What makes a "just" war?

These Humanities type courses are always very interesting to be a part of. From the conversations to the Field Experiences, I can truly say that I have a unique understanding of what the world is and how it works thanks to these courses. The last term of our Humanities course, Policy, was all about laws, and legislation. The last unit of this term, however, was all about wars and the policies passed during those wars. We even went to the National Veteran's Art Museum(NVAM) here in Chicago to start thinking about how art has expressions about the policies that were popular during their respective wars. These conversations and Field Experiences got us thinking about the validity of some of the wars we've talked about. And that's what led us to this Action Project. We were tasked with choosing a war and coming up with a verdict on whether the war was just or unjust and to provide details about the war as well as the reasoning behind why the war was just or unjust. Here is my version of the project. Enjoy! 

By  Container: Cbsnews.com Year: 2018 URL: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-korean-war-timeline/

    The Korean war is one of the least known wars in America even though some of our late family members like grandfathers, great uncles and such may have told us of their service in the war. The question is though, how much do we not know about this war? Let’s start with the basics. The Korean war was fought in the general area of Korea; North Korea, South Korea, Cambodia, Laos, and the bulk of Southeast Asia. It began on June 25th of 1950 and ended in 1953. The main powers in this war were obviously North Korea and South Korea, but the U.S was aiding South Korea while communist china decided to help north Korea. Unlike most wars that have wildly interesting tactics for winning the war, the Korean war was as simple as ever when it came to winning tactics. Night operations and infiltration were the primary strategies used, and they worked to some extent but didn't lead to a victory at all. The underlying reason was communism. Five years after the country’s partition, the communist leader of North Korea, Kim Il Sung, decided to try and to reunify Korea under his control. So on the 25 of June in the year 1950, Kim launched a surprise invasion of South Korea. Based on this basic analysis of the Korean war, we can start to discern whether this war was truly just or not. North Korea was trying to expand its communist agenda onto another country, and South Korea wasn't open to the idea at all. Self-defense is always a just reason for retaliation and that’s exactly what happened here.

    According to History.com, “On April 14, 1950, Truman received a document called the National Security Council, Paper Number 68 (NSC-68). Created by the Defense Department, the State Department, the CIA, and other agencies, it advised the president to grow the defense industry to counter what these agencies saw as the threat of global communism. The recommendations cemented Truman’s next move.” His next move was to issue out orders for the U.S army to participate in the Korean War. This simple document was kickstarted by another event though, and it was definitely more life-threatening than simple communism. The start of that document was instigated by the previous leaking of the U.S’s nuclear bomb program to the soviets. This gave rise to paranoia about the cold war and thus prompted the National Security Council Paper to be taken a little more seriously thus encouraging the U.S even further to get involved in this war where North Korea was backed by the Soviets.

    Out of the U.S’s involvement in the Korean war, there was an interesting act passed that changed a lot. It was called the defense production act of 1950 and it, essentially, expedited and expanded the supply of materials and services from the U.S industrial base, in order to promote national defense. Proposed by the 81st United States Congress, this act was in direct correlation with the civil defense and war mobilization effort in reference to the Cold War. It has three purposes: “The first authorizes the president to require businesses to accept and prioritize contracts for materials deemed necessary for national defense, regardless of a loss incurred on business. The second section authorizes the president to establish mechanisms to allocate materials, services, and facilities to promote national defense. The third section authorizes the president to control the civilian economy so that scarce and critical materials necessary to the national defense effort are available for defense needs.”

    This act allowed for the requisition of materials and property, fixed prices and wages, institute credit controls, and forced settlement of some labor disputes. An example of this act in use during the current day would be against the COVID-19 pandemic that the world has been facing. This act was invoked to require by law that certain measures be taken and equipment be issued to fight against this pandemic which could be considered a matter of national defense.

    After all of the information gathered about this war, the acts surrounding it, and the effects both of them had on even our world today, it could be concluded that this war itself was in fact just. The war was fought against the idea of communist rule with the U.S as an ally and brought about the defense production act that then gave rise to some reliable services and protocols that are integrated in today’s society. Even though this war is one of the less known ones, it was pretty prominent as to the structure of the modern-day and it also wasn’t fought over the behalf of questionable ideals, thus making this war and its outcomes completely just.

Work cited:

By Container: Khanacademy.org Year: 2021 URL: https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/postwarera/1950s-america/a/the-korean-war#:~:text=The%20United%20States%20came%20to,also%20covertly%20supported%20North%20Korea.

By Wikipedia Contributors Container: Wikipedia Publisher: Wikimedia Foundation Year: 2021 URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defense_Production_Act_of_1950

By Jessica Pearce Rotondi Container: HISTORY Publisher: HISTORY Year: 2021 URL: https://www.history.com/news/korean-war-causes-us-involvement#:~:text=On%20June%2027%2C%201950%2C%20President,the%20aid%20of%20their%20allies.%E2%80%9D

By Erin Blakemore Container: HISTORY Publisher: HISTORY Year: 2020 URL: https://www.history.com/news/defense-production-act-cold-war-emergency-truman

By Container: Fema.gov Year: 2016 URL: https://www.fema.gov/disasters/defense-production-act