The Forgotten War: The Korean War

The Korean War was a difficult time for many people. Americans were worried that the soldiers wouldn't come back, and some of them never did. Even though it was called the Korean War, North and South Korea were not the only countries involved in the war. Countries from all over the world either sent troops or supplies to both North and South Korea. Although the Korean war only lasted three years, its four stages of the war were harsh and took many lives, and is now often called the Forgotten War.

The Korean War started with North Korea’s invasion to the Pusan Perimeter, on June 25, 1950. North Korea's invasion was the first of four stages of the Korean war. The North Koreans called their invasion a violation of peace. When the invasion happened, the North had 135,000 soldiers. Since the South wasn’t prepared for war, troops from sixteen different countries fought alongside the South. Forty-one more countries got involved in the war by supplying the South with weapons and food.

The second stage of the Korean war was the Inchon Landing. In the time of the Inchon Landing, which was led by General Douglas MacArthur, the course of the war changed completely. In September of 1950, after the invasion, U.S X Corps and the U.S Marines, sailed from Japan to

Inchon, South Korea. The Allies, or the South as they are also called, forced U.N troops (the North) to move farther north to the Yalu River. Later that December, the Southern Allies prepared to move north once again.
The third stage was when the Allies moved North. October 8, 1950 is when the Allies reached North Korea and forced the Northern troops to move farther north to the country's capital, Pyongyang. In late November, when China entered the war to help the North, the Southern troops were forced to retreat. As early December came the south began to withdraw from Pyongyang. Later that month, commander General Walker was killed and General Matthew B. Ridgway became his replacement. As the new commander, Ridgway rebuilt the confidence the Allies lost when the Chinese troops entered the war and forced them to retreat.
The fourth and final stage in the Korean War was the Battle for the Hills. On January 16, 1951, after the Southern Allied troops gained back their lost confidence, they began to move North once again. General Ridgway commanded that this time they go North, advance slowly so they didn’t miss any of the enemies trying to attack. By June of 1951, the Allies advanced a short distance to the North, but by then the war had changed. The Southern troops positioned to fire on a Northern city known as Seoul. Eventually both the Northern and Southern Korean troops began to fight along a battle line just north of the thirty-eighth parallel.
After a long harsh, war truce talks began July 10, 1951, in Panmunjom. Both the Northern and Southern troops were willing to end the war, yet they couldn’t agree on what to do with the prisoners they had captured in the war. After two years of negotiations, the truce talks were deadlocked by April of 1952, and they made the armistice. The armistice stated that all prisoners of war could stay wherever they chose, drew a new boundary line giving the southerners an extra fifteen-hundred square miles of land, and created a two mile wide military free zone. The war finally ended July 27, 1953. Although the war only lasted three years, many lives were taken by the war. Nearly five million people died, over one-hundred thousand were wounded, and almost forty thousand of the people killed or injured were Americans.
Even though the Korean war just ended a little over sixty years ago, most people don’t remember it ever happened.

Since many don’t remember the Korean War, it is often called the Forgotten War. This war has been called the Forgotten War since the October of 1951. At the time when China entered the war in 1950, then resulted in stalemate in 1951, most people didn’t want to read or even think about Korea or the Korean War. Many of the soldiers, who fought in the Korean, war never told their wives or children about fighting in it. Veterans of the Vietnam War and World War II loved to come home and talk about all the experiences of the war, but Korean War veterans came home and tried their best to forget about the

war.
The Korean war was a bloody and dangerous war. Many soldiers were either injured or killed while in battle. Although it is called the Korean War, over fifty other countries were involved. Even if many people don’t remember that it happened, those who lost loved ones will always remember the three years of the Korean. Since a large quantity of people forget about this war it is now known as the Forgotten War.