( talk • contribs)
I wonder at what point does the assertion "leading scholar" become fact as opposed to opinion? Who, according to you are "leading scholars" of the Korean War and what is your criteria? What is the appropriate criteria for wikipedia? We know that Cumings has received several awards for Korean scholarship including one from the republic of Korea itself, we know that he is widely cited in the field, and even that many of those scholars who disagree with him have acknowledged his importance and his scholarship. All of this is easily demonstrable. What evidence do you have to offer to demonstrate that Cumings views are negatable with regards to this article? The suggestion at hand pertains to a paragraph referencing the work of Cumings, what do Chang and Halliday have to do with this? BernardL 23:34, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
Whoa. Wait a minute. I just realized the "three hypotheses" section added by wbfergus was taken verbatim from here. This is a massive copyvio and must be removed immediately which is what I am going to do. I'm not saying anything about the content, but we can't steal whole blocks of text (not even with quotation marks, much less without them) and insert them in an article. wbfergus you really should know better than that. If you want to put this back in somehow please paraphrase the salient points and/or use quote marks when you quote directly. I have to deal with enough of this stuff with my undergraduate's papers--though they copy from Wikipedia!--and certainly don't want to see it here. The section might not make sense for awhile but we can't keep that copyvio stuff in any longer.-- Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 19:19, 30 September 2007 (UTC)
The author does not cite any reports. Gives a vague disclainer about conflicting numbers form various scholarly journals (alas none are mentioned0. Then the author goes on to cite some purported figures by a communist regime.
Bad history, bad communist propaganda piece
"The Korean War finally ended in July 1953. Left in its wake were four million military and civilian casualties, including 33,600 American, 16,000 UN allied, 415,000 South Korean, and 520,000 North Korean dead. There were also an estimated 900,000 Chinese casualties. Half of Korea's industry was destroyed and a third of all homes" source http://www.cotf.edu/ete/modules/korea/kwar.html
Apparently one third of the Peoples Republic of China's army was wiped out and or disabled in Korea.
America's air superiority led to enormous chinese casulties in what a commanding general called a meat grinder. China would send its human wave , Nato forces would withdraw and then the chinese troops would be annihiliated by bommbing. The US airforce called this the meat griner —Preceding unsigned comment added by Paleocon ( talk • contribs) 20:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Parsecboy Its a history article not a propaganda piece for some trotskyite magazine as for your imagined communist troop strength cite your sources, 80 % of Chinese PLA was in Nkorea , 2.7 million /3 =900,000 hardly a success story for your communists. The NYTimes in various articles of the period cited the ten of thousands of POW defectors MacGregor NYTIMES NOV 16, 1953. Also some American casualities were due to the cowardly execution of of out unarmed men by the communists. Robert Alden NYTIMES 8-30-195 If this is your article it's something out of the ministry of truth from George Orwells 1984 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four —Preceding unsigned comment added by Paleocon ( talk • contribs) 21:00, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
someone needs to add the new treaty sighned by both North and South Korea stating the war is over. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.69.176.65 ( talk • contribs)
still nice to have the future of one. might as well add the peace treaty, doesnt look like its fading. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
68.205.70.254 (
talk)
02:01, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Could someone please fix the section on nuclear weapon threats? I saw quite a few weasel words, and the main focus of the paragraph is that Truman accidentally threatened using nukes. Crisco 1492 13:30, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't think that we should approach this article for long, even for a rewrite (this is response for Wberfugus' request) until we have ton of more editors interested in Korea-related topics. It's my opinion that about 1/10 editors signed up for WikiProject Korea are sock puppets & about 8/10 editors have lost interest in Wikipedia. And then the remaining 1/10 can't do anything - most of the work groups are inactive except for maybe food & even that is done by ppl not in the cuisine work group. Currently, I'm trying to push Japanese invasions of Korea (1592-1598) to become a featured article, but user:Good friend100 seems to dislike my edits & he doesn't reply to my suggestions so I'm not quite sure what I want to do. I could begin contributing to this article, but I don't want to invest my time if it'd become a waste (as were several of my experiences in contributing). ( Wikimachine 19:10, 5 October 2007 (UTC))
I am very uncomfortable about the bloody picture of the dead Chinese man. A soldier is human first, then he is a Chinese man, then he was a soldier. The bloody picture shows his face clearly, with his chopped legs.
He should be not responsible for the justice of the war, regardless who was right and who was wrong. It is a shame that recently Inter-Korean Summit already formally ended their war in Oct 2007, by visiting each other and this bloody picture is still shown here in this article.
The picture is real, but real things like adult contents and violent scene are still not good for all of us, especially for Children who are reading this article. I have seen more bloody move such as the Pathfinder (2007 film), in which the indigenous people in North America were bloodily killed by Vikings, but that is an 18+ movie. I am not a child and I still feel upset, not only because I am a Chinese, more important I am trying to be keep my dignity as a human.
As a considerate member of Wikepedia, I would suggest to delete this bloody picture. I am aware of the fact that the sever of Wikipedia is in US, not in UN, nor in China. But we are all humans; I did not see a bloody body with clear face from US soldier in this article (I am sure someone died and the pictures are available). Unless if there is a USA dead body added to this article, I strongly suggest to delete this picture, for the dignity of a dead person, although we don’t even know his name. Dongwenliang 04:30, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Everyone knows war is not pretty, except the one who inserted this image in this article. Above I mentioned that it is a real picture, the authenticity of the picture is not the reason the picture should stay. Violence, rape, murder happens everyday somewhere on our earth, those are also not pretty but true, can that be the reason this picture should stay?
Violence can be taught. That is why we should hide these explicit atrocity pictures and sex explicit pictures from Children, even from all the person who are with dignity. I noticed the picture of US soldier, his face is down and his identity is not shown, without the word beneath, you can not even tell if he is an US soldier or not. Similar picture should be used to replace the Chinese picture. I hate to say this but it seems that in your eyes we are not human. Dongwenliang 15:19, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Of course no complain. If the Chinese soldier' face is not shown, why would I bother to complain? People complain because they feel unfair. The bias is, the dead American soldier is shown with dignity and the Chinese soldier is not, the fact is not that complicated at all. Dongwenliang 23:24, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure about the dignity stuffs. Who cares? ( Wikimachine 00:39, 7 October 2007 (UTC))
Here we go again. In the previous discussions on this image, the majority of the editors (presumably mostly white males in their 20s) claimed that the image is neutral and decline to change it, on the ground that it is a Wikipedia featured image, which was almost certainly voted again by the same demographic group of people. Despite all these, they actually believe this should be a "featured" article. What an irony. It is an even bigger irony that they claim "communism reeducation" is a crime against POW. In other words, the preaching of the creed of a dead white man to the communist POWs is the real salvation. And, look at the amazing results of the powerful American Air force, their big bombs can break the legs of your poor Chinese solider. And, look at the crimes committed by the Chinese, they even killed an American POW. Oh, by the way, the US Army is not only mighty, it is also really a big family, because the black and white American solders were fighting side by side in the advertisement on this site.
And besides, the people from mainland China have been brain-washed, they cannot even think independently, so their opinions are highly biased. Only the people in the western world, (oh I am sorry, I should say the free world), can think objectively and neutrally, even though they have been taught by their media 24/7 that the communist China is evil. Information from the communist governments are simply propaganda. Only the documents provided by the US government, (including the Bush administration, I guess), are the facts. Guess whose brain-wash is more successful?
Oh, yes. Welcome to the Wikipedia.
Yours truly, ( Postdoc 05:46, 9 October 2007 (UTC))
(outdent)Get over it. If you don't like it, either don't read the article or find a suitable replacement. The picture has occasionally been the subject of one person 'outrage' numerous times, and the picture is still here. Consensus seems to be to keep it, as whenever somebody deleted it, it was reverted back. Just like porn sites, if you don't like what you see there, don't go there. It's really kind of simple. And, as stated above, the dead Chinese soldier is actually portrayed better than the dead American soldier. Per Chinese and Japanese cultures, dying in combat is considered much more honorable than surrender or capture, hence the Chinese soldier would be regarded in those cultures as being a more honorable death than the American soldier who was captured and subsequently executed. So, if that person has any relatives or friends who can identify him, then they would at least know he died honorably. This merely shows that he did not die a dishonorable death or disgrace his family. wbfergus Talk 13:42, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
And, I am Chinese and I never know we have a culture of being pride to show dead body with identity. That is not my culture. I think no culture in the world likes that, the baseline is, we are all humans. Dongwenliang 20:54, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
People here are not taking this to a racist level. Nobody here has any anti-Chinese sentiment here, and if they do, they shouldn't be here. Just add an image of a dead american soldier on the page. And, assume good faith on your part. People don't add an image of a dead chinese solider to insult Chinese soldiers. Its just part of the article. Good friend100 21:44, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The anti-China and anti-North Korean tone is quite obvious in this article, due to the editing community of this article (mainly from the US and partly from South Korea). The point is that some people claim that they want to remove this kind of "systematic bias" from this article, while in reality these "assertive" people refuse to budge from their "original" positions. "Dongwenliang"'s arguments are met with such "good faithed" words like "Who cares?", "Get over it", "Over-react", "disruptive", "case closed", etc. In fact, looking through the editing histories of some users here, their attitudes to mainland China and North Korea are quite obvious. Yes, statistics really speak for themselves. Claiming neutral is one thing, doing it is another thing. Isn't it? Postdoc 16:15, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
"Following Colonel Harrison Thyng’s famous message to the Pentagon, the 51st FIW reinforced the beleaguered 4th in December 1951" - as a UK citizen I have no idea what this famous message might be. Could this be rewritten to be clear to a wider audience? Tim Vickers 03:42, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Please stop edit warring. I just checked the edit history and theres a long string of edit warring. WP:3RR will remain in effect and if you keep this up, somebody will have to file a report. Good friend100 19:23, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
The total numbers of casualties suffered by all parties involved may never be known. In Western countries, the numbers have been subjected to numerous scholarly reviews, and in the case of one U.S. estimate, the number was revised after a clerical error was discovered. Each country's self-reported casualties were largely based upon troop movements, unit rosters, battle casualty reports, and medical records.
The Western numbers of Chinese and/or North Korean casulties are based primarily on battle reports of estimated casualties, interrogation of POWs and captured documents. The Chinese estimation of UN casualties states "The after-war joint declaration of the Chinese People's Volunteers and the Korean People's Army claimed that they 'eliminated 1.09 million enemy forces, including 390,000 from the United States, 660,000 from South Korean, and 29,000 from other countries.' The vague 'eliminated' number gave no details to that of dead, wounded and captured." Regarding their own casualties, the same source said "During the wartime, 70 percent of the forces of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) were dispatched to Korea as the Chinese People's Volunteers (accumulated to 2.97 million), along with more than 600,000 civil workers. The Chinese People's Volunteers suffered 148,000 deaths altogether, among which 114,000 died in combats, incidents, and winterkill, 21,000 died after being hospitalized, 13,000 died from diseases; and 380,000 were wounded. There were also 29,000 missing, including 21,400 POWs, of whom 14,000 were sent to Taiwan, 7,110 were repatriated." This same source concluded with these numbers for North Korean casualties, "The Korean People's Army had 290,000 casualties and 90,000 POWs. There was a large number of civilian deaths in the northern part of Korea, but no accurate figures were available."[44]
The casulties of the various UN forces are listed in the infobox, along with their estimates of Chinese and North Korean forces."
That entire section is very poor and includes multiple misspelled words, among other errors. Where is the "390,000 eliminated" from the U.S. coming from? What source do they have other than North Korea (reputable source right?). All Western historians agree that the American casualties in the Korean war were no more than 40,000.
