Frozen frontline: Lessons learned from the Korean model of conflict termination

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Light at the end of the tunnel

The Korean War reached a positional stalemate exactly one year after it began. Before the summer of 1951, the frontline had twice swept across the entire peninsula — first to the far south, then all the way north to the Yalu River on the border with China — before finally settling near its original position along the 38th parallel. From that point on, neither the UN forces (80% of whom were American troops) fighting on behalf of the South, nor the 1 million Chinese “volunteers” who had intervened to support the North Koreans, were able to dislodge one another.

With the 1952 U.S. presidential election looming, American soldiers’ coffins continued arriving back home on a daily basis, and increasing numbers of Americans wanted to know why the sacrifice was being made and how much longer the fighting was likely to continue. South Korean President Syngman Rhee’s authoritarian tendencies had become a byword for repression — so much so that even the usually restrained Christian Science Monitor described his rule as being “worthy of a totalitarian police state.”

So when, on October 24, 1952, at a campaign rally in Detroit, Republican presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower pledged that his first and foremost priority would be “to bring the Korean war to an early and honorable end,” the entire nation listened. His declaration — “I shall go to Korea to learn how best to serve the American people in the cause of peace” — made its way into American political science textbooks. It is widely believed that the statement alone earned him an additional 2 to 3 million votes. “But to many American people it promised precisely what they had hoped for: thumbs down on the war-hungry men who clamored for a vengeful extension of the war to China, and, in Korea, peace,” writes historian Alexander Bevin.

Eisenhower, as president-elect, did indeed visit Korea, where he saw firsthand the futility of continuing the war. However, when it comes to peace negotiations, it takes two to tango — both parties must be genuinely interested in the outcome. That condition was not met until March 1953.

Formally, armistice negotiations between the Chinese-Korean and American-Korean delegations were held in the village of Panmunjom starting from July 1951. One meticulous observer calculated that over the course of the talks, 18 million words were spoken at the meetings. Yet the two sides remained deadlocked — largely because the real operator of the Korean War from the North’s side was Joseph Stalin, who was more than satisfied with the ongoing conflict. While the Americans were wasting their resources on a distant Asian peninsula, he could leisurely prepare his army for a potential Third World War in Europe.

This diplomatic stalemate continued until the death of Stalin on March 5, 1953, after which his successors sent Beijing a clear signal that the political mood in Moscow had shifted. Chinese leader Mao Zedong welcomed the change: Korea was consuming nearly one-third of China’s budget, and crop failures had caused widespread famine in the northern provinces. In fact, if it had been up to Mao, the war would have ended in an armistice the previous year. On April 26, 1953, the delegations of the opposing sides met once again in Panmunjom, and this time, the talks actually progressed.

By then, the front line closely matched the 38th parallel, so the parties quickly agreed to turn the line of contact into a demarcation line. But a far more complicated issue involved the exchange of prisoners of war.

South Korean camps held 132,474 North Korean and Chinese prisoners. In Chinese camps, there were 11,559 POWs from the UN forces — not counting 65,000 South Koreans, who, according to the Chinese, had been “re-educated” and integrated into the communist armies. Mao insisted on an “all for all” exchange, citing the 1949 Geneva Convention, which stated that “prisoners of war must be repatriated without delay after the cessation of hostilities.” The Americans disagreed: in 1945–1947, they had returned 1.5 million Soviet citizens to Stalin without regard for their wishes and did not care to repeat that bitter experience. A quick survey in the camps showed that only 70,000 prisoners from the North were willing to return home; the Chinese prisoners overwhelmingly requested to be sent to Taiwan.

It was not just a matter of principle. Washington believed that setting the precedent of providing political asylum to prisoners of war would make communist armies “far less dependable than ever before” and that their governments would therefore be “far less likely to use…[them] for aggression.” If soldiers were confident they would not be handed over at the war’s end, they would be far more likely to surrender — a point especially relevant to the armies of the Soviet satellites in Eastern Europe.

As reluctant as Mao was to hand over thousands of Chinese prisoners to his mortal enemy Chiang Kai-shek in Taiwan, he was even less eager to continue the war. Beijing had already run up a $2 billion debt for Soviet arms supplies, and Moscow had no intention of writing it off. In the end, China abandoned the “all for all” principle, and the subsequent negotiations focused on ironing out details: which countries’ representatives would join the repatriation commission, how to ensure access for Chinese delegates to the non-returnees, how long they would be allowed to attempt to persuade them to return “home,” and so on.

