Is the UN Role in Korea 1947-1953 the Model Being Repeated Today?

I. The United Nations

The United Nations (UN) is a globally inclusive international security organization that grew out of a war-time military alliance fighting against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan and their Axis allies. The 26 nations and the governments in exile that signed the Declaration by the United Nations on January 1, 1942 pledged “not to make a separate armistice or peace. . .” but to seek “complete victory over their enemies.”[1] As that victory drew closer in 1945, the United States (US) submitted a draft to its war time partners the United Kingdom (UK), the Soviet Union (SU) and China for a Charter for the UN. The US and SU insisted that their membership would be conditional upon the agreement that no substantive action would be taken by the organization without concurrence of the major powers (US, SU, UK, France and China). The draft with amendments was agreed to by 50 nations at the United Nations Conference on International Organization, (April 25–June 26, 1945) in San Francisco. The main purpose of the organization stated in the Charter is to maintain international peace and security.

A General Assembly was provided to discuss and make recommendations on all questions. A Security Council was provided to take decisions on questions of peace and security that would be binding on the member states to enforce. The condition imposed on the organization by the US and SU is embodied in the Charter in Article 27 where the voting procedure of the Security Council requires that all decisions on non-procedural (i.e., substantive) matters must include the concurring votes of the five members given permanent seats on that Council (China, France, SU, UK, and US).

Among the principles of the organization agreed to in the Charter are sovereign equality of all its Members, refrain in international relations from the threat or use of force, and the non intervention in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state.[2]

II. Korea: Background

Korea has been a single nation for at least 1000 years with a continuous society, language and political system. In 1943, a Korean in exile wrote that “When the ancestors of northern Europe were wandering in the forests, clad in skins and practicing rites, Koreans had a government of their own and attained a high degree of civilization”.[3] Koreans had a national governance system before some Europeans gathered themselves together and started to form nations.

There was foreign influence on Korean society especially from China but never long lasting foreign domination. Koreans had turned back, with some help from China, military action by Japan in 1593 and 1597 trying to subordinate their country. Korea remained independent despite 400 years of efforts of bigger powers to dominate it. That is until Japan defeated China in the First Sino-Japanese War in 1895 and Russia in the Russo-Japanese War in 1905, and the big powers acquiesced to the Japanese annexation of Korea in 1910. Before and during the annexation, Koreans continuously struggled for their independence. Japanese colonization of Korea ended on August 15, 1945 when Japan surrendered unconditionally to end the Second World War (WWII).

Perhaps we could say that modern Korea begins with the liberation of Korea with the surrender of Japan. That liberation however was coupled with the arbitrary drawing by the US of a dividing line at the 38th Parallel on August 10 1945. The SU accepted the US proposal of a zonal division of Korea for the purpose of receiving the surrender of the 600,000 Japanese military personnel and the colonial government. But that led to a division between northern and southern Korea. The American historian Bruce Cumings places the beginning of the Korean War at these two events in 1945, liberation and division. Three years later in 1948 the UN give the division its sanction and almost 5 years later military hostilities broke out between South and North Korea again with the UN giving its sanction this time to internationalization of the military conflict.

III. The UN and Korea: 1948.

After WWII, the question of the future of Korea was addressed internationally by the US, SU and UK at the Moscow Conference of Foreign Ministers in Dec 1945. It was agreed that a Joint Commission would be drawn from the US and SU commands in their respective zones to assist in forming a provisional Korean government. The SU aimed for quick independence for Korea while the US aimed for a four power trusteeship. The conference agreed to the formation of a provisional government under a trusteeship of not more than five years.[4] There were no Koreans at the Moscow Conference or at any previous discussion by the allies about Korea. Apparently ignored in Moscow was the fact that the Korean nationalist and revolutionary resistance to Japanese colonialism emerged after the surrender of Japan and by September 1945 had formed a Korean People’s Republic with Peoples Committees throughout the Peninsula. In 1945-46, these Peoples Committees were incorporated into the Soviet Union’s occupation governance north of the 38th Parallel but were suppressed by the US Army Military Government in Korea (USAMGIK) in the US zone.[5]

By the summer of 1947, it was clear that the bilateral Joint Commission was failing to make progress toward formation of a provisional Korean government. The US State Department had been planning since at least 1946 for the possible involvement of the UN if the US and the SU were unable to make progress agreeable to the US. This despite the agreement among the major powers that the UN was not to handle questions arising in connection with peace treaties or other actions at the end of WWII. Also, as American journalist IF Stone argues, since the organization was founded to take actions only upon which all the major powers agree, to “take a hand in a dispute between the United States and the USSR was itself unwise”.[6] In any case, by 1947 the US State Department planning included involving the UN in elections to establish a separate provisional government in its zone.[7]

In September 1947, the US brought the “problem of Korean independence” to the UN. Not to the Security Council which could take action if necessary to enforce a solution but also where a SU veto was possible but to the General Assembly, which has according to the Charter only the powers to “discuss” and “recommend” or “call the attention of the Security Council to situations which are likely to endanger international peace and security”.[8] The SU challenged the US arguing that the question of Korea was a product of WWII, being only properly addressed by the parties to the Moscow Agreement issued at the end of the Moscow Conference.