Here's a link: http://www.cotf.edu/ete/modules/korea/kwar.html
The entire Korean War section on casualties (see how I spelled it correctly?) needs to be rewritten by someone that isn't a North Korean propagandist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.100.101.142 ( talk) 03:33, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
I hope some professions would write this article. In this casualities section, there are several numbers hard to believe or inconsistent. the US has ~36K dead in the whole war (about ~26K died in battles). However, in the section of first Chinese-US battle, it claims 15000 casualities on one army. this number should count to the 26K, i guess. That means, for the rest of the war, only about 10,000 more US troops died. This is just beyond my understanding. Also, according to the history of the articles, this ~36K is coming from a previous error that count the death in the other area at the same period of time. the miscounted number is about ~17K. I am not sure if this ~17K was the total of death in other area at the same time or not. I assume it is. As far as I know, there were no other war US involved during this time. So that means, the US troops death toll in the peaceful zone is almost half of the hot war zone like Korea at that time. This really shocks me b/c the majority of the troops are young and fit. US military is such dangeous job? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.135.235.188 ( talk) 22:00, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
The total death in the US estimates of Chinese is over 400,000. The total wounded is 486,000. So if you add them together, it is 886,000+. This number even larger than the total Chinese strength of 780,000 which is all agreed. We now can see how absurd these US estimations are. Nobody returned home? Even so it should be right 780,000. Dongwenliang 17:38, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
The Chinese offical number of death is about 140,000. I found another source that shown break-down number from each provinces of PVA. Here: [4]. Beijing:1483, Fujian:982, Tianjin:977, Henan:10673, Hebei: 10155, Hubei:5167, Shanxi:5835, Hunan:10687, Inner Mongolia: 1683, Guangdong:3186, Liaoning:13374, Guangxi:2915, Jilin:18260, Shan'xi:2802, Heilongjiang:8222, Ningxia:461, Shandong: 19685, Gansu: 1041, Shanghai:1634, Qnghai:48, Jiangsu:7268, Xinjiang:61, Anhui: 4151, Sichuan:30789, ZHejiang: 3732, Guizhou: 2799, Jiangxi: 2162, Yunnan: 1482. THe Hainan province was not established yet, and I did not find Tibet. I added toal number to about 170,000. Dongwenliang 14:22, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The last paragraph of the section "Invasion of North Korea" and the first paragraph of "Entrance of China" conflict. The latter paragraph has three uncited statements that seem to be the cause of the problem. Someone with a good grasp of these pivotal events, namely the causes of the PRC's entrance into the war, needs to clear this up. 70.18.234.120 Maro Sunday, Oct. 21, 2007, 11:36 pm EST. —Preceding comment was added at 03:34, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
The Crimes Against POWs section currently begins with the sentence: Prisoners of war were severely mistreated by both sides of the conflict. Yet the only specific instances given (and more importantly, the only cited claims) refer to crimes against POWs by North Korean forces. We should support the claim with evidence or remove it. Miraculouschaos 02:43, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Requesting comment on the following questions:
(copied from the picture page itself):
Requesting comment on the following questions: (I only have two requests for this survey: 1. Answer with honesty. 2. Be consistent with above discussions your wrote down and your comments in my talk page):
This is comepletely irrelevant. I stress again, Dongwenliang, that you read
WP:CENSOR. The image adds to the article; whether you find it offensive or not does not matter. You cannot force your opinions on the rest of the world that will come to read this article. You may also want to read
Wikipedia:Profanity, the first line reads
This image fills all three of those requirements. If you want to find a replacement image with a dead Chinese soldier face down, that is in public domain, go right ahead. Until you or anyone else does so, however, this image will remain in the article. Parsecboy 15:04, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
But, let me come to the real question here. The point is that it is non-neutral because of the intentions behind this picture. It was taken as a showcase by "the winners", in the same way as hunters posing with their preys. It is a blatant showing off. It is released from the US army archives. Did the US army release similar pictures of US solders? No. This non-neutral picture is a major eye-catching point of the this article, and it violates the neutral stands of Wikipedia. I don't care whether it shows up in in other websites. If Wikipedia claims one thing but is doing another thing, it is hypocrisy.
People said that it is egregious for Microsoft employees to temper with their own wikipedia sites. Well, look at this site. It even contains sections literally plagiarized from the US ARMY documents. If you believe in what the US government said, you would think the IRAQ would have been over a long ago. Postdoc 05:00, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
In my opinion, the RfC's have run their course. The comments made by various users seem to have concensus for the following:
But, before I remove the RfC tags, I want to make sure that nobody else has any objections and can present a valid argument for keeping them active. Thanks. wbfergus Talk 13:13, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Argh, the Axe Murder Incident is another reason why I hate North Korea.
On topic: If we still have objections, I think we should make the picture a thumbnail size. Perhaps a gallery of a number of Korean war images? There are many many good pictures from Wikipedia commons. Good friend100 04:56, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
Is there a reason why Joint Security Area isn't included in the film section? -- 64.180.70.35 ( talk)
These four bttles were among the bloodiest in the entire war, costing lives of thousands soldiers and civilians. -- HanzoHattori ( talk) 22:47, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
"The South Korean army had anti-tank rockets but these were World War II vintage 2.36 inch (60 mm) M9 bazookas. These weapons could pierce the armor of the T-34-85s only at extremely close range." armour penetration of HEAT weapons like the bazooka is independent of range. i'll remove this sentence unless someone wants to rewrite-- Mongreilf ( talk) 16:46, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
Would be nice to have a "causes" of the war —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.240.125.212 ( talk) 04:12, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
There is an inaccuracy which a registered user may wish to correct.
'China warned American leaders through neutral diplomats that it would intervene to protect its national security. Truman regarded the warnings as “a bold attempt to blackmail the U.N.” and did not take it seriously'
This should actually read: China warned American leaders through neutral diplomats that it would intervene to protect its national security. Truman regarded the warnings as “a BALD attempt to blackmail the U.N.” and did not take it seriously.
A small mistake i know but accuracy defines the right from the lazy ;) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.42.124.228 ( talk) 18:16, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
The Corean Air War was a pure "fighter" war, fought by fighter planes ? Did you really believe that ? I rather believe the author missed the point. What about the bombings, the B-29 fleet burning down Northern Korea - no part of air war, or what should one think ? WernerErnie, 28.1.2008 —Preceding comment was added at 10:20, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Why is the equipment North Korea got from the Soviet Union referred to as outdated? T-34s certainly weren't outdated by 1950. A piece of equipment is not outdated just because someone, somewhere has something better. -Sensemaker
The film director Anthony Mann's name is misspelled in the Korean War article -- it should have two n's in it.
Andrew Szanton, February 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.6.179.134 ( talk) 14:43, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Come on. One is enough, two is max. -- HanzoHattori ( talk) 22:40, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
I agree the page should have more picture from other battle. Not just the decisive battle. -- Mike Ma
The qualifier tacked onto the Rhee government, "American-armed" suggests a hint of bias, and I've never heard of such a claim. While the typical Korean War historiography turns the other cheek to South Korean political repression and violence, 100,000 people dead in a few years amounts to a petite genocide. Citation is needed or it should be removed until resolved. Thoughts on the claim itself? Dawson ( talk) 03:58, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
A couple points/thoughts about the recent slew of citation requests.
Minor points, but this article needs so much additional work, these minor annoyances detract from accomplishing real 'repairs'. Thanks. wbfergus Talk 13:48, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
Reproducing the relevant section of the reference for those without free access to journals:
"43 During the Korean War (which occurred during the American Occupation of Japan and prior to the establishment of the SDF in 1954), Japanese ships were involved in minesweeping and a number of Japanese were killed. The Japanese were also engaged in servicing and repair of US military equipment. During the Vietnam War, Japan provided political and diplomatic support but no logistical support, although the United States used the Okinawa bases to launch bombing attacks in Vietnam (Okinawa was under US administration until 1972). After the reversion of Okinawa to Japanese sovereignty, US forces ceased direct attacks from Japan. Personal interview, Associate Professor Katahara Eiichi, Canberra (March 2000)." - [ http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/713604482 Mulgan, Aurelia George (2000) 'Beyond Self-defence? Evaluating Japan's Regional Security Role under the New Defence Cooperation Guidelines', Global Change, Peace & Security, 12:3, 223 - 246], page 229, footnote #43
Dr. Katahara Eiichi is in fact a fellow Chief, 1st Research Office, Research Department at National Institute of Defense Studies (NIDS), Tokyo, Japan. The NIDS website describes his area of expertise as "International Relations, US defense policy, Japan's foreign and security policy, US-Japan security relations, International Relations in East Asia and the Pacific". The Australian Defence College, Canberra website lists this same Katahara Eiichi of the Tokyo NIDS as a visiting fellow (retrieved 3.26.05).
Since this seems to be a fact that would have been kept secret at the time, and is rarely even mentioned in the literature, I wonder what extent the cover up was at the time, i.e. were the Japanese sailors families notified of the true cause of their deaths? ( 24.7.75.93 ( talk) 20:20, 26 March 2008 (UTC))
The Korean War was a very carefully planned invasion by North Korea. The date was chosen to overlap with the time of summer vacation for most South Korean soldiers. It was not some accident that occurred after a couple of border skirmishes, as the article states. Perhaps that's what North Korea and her sympathizers might like you to believe. Before the invasion, Kim Il-Sung conferred with Stalin and Mao and got their approval. Stalin provided much of the military equipment and supplies. Mao promised backup support. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.223.183.78 ( talk) 21:31, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
The article stated that the War resulted from an escalation of border clashes. While border clashes did occur and continue to occur today (at a much lower frequency and intensity), that has little bearing on the fact that the War was a carefully planned and executed effort that had been in the works for years. The North Korean troop buildup at the border, acquisition and deployment of Soviet tanks for rapid penetration into the South Korean territory, massive air attacks that almost instantaneously wiped out the virtually nonexistent South Korean air force, and the timing of the invasion to coincide with the summer vacation for most South Korean troops, all point to a longstanding plan to launch a massive overwhelming invasion. Your claim that South Korea was also responsible for the War is quite laughable. There is just no way South Koreans would have wanted this war, a war they knew very well they would lose. The lines about South Koreans refusing a general election in the preceding years is also not quite accurate. In fact, it was the North Korean Communists who closed the border.
The person who refers to a Chinese website for validation. Why should we trust the Chinese to tell an accurate version of Korean history? Please go edit Chinese articles as you see fit and leave this article alone. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.19.219.153 ( talk) 03:03, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree with AsianGURU and I would comment on his great style. Euge246 ( talk) 06:29, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
The ROK can't be lily-white if Iraq isn't? What kind of reasoning is that? Are you saying that ROK was developing weapons of mass destruction or even pretending to develop one? Are you saying that there was a legitimate reason such as self-defense why North Korea could invade South Korea?
There is nothing to justify. It is an incontrovertible, historical fact that the War was a consequence of premeditated, long-planned invasion on a massive scale. I do not know of any reason why South Korea would have invited a war. The burden is on YOU to provide any evidence that South Korea triggered this war. Border clashes do not qualify. To give an analogy, this is akin to describing a premeditated murder as an "escalation of arguments" that turned violent. That there were arguments does not change the main fact that the attack was premeditated, nor does it erase the fact that a handgun was purchased recently and brought hidden to the site of the crime. You are trying to label a first-degree murder as an involuntary manslaughter, so it's a factual error. There is a huge body of evidence to show that the invasion was executed by North Korea in a systematic fashion.
Please do not patronize. I have two doctorates and have lived in Korea as well as in the U.S. and studied Korean history.
Asian GURU, you should change your username to Chinese GURU, since China is just one part of Asia; stop pretending to be an expert in all of Asia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.19.224.193 ( talk) 12:59, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Parsecboy - Please look at the Iraq War article. It says it is a conflict that began with the United States led invasion of Iraq. It does NOT say it was an escalation of tension between the United States and Iraq over the perceived presence of nuclear weapons. In every case of war in human history, there is always a preceding period of tension between the two parties. It does NOT follow that each war is most accurately described as an escalation of tensions between the two parties with blame equally assigned to each. Poland was not equally responsible as the Nazis for the latter's invasion, and the Wikipedia article does not claim that they were equally complicit. Similarly, the attack on Pearl harbor is described in the Wikipedia article as a surprise attack on the U.S. Navy by the Japanese. Now, the U.S. had repeated frustrated Japanese ambitions in the Pacific, preventing them from getting their hands on crucial supplies, and in that sense, the U.S. was courting an attack one way or the other. However, the article does not start by saying that it was an escalation of tensions between the U.S. and Japan. Why should the Korean War be singled out as a war where both sides must share the blame equally? It was a surprise attack, just as the Pearl Harbor was, and it was a premeditated, carefully planned attack, and this information is important to be included at the beginning of the article. If you disagree, please state your reasoning in a rational, scholarly fashion instead of being arbitrary and authoritative. Even if you are an administrator for Wikipedia, it does not mean that the article has to suite your POV.
You say that ROK was partially complicit. Please give specifics as to how; that's what I asked for and you have failed to give concrete examples. RoK may have wanted to invade DPRK in their fondest dreams, but in practice its military was no match for the DPRK's, they knew it well, and it was just a dream. That itself does not make them complicit or equally responsible for the War.
My edit says nothing about ROK being "good" and DPRK being "bad". It just says that the War resulted from an invasion, just as the Iraq war resulted from a U.S.-led invasion. It is a fact and does not reflect any bias, as you claim.
