The Korean War and The US

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A. PLAN OF INVESTIGATION
To what extent did the United States or the Soviet Union cause the ceasefire of the Korean War in 1953? This investigation is historically significant because it focuses on which country influenced Korea to create the Armistice Agreement on the Korean War. The scope of this investigation focuses on the years 1945-1953 through the span of the Korean War and when the Armistice Agreement was created. One method to be used in this investigation is an examination of The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History. This resource will be examined to see the impact the United States had on Korea as a whole. Another resource utilized is the documents of “Army Department Teletype Conference” during the time of the Korean War. This source will be analyzed to peek into some of the United State’s actions during the Korean War. To further research additional sources will be used such as books, articles, letters, and documents from important assets in the war.
B. SUMMARY OF EVIDENCE
HISTORICAL CONTEXT
Korea ended its isolation in the mid-nineteenth-century age of imperialism, in 1882, as a defensive measure against its neighbors, signing “Treaty of Amity and Commerce” with the United States to provide “good offices if there is an external threat”. As a result of the rising Soviet-American rivalry at the end of World War II, the Korean peninsula was divided along the 38th parallel. The divide ran along the 38th parallel which is part of the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) separating North and South Korea . The Soviet Union supported North Korea with Communist-control and the United States supported South Korea in democracy. In 1953 the Armistice Agreement ended three years of fighting (starting June 25, 1950) that killed over a milli...

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Bleiker, Roland. Divided Korea: Toward a Culture of Reconciliation. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota, 2005. Print. Print.
Cumings, Bruce. The Korean War: A History. New York: Modern Library, 2010. Print.
Cumings, Bruce. The Origins of the Korean War. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1981. Print.
Harry S. Truman to Douglas MacArthur, January 13, 1951. President's Secretary's Files, Truman Papers. Web.
Oberdorfer, Don. The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley,
1997. Print.
Pak, Chi-Young. Korea and the United Nations. The Hague,The Netherlands: Kluwer Law
International, 2000.Print.
People and Events- The Korean War." PBS. PBS, n.d. Web.
Repatriation of Korean Prisoners of War, May 13, 1953. Post-Presidential Papers, Truman
Papers. Web.
Smith, Nora. "Democratic People's Republic of Korea." History of Division. N.p., 21 Dec. 2010.
Web.

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