An elephant in the conference room

An elephant stood in the room where the negotiations were taking place: President Syngman Rhee’s categorical rejection of any kind of armistice. As early as the summer of 1951, when the two sides began probing each other’s positions at Panmunjom, Rhee declared that any agreement that failed to provide for the reunification of Korea into a single state would have no legal force. “If we accept anything less than the integrity of this nation, we will betray the trust of those who sacrificed all they held dear in the fight for freedom — and that we will not do,” he proclaimed.

So while publicly advocating for peace, Syngman Rhee put forward conditions that were clearly unacceptable to the other parties — such as the withdrawal of Chinese troops from the peninsula and the disarmament of the North Korean army. When he learned that the negotiations had finally entered a serious phase, he recalled his representative from Panmunjom and told U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Ellis Briggs that he would withdraw the South Korean army from under UN (i.e., American) command and continue the war on his own.

“We made our mistake perhaps in the beginning in relying upon democracy to assist us. … Sorry, but I cannot assure President Eisenhower of my cooperation under the present circumstances,” Syngman Rhee announced.

On May 30, Syngman Rhee wrote a letter to Eisenhower in which he complained bitterly that an armistice based on the current front line would be “a death sentence without protest” for Korea, dooming the divided country to economic failure. He agreed to consider a ceasefire only on the condition that all foreign troops — that is, Chinese forces — would be withdrawn from the peninsula, and that the signing of the agreement would be preceded by the conclusion of a mutual defense pact with the U.S. that provided for immediate, unconditional aid in the event of aggression against South Korea, without any consultations with other countries or the United Nations.

For Washington, meeting this demand would effectively place the question of war and peace in Syngman Rhee’s hands — which would render the armistice a mere scrap of paper. Given the South Korean president’s obsessive drive to reunify the country, he could easily provoke a second Korean War — and then what would Washington do?

The Eisenhower administration found itself in a difficult situation. On one hand, NATO allies were pressuring the U.S. to conclude an armistice as soon as possible. Seven American divisions were bogged down in Korea, while only six remained in Europe, and this clear imbalance with the Soviet forces stationed in Germany was deeply unsettling to the Europeans. On the other hand, in the U.S. itself there was domestic opposition to an armistice based on the status quo, even within the Republican Party — after all, what about punishing the aggressor?

The fact that the aggressor's territories in the north of the peninsula had already been bombed to dust did little to comfort them, since the south did not look much better after the withdrawal of North Korean troops. William Knowland, the Republican majority leader in the Senate, grumbled that NATO allies were “pushing us toward a Far Eastern Munich.”

Eisenhower faced a complex challenge. He had to avoid derailing negotiations with the Chinese side, somehow appease Syngman Rhee, and avoid giving the Republicans a reason to accuse him of making excessive concessions to Mao Zedong. The latter was of paramount importance considering that the Republicans held a Senate majority by just one vote, and the administration could not afford an open conflict with its own “hawks.”

On June 6, Eisenhower responded to Rhee’s letter:

“Korea is unhappily not the only country which remains divided after World War II. We remain determined to play our part in achieving the political union of all countries so divided. But we do not intend to employ war as an instrument to accomplish the worldwide political settlements to which we are dedicated and which we believe to be just.”

The South Korean president was furious. After his loud declarations about the country's impending reunification, the division along the 38th parallel — with no future guarantees from the Americans — meant for him a loss of face. In Asia, such disgrace amounted to political — and sometimes even physical — death.

Seeking to improve the situation, Eisenhower invited Rhee to Washington to discuss the issue. Rhee declined the invitation, citing his busy schedule.

“Set them free, all of them!”

Meanwhile, in Panmunjom, the parties finalized the terms for the repatriation of prisoners of war, and the armistice signing was scheduled for June 18. However, before dawn on that day, South Korean guards flung open the gates of several POW camps, allowing 25,000 prisoners — who refused to return north — to instantly disappear into the countryside and nearby towns.

Rhee did not even try to pretend he had not been involved. “Now the United Nations agreement with the communists is making the complications worse than ever, which will lead to a serious consequence and result in something to the satisfaction of our enemy and misunderstanding among our own people,” he declared in an address to the nation. “In order to avoid the grave consequences which might result, I have ordered on my own responsibility the release of the anti-communist Korean prisoners.”

At that time, an unprecedentedly powerful propaganda campaign promoting national unity was underway across South Korea. At least 100,000 people participated in a demonstration in Seoul, and even opposition politicians adopted the slogans “Unification or Death” and “March to the Yalu.” The South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the armistice terms as “a new Asiatic Munich, except that Korea is not Czechoslovakia and will never accept their [terms].”

However, this militant enthusiasm did little to impress Western representatives familiar with South Korean realities. As Australian diplomat Tom Critchley observed, Rhee’s “arguments would certainly be stronger if the desire of Korean youths to dodge the draft were not so obvious.”

