A NATION TORN BY IDEOLOGY: KOREA 1910 TO 1950

The Korean War Veterans Memorial should make us consider not just the sacrifice of war but the conflicting courses several nations took to create that war and its horrors. The Korean War, like other wars, had origins in the period long before the first shots were fired. A brutal Japanese occupation created two hostile governments in Korea after the Second World War ended in 1945. North Korea saw an opportunity to unite the peninsula in 1950 and took it. China and the Soviet Union wanted no anti-Communist government near their borders with North Korea. The United States was determined to show its communist rivals that it would honor its commitments to defend its allies. Rather than looking just at one perspective on the war, this article will examine the historical era and the role several countries played in creating the Korean War.