I will revert the edit, thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.223.183.78 ( talk) 15:04, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Someone should update the legacy section to reflect the change in government and policy in South Korea. Roh is referred to as the current president of Korea but that is no longer true. This should be done by someone with more knowedge about the issues than me in case you are wondering. Zamp m ( talk) 04:20, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
I have updated this section you have notified. I have also written this as a seperate comment further down. Euge246 ( talk) 06:36, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I hope the IP editor who made the substantial edits last night decides to come to this page to see the explanation. Your edits, while in general do coincide with the 'Be Bold' directive, were reverted for the following reasons:
We've worked hard over the last year or two to accommodate the 'concerns' of various editors to alleviate the POV issues in the article. Some we made grudgingly, some we just outright rejected, but they were all thouroughly discussed here first. We welcome your contributions, but there are some procedures in place as well, along with numerous interested editors. Please come back here to discuss any future large-scale edits first, so that we can all see the various viewpoints for such edits and come to an agreement first, so we don't start another series of edit-wars. Also, since it looks like you have some opinions on this subject, how about creating an account, so you have a name and a talk page where things can be dicussed? Many of us are leery of edits by IP addresses, especially with all of the vandalism that has been done by IP address editors. Thanks. wbfergus Talk 11:47, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
This is a very good idea and I agree with wbfergus. The IP should get an account on Wikipedia as it would benefit him greatly if he wants to edit the article. Please notify people if you are going to make a substantial change in the article by posting it on the disscussion page here. Euge246 ( talk) 06:40, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
NPOV violations are littered throughout those 2 sections I edited. I have no idea what this article has gone through but it is not in a NPOV. My objectives were to be neutral and thorough. I've added alot of information to certain events of the war that were omitted from the previous version. For example,
This entire paragraph violates the NPOV rule. I can sum up this paragraph in a few sentences. Chinese completely destroyed the Americans. The Americans ran like they have never ran before. Alot of Americans died. There isn't a single mention of the UN/US/SK and what they did or how they reacted. This is just blatantly pro-Chinese.
My edits could be polished up and there might be some filler I missed deleting but it is by far a more details and more neutral view point. You can hardly call the previous version neutral.
You have 3 paragraphs that details Chinese tactics and how great they were. Are you kidding? You cannot call that NPOV.
99.238.165.215 ( talk) 05:44, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Chinese involvement section is obviously in a pro-China POV. Success of tactics is a matter of opinion as Schrandit says. Not to mention what constitutes a success? If you look as casualties and casualty rates these tactics were not a factor. They may have given them an element of surprise but that lasts only for so long. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.129.142.222 ( talk • contribs)
I have successfully updated the legacy part of the article and have changed the information that Roh is the president to the current president, Lee. I thank the person who wrote about this problem in this disscussion area. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Euge246 ( talk • contribs) 06:20, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I believe that this article is at a high standard and that it should be rated an "A". Many other people probably agree with me and should put it in this disscussion area. Euge246 ( talk) 06:24, 31 March 2008 (UTC) 31/03/08
I notice that the article actually looks much better than Start-class, (well, at least B) so.... a peer review?- Kfc18645 talk 10:00, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
I agree with this person and I recommend another review on this article. Euge246 ( talk) 06:32, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Anybody else notice that the number of casualties (excluding civilians) for the North Koreans and Chinese exceeds the number of troops they deployed? Maybe I'm missing something here.... please tell me if I am. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.149.75.210 ( talk) 02:21, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
soviet union doesn' exist anymore, why this country still in the Belligerents list ? i think some one should modify and put something next to "soviet Union" like this "no longer exist" or something else. what about china ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jalh ( talk • contribs) 04:35, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
A couple sentences (just in the first few paragraphs) jump out as opinionated, considering Korean opinion of occupying powers and the actions of said powers. Could use a thorough look-through... on the whole it seems B-class. Reb42 ( talk) 15:10, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Why no lsiting of Ethiopian casualites- Kagnew Battalion-121 Killed 536 wounded? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.53.145.143 ( talk) 18:43, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
it would make sense to put them in...if we're listing them by casualty number then they have more than the phillipines (geez, does that sound morbid or what?) 72.148.113.246 ( talk) 16:41, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
Just cause tail-gunner Joe would have said it doesn't make it untrue. They were all self-professed Communist states fighting to, among other things, advance world Communism. Why shouldn't they be classified as Communists? - Schrandit ( talk) 16:09, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I noticed that there isn't even a passing reference to this in the article. Perhaps something should be added? Here is a link to an online archive of cold war documents that shows China and North Korea conspired to frame the US: [6] 92.10.182.222 ( talk) 18:09, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
The Peoples Republic of Korea ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People's_Republic_of_Korea), which the local Koreans had tried to set up as a government while overthrowing the japanese collaborators, should be mentioned by name and linked in the part near the beginning alongside the more vague "Many Korean people had organized politically prior to the arrival of American troops." This should again be mentioned by name in the part where "A second policy set forth by Hodge was to refuse to recognize the existing political organizations that had been established by the Korean people." It should say specifically that the de facto government of the People's Republic of Korea was suppressed.
If you search for "People's Republic of Korea" within wikipedia it currently links to "North Korea / Democratic People's Republic of Korea", and it seems the only way to find the page is to instead search for it in google. There should be a disambiguation on that page or it should be described within: the short lived attempt at a revolutionary republic which was part of the basis that developed into the DPRK in the north and in the south existed between the overthrow of japanese collaborators and the US restoration of collaborators. The suppression of the "people's republic" is a large part of the origin of the Cheju uprising/suppression.
It should say the People's Republic of Korea was the most popular and that the US favored the Korean Democratic Party, which consisted of large landowners and wealthy businessmen, while suppressing the PRK which had a broad base of support.
Here is an article from a Korean journal. It is covered in other sources though usually pro-US sources give it no mention. Given the bias of the US and ROK governments in helping suppress knowledge of the mass atrocities for over 50 years, we should view productions by them during that time as equivalent to "extremist sources" for the purposes of Korean war historiography, and similarly view their claims about "free elections" with the same suspicion that is used towards the North.
http://sociology.snu.ac.kr/isdpr/publication/journal/26-2/Hyesook%20Lee.pdf ``State formation and civil society under American occupation: the case of South Korea HS Lee - Korea Journal of Population and Development, 1997 - sociology.snu.ac.kr
USMGIK refers to the United States Military Government In Korea. KDP is the Korean Democratic Party. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:50, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
"At first, there was Choson Konkuk Chunbi Wiwonhoe (Committee for the Preparation of Korea's Independence) led by Un-hyoung Yeo. Just before America arrived in Korea, it adopted the title of "the Korean People's Republic" (KPR) as a Korean government along with the People's Committees which were organized throughout the country (Hong 1985, pp. 57-103). Without foreign intervention, the KPR and the organizations it sponsored would have triumphed." In the meantime, the KDP, encouraged wiht the news that America would come to Korea, was organized. That party, which remained the strongest single rightist one, consisted of large landowners and wealthy businessmen (Sim 1982)." p. 7-8
"With the support of these bureaucrats in the USMGIK, the KDP elevated itself from a weak political group to the dominant party, helping the USMGIK suppress its political rival, the KPR. The KPR was forced to transform from a de facto Korean government into several political parties and finally to abolish itself. "p.8
"The process of grasping power for the KDP and Rhee was at the same time the process of exclusion for other political groups. In alliance with the USMGIK, the KDP and Rhee became the ruling party, whereas many other groups such as peasants, workers, leftist groups and also some nationalists were oppressed and excluded."p.9
"The main tools of USMGIK in controlling Korean society were the coercive resources such as police and military forces. The important function of the Korean National Police (KNP) was a political one, and the main reason that the USMGIK retained the Japanese colonial police system and its Korean personnel was to fight against the KPR and the People's Committees, considering them as communist forces."10-11
"Especially, in the fall of 1946, the Korean peasants and workers sought to reverse the effects of a year of American occupation, and their uprisings swept throughout the whole southern Korean provinces for three months. The people's opposition to the USMGIK was strongest in the Kyeongsang and Cholla provinces, which had powerful People's Commitees. Through the uprising the Koreans expressed their strong discontent over American rule, and brought into focus the failures of the USMGIK's political and economic policies (Chung 1988)... However, as a result of the USMGIK's violent suppression of the uprising, the People's Committees and the organizations associated with them were almost totally destroyed, and the reactionary Korean groups, particularly the KNP, became the dominant forces in the provinces."13
"Of course, the USMGIK introduced a procedure of democracy on the surface to Koreans... if democracy means, at the least, that the government is supported by the majority of the people, and that the people can freely participate in political activities and express their opinions, and be treated equally by the laws, there was much limitation. We have seen how strongly the majority of Koreans opposed the USMGIK through the general strikes and the October (Chung 1988) and Cheju uprisings."(my emphasis)p14
-( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:42, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
"Free Elections" in the opening paragraph is ridiculous. The US and ROK may spin it that way, but the fact is the elections in Rhee's Korea were less free than in Mugabe's Zimbabwe of today. For example, Rhee threatened to have people's food ration cards away if they voted against him, and there were frequent arrests or executions of political opponents. South Korean elections at the time were probably no more free than elections in the North.
Such claims reach the heights of absurdity, and would be like if Britain occupied the north of the US during the war of 1812 and suppressed all opposition, then ran elections where only Tories and a couple of other pro british parties run and claims they are "free elections". This cold war propaganda is completely inappropriate to have stated as if it is the truth, though because it has been repeated so much it would be appropriate to mention in the article that the US and ROK claimed "free elections" as a discredited fringe theory.
"Failing to strengthen their case in the elections" This assumes they even tried to compete in the elections, or that it would have been possible to. No leftist parties ran in the South Korean elections, which were widely considered rigged because left wing groups were being violently suppressed and because of the associated threats to people who vote the wrong way, and also because the majority of South Korea opposed separate elections even being held. The fact is the leftists didn't attempt to "strengthen their case" in the South Korean elections and anyone trying to would just have been executed, imprisoned, or force recruited into the bodo league/NGL "rehabilitation" program and mass executed later, so laying low and trying guerilla organization was probably the obvious strategy for them. This explains how even after elections, the Rhee regime had "little public support".
WP article currently says: "The Americans did not want a communist government in South Korea so they called for elections in all of Korea. Since the population of the South was double that of the North, the Soviets knew that Kim Il-sung would lose the election."
Instead, it should say that the soviets knew that Kim Il-sung would lose an election where the south was excluding and violently suppressing leftist parties, who were the majority at the time. Also it should say that the Americans feared that in real free elections the communists would win an overall majority, which is why they suppressed leftist groups while using the phrase "free elections" as propaganda. In fact, the Soviets thought that in real free elections the communists would win an overall majority, and so did the Americans, especially once the war started and the US bombed every city and killed mass civilians etc. The soviets were boycotting the UN in general and not free elections per se, but they were boycotting "free elections" where the UN would lie and say it was fair despite widespread suppression of the left and admissions in their own reports that said people were threatened with taking away their food rations if they voted the wrong way.
Some Myths about June 1950 Robert R. Simmons The China Quarterly, No. 54 (Apr. - Jun., 1973), pp. 354-361 http://www.jstor.org/stable/652006?seq=3 [12] Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the School of Oriental and African Studies "[t]he Syngman Rhee regime enjoyed little public support" p 356
I.F. Stone. The Hidden History of the Korean War. Monthly Review Press. 1971
The first part of this quotation refers to the soviet peace/election mediation offer in 1950, and the second part relates to the UN commissions on the two previous "free elections".
"The fear that the Communists would win such elections was reflected in a speech made by Warren Austin at Lake Sucess on August 17 [1950], which "revealed that the United States wants them [the elections] to be held on the basis that the Republic of Korea's jurisdiction would be extended over North Korea automatically."... If its jurisdiction were automatically extended over the North, it would supervise the elections. Already two United Nations Commissions had reflected unfavorably on the way the Syngman Rhee regime handled elections and manhandled political opponents; threats to confiscate rice ration cards were noted as one of the milder forms of coercion by the United Nations Temporary Commission which observed the elections establishing the Rhee regime.
""The difficulty," the New York Times correspondent at Lake Success explained, "is that there is a strong probability of an over-all Communist majority if the elections were held before the communization of North Korea had been undone, and before a UN reconstruction program had assuaged the bitterness of North and South Korea against the destruction of their homes during their liberation by UN forces. In that case communism would win by an election what it failed to obtain by an invasion." p117-118
Stone's citations for these are:
United Nations Document A/Ac 19/80, p.117: Cited by George M McCune, Korea Today, p.228.