Despite loud voices of support — for example, U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy declared that “freedom-loving people throughout the world should applaud the action of Mr. Rhee” — the overall reaction of the free world was not what the South Korean president had hoped for. Accusations poured in from all sides. Even a staunch anti-communist like British Prime Minister Winston Churchill condemned Rhee’s “treacherous action,” warning that UN forces had no intention of conquering all of Korea for him.

Eisenhower was informed about the organized escape of prisoners in the middle of a Cabinet meeting in the Oval Office. The President confessed his bewilderment at “the mental processes of the Oriental.” In his view, Rhee was leading his people to national suicide. So would it not be rational to get rid of such a troublesome client?

Eisenhower inquired about the position of the South Korean military command in the event of a hypothetical coup. It turned out that the army contained both opponents and ardent supporters of Rhee. Ambassador Briggs was firmly against any forceful action that could pit them against each other:

“Rhee has aroused his country to a determination and will to fight Communism, probably unmatched by any other countries in the world including ourselves. Such spirit and fortitude should be preserved, not destroyed…his army equipped by us is [the] largest and most effective anti-Communist army in Asia and we badly need it on our side.”

Meanwhile, at Panmunjom, the Chinese delegation put the question bluntly: was the UN Command able to control the South Korean government and army? If not, who could guarantee that South Korea would abide by the armistice agreement? Considering that South Korean divisions occupied half of the front line in the south, the question was far from trivial.

Special envoy en route to Korea

The man chosen to, in the words of one American general, “show sensitivity to Eastern concerns about saving face” was Walter Robertson, Assistant Secretary of State for Far Eastern Affairs. Formerly an investment banker from Virginia, Robertson entered public service during World War II and later served as an economic adviser to Chiang Kai-shek. He was sent to South Korea as a special envoy of the U.S. president to negotiate with Syngman Rhee.

On the day of Robertson’s arrival, Rhee delivered yet another fiery speech, calling on his compatriots to “unite in spirit and persistently pursue their goal, regardless of whether others understand us or not.” For more than two weeks, Rhee and Robertson met almost daily, spending hours trying to convince each other of the righteousness of their respective positions. The American proved to be a tough negotiator. When Rhee threatened to launch an independent operation to liberate the northern part of the country, Robertson (with Eisenhower’s approval) declared that if the South Korean leader followed through, the U.S. would withdraw its troops from the peninsula and wash its hands of the matter.

Rhee, for his part, fully understood that Robertson’s visit was the last chance to obtain any future guarantees from the U.S. And gradually conceding position after position, he managed to bargain for the main prize.

Initially, Syngman Rhee demanded that:

• The U.S. should conclude a military assistance agreement with South Korea even before the signing of the armistice.
• The agreement should provide for an “automatic and immediate” intervention by the U.S. in the event of an attack on South Korea, similar to Article 5 of the NATO Charter.
• The political conference, planned for after the signing of the armistice, should be limited to 90 days. If no agreement were reached on the withdrawal of Chinese troops from Korea by the end of this period, the armistice would be canceled, and the war would resume with U.S. support.

Robertson managed to get his vis-à-vis to back down on all counts.

• No automatic resumption of the war.
• Chinese troops would remain in North Korea up to 1958.
• The Mutual Defense Treaty was not to be concluded until after the armistice was signed, and its Article III stipulated specifically that the U.S. “would act to meet the common danger in accordance with its constitutional processes” — that is, only with approval from the Congress.

Nevertheless, the Americans’ agreement to conclude a defense treaty with South Korea was a major victory for Rhee. In exchange, he gave a vague promise not to obstruct the truce “so long as no measure or actions taken under [the] armistice are detrimental to our national survival.” The White House was not entirely satisfied with Rhee's commitment, but time was running out, so it would have to do. On July 10, plenary sessions of the delegations resumed at Panmunjom.

Notably, the Chinese, who had initially suspected the Eisenhower administration of playing a double game, had by then come to understand the situation. Moreover, they took the Americans’ problems with Syngman Rhee to heart. As a result, Beijing decided to teach the South Koreans a small lesson.

On July 13, the Chinese launched a powerful attack on the positions of the South Korean 2nd Corps near Kumsong, hitting six South Korean divisions. Most of them were forced to retreat in varying degrees of disorder. The elite Capital Division was utterly routed. The American command had to urgently commit reserves into battle, including the U.S. 3rd Infantry Division, in which Eisenhower’s youngest son served. The threat of losing him in the final battles of the war did not improve the U.S. president’s attitude toward Rhee.

