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South Korea

HISTORY OF KOREA Around A.D. 668, several competing kingdoms were unified into a single dominion on the Korean Peninsula. Successive regimes maintained Korean political and cultural independence for more than a thousand years; the last of these ruling kingdoms would be the Choson Dynasty (1392‑1910). After surviving invasions by Japan at the end of the […]

North Korea

38TH PARALLEL In 1910, Japan formally annexed the Korean Peninsula, which it had occupied five years earlier following the Russo‑Japanese War. Over the next 35 years of colonial rule, the country modernized and industrialized significantly, but many Koreans suffered brutal repression at the hands of Japan’s military regime. During World War II, Japan sent many […]

Demilitarized Zone

The Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) is a region on the Korean peninsula that demarcates North Korea from South Korea. Roughly following the 38th parallel, the 150‑mile‑long DMZ incorporates territory on both sides of the cease‑fire line as it existed at the end of the Korean War (1950–53). The areas north and south of the demarcation are […]

Inch’on Landing

Korean War: Background After Japan was defeated by the Allies in World War II (1939‑45), it lost control of Korea, which it had ruled as a colony since 1910. Korea was divided into two occupations zones, with the Soviet Union administering the area north of the 38th parallel and the United States administering the area […]

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How the Kim Dynasty Took Over North Korea

North Korea hasn’t always been under the totalitarian rule of the Kim regime. Foreign enablers and internal strife have completely reshaped the region over the last 100+ years, transforming a once‑peaceful monarchy into the oppressive dictatorship we know today.

Demilitarized Zone

The spread of Communism in Korea led to a battle that was brief yet bloody, and a national divide that exists to this day.

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North Korea History

On July 10, 1950, at a meeting of the United Nations Security Council, Ambassador Warren R. Austin reports on North Korea’s refusal to retreat from its armed invasion of the Republic of Korea. By the end of the session, the U.N. officially supported sending U.S. forces into Korea.

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