New York Times August 24, 1950 -( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:42, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
North Korea is apparently claiming that the United States military massacred numerous townspeople at a place called Sinchon Ri, where they built a museum to back up their claim [13] ... However, as North Korea is apparently a backwards country, I haven't been able to find an official website, the most informative site being on Geocities. Anyone have more info on what exactly occurred at Sinchon Ri? 204.52.215.107 ( talk) 19:01, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
By CHARLES J. HANLEY and JAE-SOON CHANG, Associated Press Writers 4 minutes ago
There is more news out there today on the massacres ...Yahoo's World News Page - but it is an AP report. Credible.
DAEJEON, South Korea - Grave by mass grave, South Korea is unearthing the skeletons and buried truths of a cold-blooded slaughter from early in the Korean War, when this nation's U.S.-backed regime killed untold thousands of leftists and hapless peasants in a summer of terror in 1950. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.84.109.135 ( talk) 20:54, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
"The war eventually led to a strengthening of alliances in the Western bloc and the splitting of Communist China from the Soviet bloc." China did not split from the soviet bloc over the Korean War. They split because of a combination of Khruschev's speech against aspects of stalinism, the withdrawal of Soviet advisors after the debacle of Mao's Great Leap Forward, and Krushchev's refusal to support China in the border war with Nehru's India. I would be interested in hearing the chain of reasoning used to support the idea that it was really the Korean War where they were all cooperating that caused them to split and not those other events of extreme friction. But for now you should probably just take that out as it is far fetched, goes against most of the histories, has no source, links to an article that says nothing about it, and without additional support it is a form of the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy.-( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 20:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
I'm surprised that no one has pointed out that all of the discussion of combat operations are from a US/UN perspective. Indeed, there isn't a single other unit identified by number (e.g., the Chinese 15th Army). DOR (HK) ( talk) 02:01, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Some trusted user might wanna add Crysis to the "Games"-section —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dakkour ( talk • contribs) 08:18, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Mercenaries: Playground Of Destruction did not feature the Korean war as it's backdrop, rather, the game was set in a post-modern era wherein N. Korea was violently overthrown and sent to Overtake S. Korea. The gist of this post is that the game was set in an alternate reality, NOT the korean war. AiRsTrIkE1 ( talk) 03:04, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content?content=10.1080/1462352042000320592 [20] Dong Choon Kim. Forgotten war, forgotten massacres—the Korean War (1950-1953) as licensed mass killings. Journal of Genocide Research( http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713431069~db=all [21]), Volume 6, Issue 4 2004 , pages 523 - 544 I am copying more quotations from this journal so that if you don't have journal access you can still see these relevant parts.
So here are a couple of things that the article needs to include for accuracy. Nos. 1-4 refer to the above quotations from the Journal of Genocide Research article.
1. For the US mass killing of Korean civilian refugees, "neutralize" is too tame a quote, when the AP articles that broke the story had the quote "kill them all" ordered from US command. Also notice that there are 3 pictures in the "War Crimes" section, with two of them being pictures of people killed by the north, and the one that is a picture of a document showing US wrongdoing has a caveat while the other two do not. I don't have any specific recommendations for changing the photographs to have more balance, but do you see what I am referring to in terms of how balanced it appears? Finding ways to balance things like that may be part of the road to improving the grade of the article. Especially since the US and ROK have done much higher scale of atrocities against civilians than the north during the war, the opposite emphasis would be more in tune with a NPOV.
2. The racism among US soldiers, their use of the term "gook" and rapes of Koreans in front of their families.
3. Civilian bombing by the US is not mentioned as a crime against civilians. It is in the world war 2 article, and should be here also.
4. That most killings of civilian by pro North forces were done by irregular groups acting against the orders of the North Korean government, while most killings of civilians by the South were done on orders from the top South Korean and US commands.
5. The bombing of dikes to destroy rice production and intentionally cause starvation by the US is not mentioned. This was viewed as a war crime in the Nuremburg trials, and deserves a mention here. Chomsky's book "Understanding Power" has citations for this in footnotes #63 and #64 in chapter 8, including official US air force documents describing it from Robert Frank Futrell, The United States Air Force in Korea, 1950-53 (Revised Edition), Washington: United States Air Force, Office of Air Force History, 1983., Quarterly Review Staff Study, "The Attack on the Irrigation Dams in North Korea," Air University Quarterly Review (Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama), Vol. 6, No. 4, Winter 1953-54, pp. 40-61., and a book by Jon Halliday and Bruce Cumings, Korea: The Unknown War, New York: Viking, 1988. Unless you have access to these originals, just cite Chomsky, Schoeffel, and Mitchell and say they refers to these.
Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky (Paperback) by Noam Chomsky (Author), John Schoeffel (Editor), Peter Mitchell (Author) http://www.understandingpower.com/Chapter8.htm [22]
6. Alleged US Germ warfare. This is a major charge, and is believed by the worlds biggest country (China). The research of Endicott and Hagerman should be mentioned, along with the US government's response and their reply. The wikipedia page on germ warfare already has an ok two sentence treatment of these allegations that you could copy or use as a model. -( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:42, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
The assertion that North Korean irregulars committed war crimes against orders is upsurd, it's totally point of view and an easy google search of north korean war crimes will say diffrent. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.95.25.216 ( talk) 23:34, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
Joseph Stalin - Soviet Force Comander during KW? You must be joking. Soviet forces present were air and AA units plus engineers and vetran officers educating local troops. They did not have a single "head" during the war, afaik, but as the most important combat role of Soviets were in air fights, their air unit commander should be named. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Montezubba ( talk • contribs) 14:51, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
I dont think that the +400,000 dead "estimate" is a good source. The U.S. was on the retreat so how can they count the dead bodies of the killed Chinese? [Just like in Vietnam, the U.S. didnt have a good estimate of killed Vietcong nor Vietminh. The famous words "If he's dead and Vietnamese, he's VC".] Yes, the U.S. bombed Chinese positions but the Pentagon failed to realize that the Chinese used underground tunnels much like the ones use by the VC in Vietnam. So the Pentagon came up with an equation, something like "1 bomb dropped = 5 dead enemies". If the U.S. estimate is true then every Chinese soldier sent to Korea would be a casualty, since the entire PLA was about 3 million men and they couldnt send everyone to Korea (only 700,000 of constant rotation).
im just saying the estimate may be some what too ridiculous to be reliable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.23.102.151 ( talk • contribs)
Okay, I've read the long discussion and it got nowhere. Back on topic, obviously I cannot provide a source for the "formula" since your government would want to save face and not tell the public about some of the bullshit "estimations calculations", but I did find some examples of the U.S.'s policies in exaggerating enemy dead like "If he's dead and Vietnamese, he's VC"; link [23]
A note on the alleged "human waves tactics". By what definition do you go by when saying "human waves tactics"? Do you mean by infantry charges? If that's the case then didn't every country use "human waves tactics"? Normandy, Battle of the Bulge, Stalingrad, Konigsburg, Iwo Jima, Gettysburg; I could go on for a really long time. So don't be suprised of "human waves tactics" since everyone used them when needed. You make the assumption, or by reading your "accurate" sources, that the PLA used "human waves tactics" all the time; I tell you now, that, is a false accusation by the U.S. to explain the defeats suffered by her military to an "inferior" race. This is an ok website, link [24]
By the way when I read the link I found that you're very ignorant of your own country's history, which you said that communists were the ones that distorts history and the supposed western sources is so uncorruptable that everything they utter is regarded as absolute "fact(s)". May I suggest you read some "true" U.S. history books once in a while, for example, "A People's History" by Howard Zinn; very good book by the way. Another link just for the hell of it, link [25]—Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.23.102.151 ( talk • contribs)
Current figures in the article are 58,127 combat deaths and 175,743 wounded, but without any source. Here they say about a lot more casualties (137,899 dead etc), but still not complete data - without para-militia and police. Why the difference is so big? And what figures are correct? 195.248.189.182 ( talk) 09:37, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
I can't edit this page and was redirected here. I couldn't believe that there seemed to be no estimate or range of estimates on civilian casualties and/or total casualties. Here is what I found, please post it in article if you believe it might improve it.
The article I read provides the following information:
While accurate numbers for deaths are imprecise, various sources approximate the war's South Korean civilian casualties -- dead, wounded and missing -- at about one million people. North Korean civilian casualties were perhaps twice that, many of them as a result of the U.N. bombing campaign. The numbers vary, but it's probably safe to say that there were somewhere between three and four million Korean civilian casualties; this at a time when the total population was some 30-40 million people! And civilians died at a ghastly rate in Korea.
Historian Bruce Cumings, in a 1994 article in the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, notes that civilian casualty rates in the Korean War were nearly 70 percent of total casualties, compared to about 40 percent in World War II.
According to a June 20, 2000 article in the Korea Herald: "The war left about 5 million people dead, wounded or missing, more than half of them civilians. It also left more than 10 million people separated from their families, 300,000 war widows and 100,000 war orphans."
References: 50 Years And Counting The Impact of the Korean War on the People of the Peninsula May 2002 by Phil de Haan Johnatmls ( talk) 14:22, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
reference link: www.calvin.edu/news/2001-02/korea.htm —Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnatmls ( talk • contribs) 14:18, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
The Chinese People's Government had complained to the United Nations about United States aggression against the province of Taiwan and violations of its airspace by the United States Air Force prior to the entry by Chinese volunteers in Korea. The current version of this article disingenuously omits United States acts of war against China. Nierva ( talk) 21:33, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
I find the compilation of prominent pictures to portray the Korean War creative and conforming to what seems like an unwritten agreement to establish pictures for all major wars on Wikipedia as rectangular compilations.
I would however, like to file a complaint for the current Korean War picture. On the bottom left of the picture, a photo of Chinese soldiers being welcomed home is shown as part of the compilation. I find this disturbing and a dishonor to the UN and Korean Veterans of the war. The Korean War was a conflict between the Korean people. No matter how significant an impact the Chinese invasion of the peninsula may have been to the outcome of the war, their worth as a cultural and historical tie to the Korean War is little to none. The Chinese presence also caused a negative outcome of the war - their role in the Korean War is despicable to the US and UN and a representation of the PRC on the cover picture of the Wikipedia Korean War article is undeserving and ridiculous. Their sacrifice for another man's war for an evil cause does not stir any pity or respect in me for their veterans. If there needs be a portrayal of an army, either an American or ROK soldier should be poignantly represented as part of the main picture, for it is their total and honorable sacrifice that half the peninsula was saved from communism.
To the author of the picture, it is certainly no affront to your work - it is one of the most efficient ways to summarize the article through pictures. However my suggestion is more than just advice. I would greatly appreciate my suggestion to be taken seriously and in my opinion, should certainly be carried out. If the author is unavailable or declines to answer my suggestion, I will change it myself.
It may sound like a minor complaint but it is far from minor. It is a matter of giving equal attention to the rightful and deserving armed servicemen and women of the Korean conflict. Oyo321 ( talk) 04:33, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Deletions of text by Shcrandit are not justified. Schrandit's personal attacks accusing editors of "working for the Chinese Government" cast serious doubt on his good faith.
Concering the American invasion of Korea and UN activity, the fact is that President Truman had already ordered an invasion of Kroea before the the UN Security Council passed Resolution 83 "recommending" states to assist southern Korea. The U.S. then went to the Security Council in an attempt to legitimize its campaign. This is made clear in the papers by Leo Gross and F.B. Schick as well as in the statement to the United Nations by the the Russian deputy foreign minister Gromyko.
