It will definitely go down as one of the biggest failures of mankind. Especially since it was so easily preventable if MacArthur was permitted to just take the whole peninsula.
China was already sending troops and material to the front lines when MacArthur was ordered to stand down. Pushing further would have meant a hot war with China.
There is no way we could match them in numbers on the ground. Such a conflict would have inevitably led to us nuking them as a result. Which is probably the reason decision makers chose not to.
And maybe that's really the humanitarian failure. That USA didn't nuke China in 1950 or 1951. Would have solved a lot of problems for generations of people.
Maybe the real humanitarian failure is that the US didn't nuke everybody and start over from the stone age. Can't any societal problems if no societies exist, right?
Does any serious historian believe that fully defeating the Soviet Union after WWII would have been possible? Even with the advantage of nuclear weapons, I doubt the US would have made it very far.
Grow an "ender" first. And when you do try - keep in mind that many tried before you. The Swedes. The French. The Germans. They all got their comeuppance, and so will you.
Or how about us not blowing them to bits in the first place? South Korea was on the very edge of capitulation before the US came in full force and even most South Korean citizens were in support of Korean unification at that time. The current state of North Korea would have never come to reality if they hadn't been blown to bits by the US because of big ol' scary "communism".
What makes 1950s Korea evil? You are equating North Korea today with Korea of 75 years ago, they aren't even remotely similar. You don't think your nation getting bombed to literal fields of rubble wouldn't change views and political stances afterwards?
Unification was supported by both sides among the people, most South Koreans supported communism and 70% of them supported unification with the North. South Koreans didn't even support their own government, they were dealing with internal insurrection from their own people. The North was an industrialized nation and the South was a poor farming country and their unification would of been hugely beneficial to both. The war would have been over in another 2 weeks without intervention and a minimal amount of casualties, and it had only been 3 months from the start of the invasion. The only people not in support of it at the time was the political leaders of SK at the time because it meant they personally as individuals would lose power and wealth, and the US who was on a crusade to crush and kill anybody who dared support communism. Korea never should have been split in the first place, but the US and USSR had to be little bitches and force their will upon these people.
Killing 5 million people, most of which were innocent civilians, in the name of "fighting communism" is evil, not the idea of a unified nation of people supported by those same people.
Soviet occupation. Korea was supposed to be unified and elect a government back in 1950, Soviets made sure it didn't happen because they had no chance of winning.
So it was evil because the soviets supported the North? Because communism?
Pretty sure the soviets were perfectly fine with the North taking the South considering the South was US aligned which gave the US a foothold right on their doorstep. And again, the vast majority of Korean people on both sides supported Korean unification. The South Korean leadership, which was basically appointed by the US for their pro-US and anti-communism stance, was so unpopular among South Koreans that there was civilian insurrectionists trying to topple it. The South Korean military upon invasion couldn't even keep its own troops from deserting in significant numbers, and they even blew up a bridge full of refuges to try and stop the advance which it failed to do.
Yes the North invaded which is generally bad, but they did do it with popular sentiment among the people, and they weren't attacking and killing civilians along the way.
And regardless of all that, none of that justifies the US response of bombing and killing millions of civilians and leveling entire cities. The Korean War is considered the most deadly war in Asia ever, and had far higher percentage of civilian casualties than WWII and Vietnam.
Funny you should ask, but yes, communism is evil. Whenever somebody promises a classless society you can be sure they're about to enslave, kill and torture people in great numbers.
I guess if I have to explain it I might as well not bother.