The SU countered with a proposal at the Joint Commission and later at the General Assembly that both sides remove their troops by the beginning of 1948 to allow “the Korean people itself the establishment of a national government in Korea”.[9] A survey found that 57% of Koreans living in the US zone supported that proposal.[10] But the US had made the tactical decision to involve the UN before it would remove its troops.

The General Assembly voted, over SU objections and arguments, to put the question of the “problem of the Independence of Korea” on its agenda. The SU rejected the legitimacy of the General Assembly debating this question but submitted proposals as did the US. The SU proposals defended the right of self determination of the Korean people and required that Koreans participate in the UN debate over their independence. The US proposed amendments to the SU proposal requiring oversight of the choice of which Koreans to participate by a commission sent to Korea. Sending such a commission was seen as a substantive action by the SU which argued such action must be decided only by the Security Council.

The General Assembly eventually passed a resolution[11] based on the SU draft recognizing the “rightful claims of the people of Korea to independence” but totally changed with the US amendments establishing a United Nations Temporary Commission on Korea (UNTCOK) to travel, observe and hold consultations throughout Korea to facilitate participation of representatives of the Korean people. The US had also specified the nine member nations to serve on the commission and the recommendation to hold elections toward formation of a national assembly. The language of the resolution seemed to treat the Korean people as one nation and set as its purpose the independence of that nation.

The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (Ukraine) designated in the resolution as a commission member announced it would not serve on the UNTCOK. It argued that the resolution violated the Charter and the Korean people’s right to self-determination. If any commission should be sent, the Ukraine delegate argued, it should be made up of neutral persons not government representatives responsive to US instructions. The SU rejected the legitimacy of the process and result and made clear its intention not to cooperate with the UNTCOK. Canada was reluctant to participate on the commission but eventually sent a participant.

The General Assembly sent UNTCOK to Korea with the mandate to “facilitate and expedite the attainment of the national independence of Korea and withdrawal of occupying forces.” A secretariat was organized for UNTCOK with Victor Hoo, a former official in the Nationalist Chinese government who had close relations with rightists in Korea.[12] The commissioners arrived in Seoul in the US zone in January 1948 adopting a resolution that “every opportunity be taken to make it clear that the sphere of this Commission is the whole of Korea and not merely a section”.[13] They immediately found two obstacles to fulfilling their mandate. First, the SU stood firm in its rejection of the legitimacy of UNTCOK which therefore could not consult or observe in the SU zone. Second, the social and political situation in the US zone meant UNTCOK could not consult with many leftist parties and individuals because it found that they were in exile, in prison, dead, under police surveillance or in hiding due to the suppression of left wing activity in that zone. The US military government had outlawed the Korean Communist Party in May 1946.

Three UNTCOK commissioners favored helping establish a separate South Korean state. However, after less than one month there was agreement UNTCOK could not observe a national election and should report this back to the newly created Interim Committee of the General Assembly. UNTCOK asked the Interim Committee if it should continue efforts to only consider the whole of Korea or whether under the actual circumstances it was “open to or incumbent upon the Commission” to implement its work just in the US zone?

The Interim Committee had been created by the General Assembly on November 13, 1947, the day before it created the UNTCOK. The US State Department had introduced the draft resolution creating the Interim Committee in part because the US was dissatisfied with the use of the veto by the SU in the Security Council.[14] Already in 1947, the US was changing or molding the UN to become an organization where it could get international sanction for action it wanted to take with or without SU agreement. The SU and its allies were too weak and too few in number to prevent such use of the UN except by veto in the Security Council. Some other governments which might have wanted to keep the UN out of taking sides in disputes between the major powers made the judgment it was in their national interest to align with the US because the US was the main source of international aid and loans or out fear of the spread of socialism or to cement its alliance with the US. But also, with the defeat of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, the US gave the appearance of being on a high moral ground opposing fascism, colonialism and championing democracy, if only rhetorically.

The SU strongly opposed the resolution creating the Interim Committee as an attempt to diminish the Security Council’s primacy and to nullify the founding agreement of unanimity on questions of substance. When UNTCOK turned to the Interim Committee for guidance, the SU characterized that move as “an illegal Commission seeking instructions from an illegal Committee.”[15]

For the US, the outcome of the Interim Committee consideration was crucial to it plans to be able to have a presence on the Asian mainland while also able to withdraw it troops from Korea. But many nations friendly to the US feared the response the US wanted to the UNTCOK request “would actually result in permanent division and two hostile governments.” [16] Brazil proposed a ten day adjournment to give time to study the question. During the ten days there were consultations at the highest level as the US government sought to convince its allies of the importance to it of their support. India, Canada and Australia particularly opposed the direction the US wanted to go with an election as the first stage in the formation of a separate South Korean state.[17]

The US was successful in winning India over. Australia and Canada remained opposed. But in any case the vote on the US resolution was 34 in favor, two against and 11 abstentions. The SU and its close allies did not participate. The answer the Interim Committee voted to send to UNTCOK was that it is incumbent on UNTCOK to implement the program as outlined in the original General Assembly resolution “in such parts of Korea as are accessible to the Commission.” The abstentions were three Latin American and three Scandinavian. These allies of the US worried about the consequences.[18] The US had its victory and seemed unmoved by the warnings of its allies and friends.