It is not wise to disregard reports from China about U.S. violations of Chinese airspace, especially when considering that the U.S. regime had officially acknowledged these facts. Similarly, to delete allegations of war crimes by the United States against prisoners of war belonging to the Korean People's Army violates Wikipedia guidelines concerning the maintenance of a neutral point of view. To cite solely U.S. allegations while at the same time omitting analagous ones from the other side is propagandistic. No responsible scholar would disregard literature on the Korean War published in China and the Korean People's Republic. Nierva ( talk) 04:44, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
According to report of June 24, 2008 at [1]
Likewise it also notes that in 1969 a US Navy Aircraft was shot down over Sea of Japan by North Korean fighter-2 killed/recoverd and 29 missing —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.53.145.47 ( talk) 12:15, 13 July 2008 (UTC)
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | ← | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | Archive 7 | Archive 8 | → | Archive 10 |
Suggested material for nuclear weapons section. According to historian Bruce Cumings, Truman publicly threatened the use of the atomic bomb when the People's Republic of China entered the war (following MacArthur's crossing of the 38th parallel). This was a possibility that had been discussed and included in contingency plans. On the day Truman threatened use of atomic bomb, Air Force General Stratemeyer sent order to General Hoyt Vandenberg that the Strategic Air Command augment its capacities and that this should include “atomic capabilities”. MacArthur requested use of atomic bombs in 24 Dec 1950, although it was not approved, and a subsequent request by his successor General Ridgeway for the same in May 1951 was refused. The main reason the weapons were not used was because of a disinclination by the USSR and PRC to escalate. See Bruce Cumings, Korea's Place in the Sun: A History, WW Norton & Company, 1997, pp 289-92 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.153.125.92 ( talk • contribs)
I wonder at what point does the assertion "leading scholar" become fact as opposed to opinion? Who, according to you are "leading scholars" of the Korean War and what is your criteria? What is the appropriate criteria for wikipedia? We know that Cumings has received several awards for Korean scholarship including one from the republic of Korea itself, we know that he is widely cited in the field, and even that many of those scholars who disagree with him have acknowledged his importance and his scholarship. All of this is easily demonstrable. What evidence do you have to offer to demonstrate that Cumings views are negatable with regards to this article? The suggestion at hand pertains to a paragraph referencing the work of Cumings, what do Chang and Halliday have to do with this? BernardL 23:34, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
Whoa. Wait a minute. I just realized the "three hypotheses" section added by wbfergus was taken verbatim from here. This is a massive copyvio and must be removed immediately which is what I am going to do. I'm not saying anything about the content, but we can't steal whole blocks of text (not even with quotation marks, much less without them) and insert them in an article. wbfergus you really should know better than that. If you want to put this back in somehow please paraphrase the salient points and/or use quote marks when you quote directly. I have to deal with enough of this stuff with my undergraduate's papers--though they copy from Wikipedia!--and certainly don't want to see it here. The section might not make sense for awhile but we can't keep that copyvio stuff in any longer.-- Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 19:19, 30 September 2007 (UTC)
The author does not cite any reports. Gives a vague disclainer about conflicting numbers form various scholarly journals (alas none are mentioned0. Then the author goes on to cite some purported figures by a communist regime.
Bad history, bad communist propaganda piece
"The Korean War finally ended in July 1953. Left in its wake were four million military and civilian casualties, including 33,600 American, 16,000 UN allied, 415,000 South Korean, and 520,000 North Korean dead. There were also an estimated 900,000 Chinese casualties. Half of Korea's industry was destroyed and a third of all homes" source http://www.cotf.edu/ete/modules/korea/kwar.html
Apparently one third of the Peoples Republic of China's army was wiped out and or disabled in Korea.
America's air superiority led to enormous chinese casulties in what a commanding general called a meat grinder. China would send its human wave , Nato forces would withdraw and then the chinese troops would be annihiliated by bommbing. The US airforce called this the meat griner —Preceding unsigned comment added by Paleocon ( talk • contribs) 20:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Parsecboy Its a history article not a propaganda piece for some trotskyite magazine as for your imagined communist troop strength cite your sources, 80 % of Chinese PLA was in Nkorea , 2.7 million /3 =900,000 hardly a success story for your communists. The NYTimes in various articles of the period cited the ten of thousands of POW defectors MacGregor NYTIMES NOV 16, 1953. Also some American casualities were due to the cowardly execution of of out unarmed men by the communists. Robert Alden NYTIMES 8-30-195 If this is your article it's something out of the ministry of truth from George Orwells 1984 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four —Preceding unsigned comment added by Paleocon ( talk • contribs) 21:00, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
someone needs to add the new treaty sighned by both North and South Korea stating the war is over. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.69.176.65 ( talk • contribs)
still nice to have the future of one. might as well add the peace treaty, doesnt look like its fading. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
68.205.70.254 (
talk)
02:01, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Could someone please fix the section on nuclear weapon threats? I saw quite a few weasel words, and the main focus of the paragraph is that Truman accidentally threatened using nukes. Crisco 1492 13:30, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
I don't think that we should approach this article for long, even for a rewrite (this is response for Wberfugus' request) until we have ton of more editors interested in Korea-related topics. It's my opinion that about 1/10 editors signed up for WikiProject Korea are sock puppets & about 8/10 editors have lost interest in Wikipedia. And then the remaining 1/10 can't do anything - most of the work groups are inactive except for maybe food & even that is done by ppl not in the cuisine work group. Currently, I'm trying to push Japanese invasions of Korea (1592-1598) to become a featured article, but user:Good friend100 seems to dislike my edits & he doesn't reply to my suggestions so I'm not quite sure what I want to do. I could begin contributing to this article, but I don't want to invest my time if it'd become a waste (as were several of my experiences in contributing). ( Wikimachine 19:10, 5 October 2007 (UTC))
I am very uncomfortable about the bloody picture of the dead Chinese man. A soldier is human first, then he is a Chinese man, then he was a soldier. The bloody picture shows his face clearly, with his chopped legs.
He should be not responsible for the justice of the war, regardless who was right and who was wrong. It is a shame that recently Inter-Korean Summit already formally ended their war in Oct 2007, by visiting each other and this bloody picture is still shown here in this article.
The picture is real, but real things like adult contents and violent scene are still not good for all of us, especially for Children who are reading this article. I have seen more bloody move such as the Pathfinder (2007 film), in which the indigenous people in North America were bloodily killed by Vikings, but that is an 18+ movie. I am not a child and I still feel upset, not only because I am a Chinese, more important I am trying to be keep my dignity as a human.
As a considerate member of Wikepedia, I would suggest to delete this bloody picture. I am aware of the fact that the sever of Wikipedia is in US, not in UN, nor in China. But we are all humans; I did not see a bloody body with clear face from US soldier in this article (I am sure someone died and the pictures are available). Unless if there is a USA dead body added to this article, I strongly suggest to delete this picture, for the dignity of a dead person, although we don’t even know his name. Dongwenliang 04:30, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Everyone knows war is not pretty, except the one who inserted this image in this article. Above I mentioned that it is a real picture, the authenticity of the picture is not the reason the picture should stay. Violence, rape, murder happens everyday somewhere on our earth, those are also not pretty but true, can that be the reason this picture should stay?
Violence can be taught. That is why we should hide these explicit atrocity pictures and sex explicit pictures from Children, even from all the person who are with dignity. I noticed the picture of US soldier, his face is down and his identity is not shown, without the word beneath, you can not even tell if he is an US soldier or not. Similar picture should be used to replace the Chinese picture. I hate to say this but it seems that in your eyes we are not human. Dongwenliang 15:19, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Of course no complain. If the Chinese soldier' face is not shown, why would I bother to complain? People complain because they feel unfair. The bias is, the dead American soldier is shown with dignity and the Chinese soldier is not, the fact is not that complicated at all. Dongwenliang 23:24, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure about the dignity stuffs. Who cares? ( Wikimachine 00:39, 7 October 2007 (UTC))
Here we go again. In the previous discussions on this image, the majority of the editors (presumably mostly white males in their 20s) claimed that the image is neutral and decline to change it, on the ground that it is a Wikipedia featured image, which was almost certainly voted again by the same demographic group of people. Despite all these, they actually believe this should be a "featured" article. What an irony. It is an even bigger irony that they claim "communism reeducation" is a crime against POW. In other words, the preaching of the creed of a dead white man to the communist POWs is the real salvation. And, look at the amazing results of the powerful American Air force, their big bombs can break the legs of your poor Chinese solider. And, look at the crimes committed by the Chinese, they even killed an American POW. Oh, by the way, the US Army is not only mighty, it is also really a big family, because the black and white American solders were fighting side by side in the advertisement on this site.
And besides, the people from mainland China have been brain-washed, they cannot even think independently, so their opinions are highly biased. Only the people in the western world, (oh I am sorry, I should say the free world), can think objectively and neutrally, even though they have been taught by their media 24/7 that the communist China is evil. Information from the communist governments are simply propaganda. Only the documents provided by the US government, (including the Bush administration, I guess), are the facts. Guess whose brain-wash is more successful?
Oh, yes. Welcome to the Wikipedia.
Yours truly, ( Postdoc 05:46, 9 October 2007 (UTC))
(outdent)Get over it. If you don't like it, either don't read the article or find a suitable replacement. The picture has occasionally been the subject of one person 'outrage' numerous times, and the picture is still here. Consensus seems to be to keep it, as whenever somebody deleted it, it was reverted back. Just like porn sites, if you don't like what you see there, don't go there. It's really kind of simple. And, as stated above, the dead Chinese soldier is actually portrayed better than the dead American soldier. Per Chinese and Japanese cultures, dying in combat is considered much more honorable than surrender or capture, hence the Chinese soldier would be regarded in those cultures as being a more honorable death than the American soldier who was captured and subsequently executed. So, if that person has any relatives or friends who can identify him, then they would at least know he died honorably. This merely shows that he did not die a dishonorable death or disgrace his family. wbfergus Talk 13:42, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
And, I am Chinese and I never know we have a culture of being pride to show dead body with identity. That is not my culture. I think no culture in the world likes that, the baseline is, we are all humans. Dongwenliang 20:54, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
People here are not taking this to a racist level. Nobody here has any anti-Chinese sentiment here, and if they do, they shouldn't be here. Just add an image of a dead american soldier on the page. And, assume good faith on your part. People don't add an image of a dead chinese solider to insult Chinese soldiers. Its just part of the article. Good friend100 21:44, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The anti-China and anti-North Korean tone is quite obvious in this article, due to the editing community of this article (mainly from the US and partly from South Korea). The point is that some people claim that they want to remove this kind of "systematic bias" from this article, while in reality these "assertive" people refuse to budge from their "original" positions. "Dongwenliang"'s arguments are met with such "good faithed" words like "Who cares?", "Get over it", "Over-react", "disruptive", "case closed", etc. In fact, looking through the editing histories of some users here, their attitudes to mainland China and North Korea are quite obvious. Yes, statistics really speak for themselves. Claiming neutral is one thing, doing it is another thing. Isn't it? Postdoc 16:15, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
"Following Colonel Harrison Thyng’s famous message to the Pentagon, the 51st FIW reinforced the beleaguered 4th in December 1951" - as a UK citizen I have no idea what this famous message might be. Could this be rewritten to be clear to a wider audience? Tim Vickers 03:42, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Please stop edit warring. I just checked the edit history and theres a long string of edit warring. WP:3RR will remain in effect and if you keep this up, somebody will have to file a report. Good friend100 19:23, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
The total numbers of casualties suffered by all parties involved may never be known. In Western countries, the numbers have been subjected to numerous scholarly reviews, and in the case of one U.S. estimate, the number was revised after a clerical error was discovered. Each country's self-reported casualties were largely based upon troop movements, unit rosters, battle casualty reports, and medical records.
The Western numbers of Chinese and/or North Korean casulties are based primarily on battle reports of estimated casualties, interrogation of POWs and captured documents. The Chinese estimation of UN casualties states "The after-war joint declaration of the Chinese People's Volunteers and the Korean People's Army claimed that they 'eliminated 1.09 million enemy forces, including 390,000 from the United States, 660,000 from South Korean, and 29,000 from other countries.' The vague 'eliminated' number gave no details to that of dead, wounded and captured." Regarding their own casualties, the same source said "During the wartime, 70 percent of the forces of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) were dispatched to Korea as the Chinese People's Volunteers (accumulated to 2.97 million), along with more than 600,000 civil workers. The Chinese People's Volunteers suffered 148,000 deaths altogether, among which 114,000 died in combats, incidents, and winterkill, 21,000 died after being hospitalized, 13,000 died from diseases; and 380,000 were wounded. There were also 29,000 missing, including 21,400 POWs, of whom 14,000 were sent to Taiwan, 7,110 were repatriated." This same source concluded with these numbers for North Korean casualties, "The Korean People's Army had 290,000 casualties and 90,000 POWs. There was a large number of civilian deaths in the northern part of Korea, but no accurate figures were available."[44]
The casulties of the various UN forces are listed in the infobox, along with their estimates of Chinese and North Korean forces."
That entire section is very poor and includes multiple misspelled words, among other errors. Where is the "390,000 eliminated" from the U.S. coming from? What source do they have other than North Korea (reputable source right?). All Western historians agree that the American casualties in the Korean war were no more than 40,000.
