Rethinking the Korean War - Book Review

Parameters, Winter, 2003 by Donald W. Boose, Jr.

By William Stueck. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2002. 285 pages. $22.95.

William Stueck, a highly respected diplomatic historian, previously published two important books on the Korean War. The Road to Confrontation (Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1981) provided a thorough description and analysis of US policy toward China and Korea in the years leading up to the Korean War. The Korean War: An International History (Princeton Univ. Press, 1995) focused on the role of the major powers outside of Korea concerning the origins, conduct, and termination of the war. Both books are essential reading for anyone trying to understand the strategic and political aspects of the war. In Rethinking the Korean War: A New Diplomatic and Strategic History, Stueck addresses some of those aspects, taking into consideration evidence that has come to light since his last book.

In the first section of the book, Stueck examines the post-World War II division of Korea and the policies of the United States and the Soviet Union that, in conjunction with the internal social, political, and economic dynamics of Korea, led to war. Stueck sees the origins of the war in the US-Soviet agreement to divide Korea at the 38th Parallel in 1945, their failure to eliminate that boundary, and the failure of the Koreans to unite against the division. He argues that in the absence of "extraordinary patience and trust on all sides," the United States and the Soviet Union were incapable of devising a plan for reunification that would protect both their interests, while the Koreans themselves, deeply divided by class and ideology and having failed to liberate themselves, lacked the power to control their future. Stueck believes that neither the United States nor the Soviet Union sought war over Korea and "so long as both maintained troops there, all-out war remained unlikely." But by 1950, both powers had withdrawn forces from Korea and two competing states had been established. A series of events (including Communist success in the Chinese Civil War, conclusion of a Sino-Soviet alliance, Soviet acquisition of the atomic bomb, and the failure of the United States to provide sufficient support for South Korea to deter attack) then led Joseph Stalin to support North Korean leader Kim Il-sung's desire to attempt reunification by military force.

In that regard, Stueck weighs in on whether the United States intervened in a Korean civil war or responded to an international conflict supported by the USSR. This controversy was explained lucidly in the Spring 1998 issue of Parameters by James I. Matray, another premier Korean War historian, in his article, "Korea's Partition: Soviet-American Pursuit of Reunification, 1945-1948." Stueck's argument is that the "unrest in South Korea grew in part out of local conditions, but neither its origins nor its course can be understood without devoting heavy attention to activities originating in the North or to actions heavily influenced by the Soviet and American presence on the peninsula. The local, national, and international forces blended together in a manner that would have made the actual course of events largely unrecognizable with the elimination of any of the three." The term "Korean War" is imprecise, says Stueck, because it does not recognize the international dimensions of the conflict, but it is more accurate than the term "Korean Civil War," which is a "clear-cut distortion of reality."

In the second section of the book, Stueck traces the course of the war, devoting one chapter to the Chinese intervention, another to the question of why the war did not expand beyond the peninsula, and a third to the long and tortuous course of the Armistice negotiations. The final section of the book examines the effects of the war on the US-Korea relationship and the interrelationship between the war and American democracy.

Rethinking the Korean War is a valuable addition to the short list of reliable and authoritative politico-military histories of the Korean War. Its shortcomings are few. There are a few trivial spelling mistakes and two typographical errors of more substance: Maxwell Taylor is identified in a photo caption simply as "Lieutenant General Maxwell" and, disconcertingly, Colonel General Teretii F. Shtykov, the head of the Soviet occupation of North Korea, is identified throughout the text and in the index as "Shytkov." Reflecting his own views on the nature of the war, Stueck's greater emphasis is on the international aspects, although he provides enough information on the internal political dynamics of Korea to demonstrate the "civil war" aspects as well. There is no traditional bibliography, but information on his sources is set forth in the endnotes and in a list, with full publication data, of the abbreviations he uses for the most frequently cited works.

For specialists and those already familiar with the issues, Stueck provides a cogent summary of the current scholarship, a clear explanation of his own views, and thought-provoking arguments that will stimulate further debate and research. In the process, Stueck sets forth a systematic and coherent overview of the background to the war, the major military operations, the long process of the Truce Talks, and the consequences of the war. Thus, his book can also be read with profit as an introductory text and a basis for further reading. Parameters readers will find this short, content-rich book worthwhile and illuminating.