The commander of the American forces in the Far East, General Mark W. Clark, later wrote: “There is no doubt in my mind that one of the principal reasons, if not the one reason, for the Communist offensive was to give the ROK's a ‘bloody nose,’ to show them and the world that ‘PUK CHIN’ — Go North [Syngman Rhee's insistence on continuing the war] — was easier said than done.” An additional bonus for the North Koreans was the elimination of the so-called Kumsong Bulge, which gave them an extra eight kilometers of territory.

Nothing sobers a politician like a clear military defeat. True, the South Koreans did not attend the armistice signing ceremony on July 27, 1953, and Rhee stated the next day: “This armistice is only a temporary truce, it is not peace. The Korean question cannot be solved by peaceful means.” And yet, he made no further attempts to disrupt the agreement.

The prospect of a Third World War

Rhee was not alone in his opinion: many at the time feared that the Korean demarcation line would end up being just as unstable as the borders recently drawn in Palestine and Kashmir. Time, however, has proven the skeptics wrong. On the other hand, divided Germany eventually reunified on a democratic foundation, while North Korea, the nuclear enfant terrible, continues to destabilize the region. This raises the question: Did Eisenhower act too hastily? Was there a chance to eliminate the root cause of the problem? And what did the military command in Washington have to say on the matter?

During Eisenhower’s visit to Korea in the fall of 1952, the military presented him with “Plan 8-52.” The logic behind the document was brutally straightforward: punching through the Chinese forces’ layered defenses all the way to the Yalu River would not only be extraordinarily costly, but ultimately pointless if combat operations remained confined to the Korean Peninsula. What would a drive to the Yalu accomplish, apart from satisfying Rhee’s ambitions? What guarantee was there that the Chinese — who had entered the fight precisely to prevent American troops from reaching their border — would consider the war over at that point? (As a side note, this experience would later weigh heavily in U.S. strategic thinking: in the 1960s, Washington refrained from launching a ground invasion of North Vietnam largely due to concerns over how China might respond to the presence of American troops near its southern frontier.)

Thus, the U.S. Far East Command proposed a radical solution to this potential problem: dropping atomic bombs on Chinese targets — first and foremost on the airfields in Manchuria — and imposing a naval blockade of the country. Only if the American side were prepared to go that far, they argued, would a renewed offensive in Korea make strategic sense. However, since Beijing was the signatory to a mutual defense treaty with the Soviet Union — a power with a functional nuclear arsenal —the U.S. could expect retaliatory atomic strikes against Korean seaports and U.S. military bases in Japan.

Eisenhower, himself a career officer, had little difficulty predicting that any further escalation would lead directly to a third world war. If the Soviets were to launch strikes against the U.S. mainland, projections from the National Security Council in Washington placed the estimated number of American casualties at approximately 9 million.

In the end, three options remained. One was to leave everything as it was and simply continue to send American men to fight in a war that had lost its strategic meaning. Over time, this would have led to domestic turmoil and the decay of the U.S. army — exactly what the country faced by the late 1960s due to a different war under a different administration. Eisenhower rejected this path even before his inauguration.

The alternatives were either to move toward a nuclear Armageddon or to seize the window of opportunity opened by Stalin’s death. For Eisenhower, the choice was clear, and after 1953, on his list of achievements, he consistently placed the Korean peace above the Normandy landing or the economic boom of the 1950s.

His biographer, Stephen Ambrose, believes that “Just as de Gaulle almost nine years later was the only Frenchman whose prestige was great enough to allow him to end the war in Algeria without himself being overthrown, so too was Eisenhower the only American who could have found and made stick what Eisenhower called ‘an acceptable solution to a problem that almost defied . . . solution.’”

Syngman Rhee also gained his share of fame. While formally conceding to Robertson on all points, he nevertheless secured the main prize — a military alliance with the U.S. “The agreement was a triumph for Rhee,” writes historian Richard Allen. “If it did not guarantee Korean unification, it nonetheless embodied promises which Rhee had sought for years: the protection afforded by a mutual defense treaty with a great power, coupled with a commitment that he would be consulted on all matters affecting Korea. On top of this there was the prospect of large-scale economic aid for his country.”

His South Korean counterpart, Yeon-pyo Hong, however, reminds us that Rhee’s success was also due to the limited room for maneuver available to Washington. In light of the global confrontation between open and closed political systems, the U.S. could not abandon South Korea to its own devices. Still, South Korean historians consider that in the summer of 1953, Rhee achieved an outstanding result.

Moreover, according to General Clark, in that last month of the war — a month of fighting that might have been avoided had Rhee not prolonged the conflict with his prisoner crisis — the UN forces lost 25,000 men killed and wounded.