Here's a link: http://www.cotf.edu/ete/modules/korea/kwar.html
The entire Korean War section on casualties (see how I spelled it correctly?) needs to be rewritten by someone that isn't a North Korean propagandist. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.100.101.142 ( talk) 03:33, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
I hope some professions would write this article. In this casualities section, there are several numbers hard to believe or inconsistent. the US has ~36K dead in the whole war (about ~26K died in battles). However, in the section of first Chinese-US battle, it claims 15000 casualities on one army. this number should count to the 26K, i guess. That means, for the rest of the war, only about 10,000 more US troops died. This is just beyond my understanding. Also, according to the history of the articles, this ~36K is coming from a previous error that count the death in the other area at the same period of time. the miscounted number is about ~17K. I am not sure if this ~17K was the total of death in other area at the same time or not. I assume it is. As far as I know, there were no other war US involved during this time. So that means, the US troops death toll in the peaceful zone is almost half of the hot war zone like Korea at that time. This really shocks me b/c the majority of the troops are young and fit. US military is such dangeous job? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.135.235.188 ( talk) 22:00, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
The total death in the US estimates of Chinese is over 400,000. The total wounded is 486,000. So if you add them together, it is 886,000+. This number even larger than the total Chinese strength of 780,000 which is all agreed. We now can see how absurd these US estimations are. Nobody returned home? Even so it should be right 780,000. Dongwenliang 17:38, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
The Chinese offical number of death is about 140,000. I found another source that shown break-down number from each provinces of PVA. Here: [4]. Beijing:1483, Fujian:982, Tianjin:977, Henan:10673, Hebei: 10155, Hubei:5167, Shanxi:5835, Hunan:10687, Inner Mongolia: 1683, Guangdong:3186, Liaoning:13374, Guangxi:2915, Jilin:18260, Shan'xi:2802, Heilongjiang:8222, Ningxia:461, Shandong: 19685, Gansu: 1041, Shanghai:1634, Qnghai:48, Jiangsu:7268, Xinjiang:61, Anhui: 4151, Sichuan:30789, ZHejiang: 3732, Guizhou: 2799, Jiangxi: 2162, Yunnan: 1482. THe Hainan province was not established yet, and I did not find Tibet. I added toal number to about 170,000. Dongwenliang 14:22, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The last paragraph of the section "Invasion of North Korea" and the first paragraph of "Entrance of China" conflict. The latter paragraph has three uncited statements that seem to be the cause of the problem. Someone with a good grasp of these pivotal events, namely the causes of the PRC's entrance into the war, needs to clear this up. 70.18.234.120 Maro Sunday, Oct. 21, 2007, 11:36 pm EST. —Preceding comment was added at 03:34, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
The Crimes Against POWs section currently begins with the sentence: Prisoners of war were severely mistreated by both sides of the conflict. Yet the only specific instances given (and more importantly, the only cited claims) refer to crimes against POWs by North Korean forces. We should support the claim with evidence or remove it. Miraculouschaos 02:43, 2 November 2007 (UTC)
Requesting comment on the following questions:
(copied from the picture page itself):
Requesting comment on the following questions: (I only have two requests for this survey: 1. Answer with honesty. 2. Be consistent with above discussions your wrote down and your comments in my talk page):
This is comepletely irrelevant. I stress again, Dongwenliang, that you read
WP:CENSOR. The image adds to the article; whether you find it offensive or not does not matter. You cannot force your opinions on the rest of the world that will come to read this article. You may also want to read
Wikipedia:Profanity, the first line reads
This image fills all three of those requirements. If you want to find a replacement image with a dead Chinese soldier face down, that is in public domain, go right ahead. Until you or anyone else does so, however, this image will remain in the article. Parsecboy 15:04, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
But, let me come to the real question here. The point is that it is non-neutral because of the intentions behind this picture. It was taken as a showcase by "the winners", in the same way as hunters posing with their preys. It is a blatant showing off. It is released from the US army archives. Did the US army release similar pictures of US solders? No. This non-neutral picture is a major eye-catching point of the this article, and it violates the neutral stands of Wikipedia. I don't care whether it shows up in in other websites. If Wikipedia claims one thing but is doing another thing, it is hypocrisy.
People said that it is egregious for Microsoft employees to temper with their own wikipedia sites. Well, look at this site. It even contains sections literally plagiarized from the US ARMY documents. If you believe in what the US government said, you would think the IRAQ would have been over a long ago. Postdoc 05:00, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
In my opinion, the RfC's have run their course. The comments made by various users seem to have concensus for the following:
But, before I remove the RfC tags, I want to make sure that nobody else has any objections and can present a valid argument for keeping them active. Thanks. wbfergus Talk 13:13, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Argh, the Axe Murder Incident is another reason why I hate North Korea.
On topic: If we still have objections, I think we should make the picture a thumbnail size. Perhaps a gallery of a number of Korean war images? There are many many good pictures from Wikipedia commons. Good friend100 04:56, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
Is there a reason why Joint Security Area isn't included in the film section? -- 64.180.70.35 ( talk)
These four bttles were among the bloodiest in the entire war, costing lives of thousands soldiers and civilians. -- HanzoHattori ( talk) 22:47, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
"The South Korean army had anti-tank rockets but these were World War II vintage 2.36 inch (60 mm) M9 bazookas. These weapons could pierce the armor of the T-34-85s only at extremely close range." armour penetration of HEAT weapons like the bazooka is independent of range. i'll remove this sentence unless someone wants to rewrite-- Mongreilf ( talk) 16:46, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
Would be nice to have a "causes" of the war —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.240.125.212 ( talk) 04:12, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
There is an inaccuracy which a registered user may wish to correct.
'China warned American leaders through neutral diplomats that it would intervene to protect its national security. Truman regarded the warnings as “a bold attempt to blackmail the U.N.” and did not take it seriously'
This should actually read: China warned American leaders through neutral diplomats that it would intervene to protect its national security. Truman regarded the warnings as “a BALD attempt to blackmail the U.N.” and did not take it seriously.
A small mistake i know but accuracy defines the right from the lazy ;) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.42.124.228 ( talk) 18:16, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
The Corean Air War was a pure "fighter" war, fought by fighter planes ? Did you really believe that ? I rather believe the author missed the point. What about the bombings, the B-29 fleet burning down Northern Korea - no part of air war, or what should one think ? WernerErnie, 28.1.2008 —Preceding comment was added at 10:20, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Why is the equipment North Korea got from the Soviet Union referred to as outdated? T-34s certainly weren't outdated by 1950. A piece of equipment is not outdated just because someone, somewhere has something better. -Sensemaker
The film director Anthony Mann's name is misspelled in the Korean War article -- it should have two n's in it.
Andrew Szanton, February 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.6.179.134 ( talk) 14:43, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Come on. One is enough, two is max. -- HanzoHattori ( talk) 22:40, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
I agree the page should have more picture from other battle. Not just the decisive battle. -- Mike Ma
The qualifier tacked onto the Rhee government, "American-armed" suggests a hint of bias, and I've never heard of such a claim. While the typical Korean War historiography turns the other cheek to South Korean political repression and violence, 100,000 people dead in a few years amounts to a petite genocide. Citation is needed or it should be removed until resolved. Thoughts on the claim itself? Dawson ( talk) 03:58, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
A couple points/thoughts about the recent slew of citation requests.
Minor points, but this article needs so much additional work, these minor annoyances detract from accomplishing real 'repairs'. Thanks. wbfergus Talk 13:48, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
Reproducing the relevant section of the reference for those without free access to journals:
"43 During the Korean War (which occurred during the American Occupation of Japan and prior to the establishment of the SDF in 1954), Japanese ships were involved in minesweeping and a number of Japanese were killed. The Japanese were also engaged in servicing and repair of US military equipment. During the Vietnam War, Japan provided political and diplomatic support but no logistical support, although the United States used the Okinawa bases to launch bombing attacks in Vietnam (Okinawa was under US administration until 1972). After the reversion of Okinawa to Japanese sovereignty, US forces ceased direct attacks from Japan. Personal interview, Associate Professor Katahara Eiichi, Canberra (March 2000)." - [ http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/713604482 Mulgan, Aurelia George (2000) 'Beyond Self-defence? Evaluating Japan's Regional Security Role under the New Defence Cooperation Guidelines', Global Change, Peace & Security, 12:3, 223 - 246], page 229, footnote #43
Dr. Katahara Eiichi is in fact a fellow Chief, 1st Research Office, Research Department at National Institute of Defense Studies (NIDS), Tokyo, Japan. The NIDS website describes his area of expertise as "International Relations, US defense policy, Japan's foreign and security policy, US-Japan security relations, International Relations in East Asia and the Pacific". The Australian Defence College, Canberra website lists this same Katahara Eiichi of the Tokyo NIDS as a visiting fellow (retrieved 3.26.05).
Since this seems to be a fact that would have been kept secret at the time, and is rarely even mentioned in the literature, I wonder what extent the cover up was at the time, i.e. were the Japanese sailors families notified of the true cause of their deaths? ( 24.7.75.93 ( talk) 20:20, 26 March 2008 (UTC))
The Korean War was a very carefully planned invasion by North Korea. The date was chosen to overlap with the time of summer vacation for most South Korean soldiers. It was not some accident that occurred after a couple of border skirmishes, as the article states. Perhaps that's what North Korea and her sympathizers might like you to believe. Before the invasion, Kim Il-Sung conferred with Stalin and Mao and got their approval. Stalin provided much of the military equipment and supplies. Mao promised backup support. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.223.183.78 ( talk) 21:31, 3 March 2008 (UTC)
The article stated that the War resulted from an escalation of border clashes. While border clashes did occur and continue to occur today (at a much lower frequency and intensity), that has little bearing on the fact that the War was a carefully planned and executed effort that had been in the works for years. The North Korean troop buildup at the border, acquisition and deployment of Soviet tanks for rapid penetration into the South Korean territory, massive air attacks that almost instantaneously wiped out the virtually nonexistent South Korean air force, and the timing of the invasion to coincide with the summer vacation for most South Korean troops, all point to a longstanding plan to launch a massive overwhelming invasion. Your claim that South Korea was also responsible for the War is quite laughable. There is just no way South Koreans would have wanted this war, a war they knew very well they would lose. The lines about South Koreans refusing a general election in the preceding years is also not quite accurate. In fact, it was the North Korean Communists who closed the border.
The person who refers to a Chinese website for validation. Why should we trust the Chinese to tell an accurate version of Korean history? Please go edit Chinese articles as you see fit and leave this article alone. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.19.219.153 ( talk) 03:03, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
I agree with AsianGURU and I would comment on his great style. Euge246 ( talk) 06:29, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
The ROK can't be lily-white if Iraq isn't? What kind of reasoning is that? Are you saying that ROK was developing weapons of mass destruction or even pretending to develop one? Are you saying that there was a legitimate reason such as self-defense why North Korea could invade South Korea?
There is nothing to justify. It is an incontrovertible, historical fact that the War was a consequence of premeditated, long-planned invasion on a massive scale. I do not know of any reason why South Korea would have invited a war. The burden is on YOU to provide any evidence that South Korea triggered this war. Border clashes do not qualify. To give an analogy, this is akin to describing a premeditated murder as an "escalation of arguments" that turned violent. That there were arguments does not change the main fact that the attack was premeditated, nor does it erase the fact that a handgun was purchased recently and brought hidden to the site of the crime. You are trying to label a first-degree murder as an involuntary manslaughter, so it's a factual error. There is a huge body of evidence to show that the invasion was executed by North Korea in a systematic fashion.
Please do not patronize. I have two doctorates and have lived in Korea as well as in the U.S. and studied Korean history.
Asian GURU, you should change your username to Chinese GURU, since China is just one part of Asia; stop pretending to be an expert in all of Asia. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.19.224.193 ( talk) 12:59, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Parsecboy - Please look at the Iraq War article. It says it is a conflict that began with the United States led invasion of Iraq. It does NOT say it was an escalation of tension between the United States and Iraq over the perceived presence of nuclear weapons. In every case of war in human history, there is always a preceding period of tension between the two parties. It does NOT follow that each war is most accurately described as an escalation of tensions between the two parties with blame equally assigned to each. Poland was not equally responsible as the Nazis for the latter's invasion, and the Wikipedia article does not claim that they were equally complicit. Similarly, the attack on Pearl harbor is described in the Wikipedia article as a surprise attack on the U.S. Navy by the Japanese. Now, the U.S. had repeated frustrated Japanese ambitions in the Pacific, preventing them from getting their hands on crucial supplies, and in that sense, the U.S. was courting an attack one way or the other. However, the article does not start by saying that it was an escalation of tensions between the U.S. and Japan. Why should the Korean War be singled out as a war where both sides must share the blame equally? It was a surprise attack, just as the Pearl Harbor was, and it was a premeditated, carefully planned attack, and this information is important to be included at the beginning of the article. If you disagree, please state your reasoning in a rational, scholarly fashion instead of being arbitrary and authoritative. Even if you are an administrator for Wikipedia, it does not mean that the article has to suite your POV.
You say that ROK was partially complicit. Please give specifics as to how; that's what I asked for and you have failed to give concrete examples. RoK may have wanted to invade DPRK in their fondest dreams, but in practice its military was no match for the DPRK's, they knew it well, and it was just a dream. That itself does not make them complicit or equally responsible for the War.
My edit says nothing about ROK being "good" and DPRK being "bad". It just says that the War resulted from an invasion, just as the Iraq war resulted from a U.S.-led invasion. It is a fact and does not reflect any bias, as you claim.
I will revert the edit, thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.223.183.78 ( talk) 15:04, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Someone should update the legacy section to reflect the change in government and policy in South Korea. Roh is referred to as the current president of Korea but that is no longer true. This should be done by someone with more knowedge about the issues than me in case you are wondering. Zamp m ( talk) 04:20, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
I have updated this section you have notified. I have also written this as a seperate comment further down. Euge246 ( talk) 06:36, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I hope the IP editor who made the substantial edits last night decides to come to this page to see the explanation. Your edits, while in general do coincide with the 'Be Bold' directive, were reverted for the following reasons:
We've worked hard over the last year or two to accommodate the 'concerns' of various editors to alleviate the POV issues in the article. Some we made grudgingly, some we just outright rejected, but they were all thouroughly discussed here first. We welcome your contributions, but there are some procedures in place as well, along with numerous interested editors. Please come back here to discuss any future large-scale edits first, so that we can all see the various viewpoints for such edits and come to an agreement first, so we don't start another series of edit-wars. Also, since it looks like you have some opinions on this subject, how about creating an account, so you have a name and a talk page where things can be dicussed? Many of us are leery of edits by IP addresses, especially with all of the vandalism that has been done by IP address editors. Thanks. wbfergus Talk 11:47, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
This is a very good idea and I agree with wbfergus. The IP should get an account on Wikipedia as it would benefit him greatly if he wants to edit the article. Please notify people if you are going to make a substantial change in the article by posting it on the disscussion page here. Euge246 ( talk) 06:40, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
NPOV violations are littered throughout those 2 sections I edited. I have no idea what this article has gone through but it is not in a NPOV. My objectives were to be neutral and thorough. I've added alot of information to certain events of the war that were omitted from the previous version. For example,
This entire paragraph violates the NPOV rule. I can sum up this paragraph in a few sentences. Chinese completely destroyed the Americans. The Americans ran like they have never ran before. Alot of Americans died. There isn't a single mention of the UN/US/SK and what they did or how they reacted. This is just blatantly pro-Chinese.
My edits could be polished up and there might be some filler I missed deleting but it is by far a more details and more neutral view point. You can hardly call the previous version neutral.
You have 3 paragraphs that details Chinese tactics and how great they were. Are you kidding? You cannot call that NPOV.
99.238.165.215 ( talk) 05:44, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Chinese involvement section is obviously in a pro-China POV. Success of tactics is a matter of opinion as Schrandit says. Not to mention what constitutes a success? If you look as casualties and casualty rates these tactics were not a factor. They may have given them an element of surprise but that lasts only for so long. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.129.142.222 ( talk • contribs)
I have successfully updated the legacy part of the article and have changed the information that Roh is the president to the current president, Lee. I thank the person who wrote about this problem in this disscussion area. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Euge246 ( talk • contribs) 06:20, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I believe that this article is at a high standard and that it should be rated an "A". Many other people probably agree with me and should put it in this disscussion area. Euge246 ( talk) 06:24, 31 March 2008 (UTC) 31/03/08
I notice that the article actually looks much better than Start-class, (well, at least B) so.... a peer review?- Kfc18645 talk 10:00, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
I agree with this person and I recommend another review on this article. Euge246 ( talk) 06:32, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Anybody else notice that the number of casualties (excluding civilians) for the North Koreans and Chinese exceeds the number of troops they deployed? Maybe I'm missing something here.... please tell me if I am. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.149.75.210 ( talk) 02:21, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
soviet union doesn' exist anymore, why this country still in the Belligerents list ? i think some one should modify and put something next to "soviet Union" like this "no longer exist" or something else. what about china ? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Jalh ( talk • contribs) 04:35, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
A couple sentences (just in the first few paragraphs) jump out as opinionated, considering Korean opinion of occupying powers and the actions of said powers. Could use a thorough look-through... on the whole it seems B-class. Reb42 ( talk) 15:10, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Why no lsiting of Ethiopian casualites- Kagnew Battalion-121 Killed 536 wounded? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.53.145.143 ( talk) 18:43, 25 April 2008 (UTC)
it would make sense to put them in...if we're listing them by casualty number then they have more than the phillipines (geez, does that sound morbid or what?) 72.148.113.246 ( talk) 16:41, 4 May 2008 (UTC)
Just cause tail-gunner Joe would have said it doesn't make it untrue. They were all self-professed Communist states fighting to, among other things, advance world Communism. Why shouldn't they be classified as Communists? - Schrandit ( talk) 16:09, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I noticed that there isn't even a passing reference to this in the article. Perhaps something should be added? Here is a link to an online archive of cold war documents that shows China and North Korea conspired to frame the US: [6] 92.10.182.222 ( talk) 18:09, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
The Peoples Republic of Korea ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People's_Republic_of_Korea), which the local Koreans had tried to set up as a government while overthrowing the japanese collaborators, should be mentioned by name and linked in the part near the beginning alongside the more vague "Many Korean people had organized politically prior to the arrival of American troops." This should again be mentioned by name in the part where "A second policy set forth by Hodge was to refuse to recognize the existing political organizations that had been established by the Korean people." It should say specifically that the de facto government of the People's Republic of Korea was suppressed.
If you search for "People's Republic of Korea" within wikipedia it currently links to "North Korea / Democratic People's Republic of Korea", and it seems the only way to find the page is to instead search for it in google. There should be a disambiguation on that page or it should be described within: the short lived attempt at a revolutionary republic which was part of the basis that developed into the DPRK in the north and in the south existed between the overthrow of japanese collaborators and the US restoration of collaborators. The suppression of the "people's republic" is a large part of the origin of the Cheju uprising/suppression.
It should say the People's Republic of Korea was the most popular and that the US favored the Korean Democratic Party, which consisted of large landowners and wealthy businessmen, while suppressing the PRK which had a broad base of support.
Here is an article from a Korean journal. It is covered in other sources though usually pro-US sources give it no mention. Given the bias of the US and ROK governments in helping suppress knowledge of the mass atrocities for over 50 years, we should view productions by them during that time as equivalent to "extremist sources" for the purposes of Korean war historiography, and similarly view their claims about "free elections" with the same suspicion that is used towards the North.
http://sociology.snu.ac.kr/isdpr/publication/journal/26-2/Hyesook%20Lee.pdf ``State formation and civil society under American occupation: the case of South Korea HS Lee - Korea Journal of Population and Development, 1997 - sociology.snu.ac.kr
USMGIK refers to the United States Military Government In Korea. KDP is the Korean Democratic Party. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:50, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
"At first, there was Choson Konkuk Chunbi Wiwonhoe (Committee for the Preparation of Korea's Independence) led by Un-hyoung Yeo. Just before America arrived in Korea, it adopted the title of "the Korean People's Republic" (KPR) as a Korean government along with the People's Committees which were organized throughout the country (Hong 1985, pp. 57-103). Without foreign intervention, the KPR and the organizations it sponsored would have triumphed." In the meantime, the KDP, encouraged wiht the news that America would come to Korea, was organized. That party, which remained the strongest single rightist one, consisted of large landowners and wealthy businessmen (Sim 1982)." p. 7-8
"With the support of these bureaucrats in the USMGIK, the KDP elevated itself from a weak political group to the dominant party, helping the USMGIK suppress its political rival, the KPR. The KPR was forced to transform from a de facto Korean government into several political parties and finally to abolish itself. "p.8
"The process of grasping power for the KDP and Rhee was at the same time the process of exclusion for other political groups. In alliance with the USMGIK, the KDP and Rhee became the ruling party, whereas many other groups such as peasants, workers, leftist groups and also some nationalists were oppressed and excluded."p.9
"The main tools of USMGIK in controlling Korean society were the coercive resources such as police and military forces. The important function of the Korean National Police (KNP) was a political one, and the main reason that the USMGIK retained the Japanese colonial police system and its Korean personnel was to fight against the KPR and the People's Committees, considering them as communist forces."10-11
"Especially, in the fall of 1946, the Korean peasants and workers sought to reverse the effects of a year of American occupation, and their uprisings swept throughout the whole southern Korean provinces for three months. The people's opposition to the USMGIK was strongest in the Kyeongsang and Cholla provinces, which had powerful People's Commitees. Through the uprising the Koreans expressed their strong discontent over American rule, and brought into focus the failures of the USMGIK's political and economic policies (Chung 1988)... However, as a result of the USMGIK's violent suppression of the uprising, the People's Committees and the organizations associated with them were almost totally destroyed, and the reactionary Korean groups, particularly the KNP, became the dominant forces in the provinces."13
"Of course, the USMGIK introduced a procedure of democracy on the surface to Koreans... if democracy means, at the least, that the government is supported by the majority of the people, and that the people can freely participate in political activities and express their opinions, and be treated equally by the laws, there was much limitation. We have seen how strongly the majority of Koreans opposed the USMGIK through the general strikes and the October (Chung 1988) and Cheju uprisings."(my emphasis)p14
-( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:42, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
"Free Elections" in the opening paragraph is ridiculous. The US and ROK may spin it that way, but the fact is the elections in Rhee's Korea were less free than in Mugabe's Zimbabwe of today. For example, Rhee threatened to have people's food ration cards away if they voted against him, and there were frequent arrests or executions of political opponents. South Korean elections at the time were probably no more free than elections in the North.
Such claims reach the heights of absurdity, and would be like if Britain occupied the north of the US during the war of 1812 and suppressed all opposition, then ran elections where only Tories and a couple of other pro british parties run and claims they are "free elections". This cold war propaganda is completely inappropriate to have stated as if it is the truth, though because it has been repeated so much it would be appropriate to mention in the article that the US and ROK claimed "free elections" as a discredited fringe theory.
"Failing to strengthen their case in the elections" This assumes they even tried to compete in the elections, or that it would have been possible to. No leftist parties ran in the South Korean elections, which were widely considered rigged because left wing groups were being violently suppressed and because of the associated threats to people who vote the wrong way, and also because the majority of South Korea opposed separate elections even being held. The fact is the leftists didn't attempt to "strengthen their case" in the South Korean elections and anyone trying to would just have been executed, imprisoned, or force recruited into the bodo league/NGL "rehabilitation" program and mass executed later, so laying low and trying guerilla organization was probably the obvious strategy for them. This explains how even after elections, the Rhee regime had "little public support".
WP article currently says: "The Americans did not want a communist government in South Korea so they called for elections in all of Korea. Since the population of the South was double that of the North, the Soviets knew that Kim Il-sung would lose the election."
Instead, it should say that the soviets knew that Kim Il-sung would lose an election where the south was excluding and violently suppressing leftist parties, who were the majority at the time. Also it should say that the Americans feared that in real free elections the communists would win an overall majority, which is why they suppressed leftist groups while using the phrase "free elections" as propaganda. In fact, the Soviets thought that in real free elections the communists would win an overall majority, and so did the Americans, especially once the war started and the US bombed every city and killed mass civilians etc. The soviets were boycotting the UN in general and not free elections per se, but they were boycotting "free elections" where the UN would lie and say it was fair despite widespread suppression of the left and admissions in their own reports that said people were threatened with taking away their food rations if they voted the wrong way.
Some Myths about June 1950 Robert R. Simmons The China Quarterly, No. 54 (Apr. - Jun., 1973), pp. 354-361 http://www.jstor.org/stable/652006?seq=3 [12] Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the School of Oriental and African Studies "[t]he Syngman Rhee regime enjoyed little public support" p 356
I.F. Stone. The Hidden History of the Korean War. Monthly Review Press. 1971
The first part of this quotation refers to the soviet peace/election mediation offer in 1950, and the second part relates to the UN commissions on the two previous "free elections".
"The fear that the Communists would win such elections was reflected in a speech made by Warren Austin at Lake Sucess on August 17 [1950], which "revealed that the United States wants them [the elections] to be held on the basis that the Republic of Korea's jurisdiction would be extended over North Korea automatically."... If its jurisdiction were automatically extended over the North, it would supervise the elections. Already two United Nations Commissions had reflected unfavorably on the way the Syngman Rhee regime handled elections and manhandled political opponents; threats to confiscate rice ration cards were noted as one of the milder forms of coercion by the United Nations Temporary Commission which observed the elections establishing the Rhee regime.
""The difficulty," the New York Times correspondent at Lake Success explained, "is that there is a strong probability of an over-all Communist majority if the elections were held before the communization of North Korea had been undone, and before a UN reconstruction program had assuaged the bitterness of North and South Korea against the destruction of their homes during their liberation by UN forces. In that case communism would win by an election what it failed to obtain by an invasion." p117-118
Stone's citations for these are:
United Nations Document A/Ac 19/80, p.117: Cited by George M McCune, Korea Today, p.228.
New York Times August 24, 1950 -( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:42, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
North Korea is apparently claiming that the United States military massacred numerous townspeople at a place called Sinchon Ri, where they built a museum to back up their claim [13] ... However, as North Korea is apparently a backwards country, I haven't been able to find an official website, the most informative site being on Geocities. Anyone have more info on what exactly occurred at Sinchon Ri? 204.52.215.107 ( talk) 19:01, 17 May 2008 (UTC)
By CHARLES J. HANLEY and JAE-SOON CHANG, Associated Press Writers 4 minutes ago
There is more news out there today on the massacres ...Yahoo's World News Page - but it is an AP report. Credible.
DAEJEON, South Korea - Grave by mass grave, South Korea is unearthing the skeletons and buried truths of a cold-blooded slaughter from early in the Korean War, when this nation's U.S.-backed regime killed untold thousands of leftists and hapless peasants in a summer of terror in 1950. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.84.109.135 ( talk) 20:54, 18 May 2008 (UTC)
"The war eventually led to a strengthening of alliances in the Western bloc and the splitting of Communist China from the Soviet bloc." China did not split from the soviet bloc over the Korean War. They split because of a combination of Khruschev's speech against aspects of stalinism, the withdrawal of Soviet advisors after the debacle of Mao's Great Leap Forward, and Krushchev's refusal to support China in the border war with Nehru's India. I would be interested in hearing the chain of reasoning used to support the idea that it was really the Korean War where they were all cooperating that caused them to split and not those other events of extreme friction. But for now you should probably just take that out as it is far fetched, goes against most of the histories, has no source, links to an article that says nothing about it, and without additional support it is a form of the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy.-( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 20:28, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
I'm surprised that no one has pointed out that all of the discussion of combat operations are from a US/UN perspective. Indeed, there isn't a single other unit identified by number (e.g., the Chinese 15th Army). DOR (HK) ( talk) 02:01, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Some trusted user might wanna add Crysis to the "Games"-section —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dakkour ( talk • contribs) 08:18, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Mercenaries: Playground Of Destruction did not feature the Korean war as it's backdrop, rather, the game was set in a post-modern era wherein N. Korea was violently overthrown and sent to Overtake S. Korea. The gist of this post is that the game was set in an alternate reality, NOT the korean war. AiRsTrIkE1 ( talk) 03:04, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content?content=10.1080/1462352042000320592 [20] Dong Choon Kim. Forgotten war, forgotten massacres—the Korean War (1950-1953) as licensed mass killings. Journal of Genocide Research( http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713431069~db=all [21]), Volume 6, Issue 4 2004 , pages 523 - 544 I am copying more quotations from this journal so that if you don't have journal access you can still see these relevant parts.
So here are a couple of things that the article needs to include for accuracy. Nos. 1-4 refer to the above quotations from the Journal of Genocide Research article.
1. For the US mass killing of Korean civilian refugees, "neutralize" is too tame a quote, when the AP articles that broke the story had the quote "kill them all" ordered from US command. Also notice that there are 3 pictures in the "War Crimes" section, with two of them being pictures of people killed by the north, and the one that is a picture of a document showing US wrongdoing has a caveat while the other two do not. I don't have any specific recommendations for changing the photographs to have more balance, but do you see what I am referring to in terms of how balanced it appears? Finding ways to balance things like that may be part of the road to improving the grade of the article. Especially since the US and ROK have done much higher scale of atrocities against civilians than the north during the war, the opposite emphasis would be more in tune with a NPOV.
2. The racism among US soldiers, their use of the term "gook" and rapes of Koreans in front of their families.
3. Civilian bombing by the US is not mentioned as a crime against civilians. It is in the world war 2 article, and should be here also.
4. That most killings of civilian by pro North forces were done by irregular groups acting against the orders of the North Korean government, while most killings of civilians by the South were done on orders from the top South Korean and US commands.
5. The bombing of dikes to destroy rice production and intentionally cause starvation by the US is not mentioned. This was viewed as a war crime in the Nuremburg trials, and deserves a mention here. Chomsky's book "Understanding Power" has citations for this in footnotes #63 and #64 in chapter 8, including official US air force documents describing it from Robert Frank Futrell, The United States Air Force in Korea, 1950-53 (Revised Edition), Washington: United States Air Force, Office of Air Force History, 1983., Quarterly Review Staff Study, "The Attack on the Irrigation Dams in North Korea," Air University Quarterly Review (Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama), Vol. 6, No. 4, Winter 1953-54, pp. 40-61., and a book by Jon Halliday and Bruce Cumings, Korea: The Unknown War, New York: Viking, 1988. Unless you have access to these originals, just cite Chomsky, Schoeffel, and Mitchell and say they refers to these.
Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky (Paperback) by Noam Chomsky (Author), John Schoeffel (Editor), Peter Mitchell (Author) http://www.understandingpower.com/Chapter8.htm [22]
6. Alleged US Germ warfare. This is a major charge, and is believed by the worlds biggest country (China). The research of Endicott and Hagerman should be mentioned, along with the US government's response and their reply. The wikipedia page on germ warfare already has an ok two sentence treatment of these allegations that you could copy or use as a model. -( 71.202.180.190 ( talk) 19:42, 21 May 2008 (UTC))
The assertion that North Korean irregulars committed war crimes against orders is upsurd, it's totally point of view and an easy google search of north korean war crimes will say diffrent. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.95.25.216 ( talk) 23:34, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
Joseph Stalin - Soviet Force Comander during KW? You must be joking. Soviet forces present were air and AA units plus engineers and vetran officers educating local troops. They did not have a single "head" during the war, afaik, but as the most important combat role of Soviets were in air fights, their air unit commander should be named. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Montezubba ( talk • contribs) 14:51, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
I dont think that the +400,000 dead "estimate" is a good source. The U.S. was on the retreat so how can they count the dead bodies of the killed Chinese? [Just like in Vietnam, the U.S. didnt have a good estimate of killed Vietcong nor Vietminh. The famous words "If he's dead and Vietnamese, he's VC".] Yes, the U.S. bombed Chinese positions but the Pentagon failed to realize that the Chinese used underground tunnels much like the ones use by the VC in Vietnam. So the Pentagon came up with an equation, something like "1 bomb dropped = 5 dead enemies". If the U.S. estimate is true then every Chinese soldier sent to Korea would be a casualty, since the entire PLA was about 3 million men and they couldnt send everyone to Korea (only 700,000 of constant rotation).
im just saying the estimate may be some what too ridiculous to be reliable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.23.102.151 ( talk • contribs)
Okay, I've read the long discussion and it got nowhere. Back on topic, obviously I cannot provide a source for the "formula" since your government would want to save face and not tell the public about some of the bullshit "estimations calculations", but I did find some examples of the U.S.'s policies in exaggerating enemy dead like "If he's dead and Vietnamese, he's VC"; link [23]
A note on the alleged "human waves tactics". By what definition do you go by when saying "human waves tactics"? Do you mean by infantry charges? If that's the case then didn't every country use "human waves tactics"? Normandy, Battle of the Bulge, Stalingrad, Konigsburg, Iwo Jima, Gettysburg; I could go on for a really long time. So don't be suprised of "human waves tactics" since everyone used them when needed. You make the assumption, or by reading your "accurate" sources, that the PLA used "human waves tactics" all the time; I tell you now, that, is a false accusation by the U.S. to explain the defeats suffered by her military to an "inferior" race. This is an ok website, link [24]
By the way when I read the link I found that you're very ignorant of your own country's history, which you said that communists were the ones that distorts history and the supposed western sources is so uncorruptable that everything they utter is regarded as absolute "fact(s)". May I suggest you read some "true" U.S. history books once in a while, for example, "A People's History" by Howard Zinn; very good book by the way. Another link just for the hell of it, link [25]—Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.23.102.151 ( talk • contribs)
Current figures in the article are 58,127 combat deaths and 175,743 wounded, but without any source. Here they say about a lot more casualties (137,899 dead etc), but still not complete data - without para-militia and police. Why the difference is so big? And what figures are correct? 195.248.189.182 ( talk) 09:37, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
I can't edit this page and was redirected here. I couldn't believe that there seemed to be no estimate or range of estimates on civilian casualties and/or total casualties. Here is what I found, please post it in article if you believe it might improve it.
The article I read provides the following information:
While accurate numbers for deaths are imprecise, various sources approximate the war's South Korean civilian casualties -- dead, wounded and missing -- at about one million people. North Korean civilian casualties were perhaps twice that, many of them as a result of the U.N. bombing campaign. The numbers vary, but it's probably safe to say that there were somewhere between three and four million Korean civilian casualties; this at a time when the total population was some 30-40 million people! And civilians died at a ghastly rate in Korea.
Historian Bruce Cumings, in a 1994 article in the Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, notes that civilian casualty rates in the Korean War were nearly 70 percent of total casualties, compared to about 40 percent in World War II.
According to a June 20, 2000 article in the Korea Herald: "The war left about 5 million people dead, wounded or missing, more than half of them civilians. It also left more than 10 million people separated from their families, 300,000 war widows and 100,000 war orphans."
References: 50 Years And Counting The Impact of the Korean War on the People of the Peninsula May 2002 by Phil de Haan Johnatmls ( talk) 14:22, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
reference link: www.calvin.edu/news/2001-02/korea.htm —Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnatmls ( talk • contribs) 14:18, 15 June 2008 (UTC)
The Chinese People's Government had complained to the United Nations about United States aggression against the province of Taiwan and violations of its airspace by the United States Air Force prior to the entry by Chinese volunteers in Korea. The current version of this article disingenuously omits United States acts of war against China. Nierva ( talk) 21:33, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
I find the compilation of prominent pictures to portray the Korean War creative and conforming to what seems like an unwritten agreement to establish pictures for all major wars on Wikipedia as rectangular compilations.
I would however, like to file a complaint for the current Korean War picture. On the bottom left of the picture, a photo of Chinese soldiers being welcomed home is shown as part of the compilation. I find this disturbing and a dishonor to the UN and Korean Veterans of the war. The Korean War was a conflict between the Korean people. No matter how significant an impact the Chinese invasion of the peninsula may have been to the outcome of the war, their worth as a cultural and historical tie to the Korean War is little to none. The Chinese presence also caused a negative outcome of the war - their role in the Korean War is despicable to the US and UN and a representation of the PRC on the cover picture of the Wikipedia Korean War article is undeserving and ridiculous. Their sacrifice for another man's war for an evil cause does not stir any pity or respect in me for their veterans. If there needs be a portrayal of an army, either an American or ROK soldier should be poignantly represented as part of the main picture, for it is their total and honorable sacrifice that half the peninsula was saved from communism.
To the author of the picture, it is certainly no affront to your work - it is one of the most efficient ways to summarize the article through pictures. However my suggestion is more than just advice. I would greatly appreciate my suggestion to be taken seriously and in my opinion, should certainly be carried out. If the author is unavailable or declines to answer my suggestion, I will change it myself.
It may sound like a minor complaint but it is far from minor. It is a matter of giving equal attention to the rightful and deserving armed servicemen and women of the Korean conflict. Oyo321 ( talk) 04:33, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
Deletions of text by Shcrandit are not justified. Schrandit's personal attacks accusing editors of "working for the Chinese Government" cast serious doubt on his good faith.
Concering the American invasion of Korea and UN activity, the fact is that President Truman had already ordered an invasion of Kroea before the the UN Security Council passed Resolution 83 "recommending" states to assist southern Korea. The U.S. then went to the Security Council in an attempt to legitimize its campaign. This is made clear in the papers by Leo Gross and F.B. Schick as well as in the statement to the United Nations by the the Russian deputy foreign minister Gromyko.
It is not wise to disregard reports from China about U.S. violations of Chinese airspace, especially when considering that the U.S. regime had officially acknowledged these facts. Similarly, to delete allegations of war crimes by the United States against prisoners of war belonging to the Korean People's Army violates Wikipedia guidelines concerning the maintenance of a neutral point of view. To cite solely U.S. allegations while at the same time omitting analagous ones from the other side is propagandistic. No responsible scholar would disregard literature on the Korean War published in China and the Korean People's Republic. Nierva ( talk) 04:44, 1 July 2008 (UTC)
According to report of June 24, 2008 at [1]
Likewise it also notes that in 1969 a US Navy Aircraft was shot down over Sea of Japan by North Korean fighter-2 killed/recoverd and 29 missing —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.53.145.47 ( talk) 12:15, 13 July 2008 (UTC)