Soviet interests drew China into Korean War
- Source: Global Times
- [21:40 June 17 2010]
- Comments
Shen Zhihua
Editor's Note:
June 25 is the 60th anniversary of the start of the Korean War(1950-53). In a dialogue published Thursday, Professor Shen Zhihua (Shen) analyzed the reasons why the Soviet Union planned the war and why the US responded so quickly. But how was China drawn in to aid North Korea? What was the Soviet reaction? Global Times (GT) reporter Li Yanjie interviewed Shen, director of the Shanghai-based Center for Cold War International History Studies and a professor of history at East China Normal University. He is the author of Mao Zedong, Stalin and the Korean War and many other works on the Korean War. This is the second part of a two-part series.
GT: Why didn't the Soviet representative to the UN veto the UN intervention to help South Korea, since the Soviet Union had planned the war?
Shen: The Soviet Union announced a temporary withdrawal from the UN to support the PRC before the Korean War, because the UN only recognized the Chiang Kai-shek government in Taiwan. Surely the Soviet Union could have attended the UN conference and expressed its opinion on the Korean War, but it didn't. The reasons are still a puzzle.
A telegram from Stalin to Klement Gottwald, the then-Czechoslovakia's Communist Party leader, revealed by a Russian scholar several years ago, showed that the Soviet Union intentionally didn't attend the conference. Stalin said that in this way, the US decision was illegal with the absence of two big powers (the Soviet Union and the PRC), and the US would make its real intentions clear on the Korean issue and make more silly mistakes.
This telegram implies that Stalin had predicted that the US would enter the war and thus created the conditions for the US to get involved and trapped in the Far East. As a result, US forces in Europe would be weakened and World War III would be postponed.
But I don't agree with this interpretation. The Soviet Union withdrew from the UN on January 13, 1950, yet it wasn't until the end of January that it approved Kim Il-sung's plan. And the withdrawal was made after discussion with China. This contradicted Stalin's telegram meaning to let the US in, and then China would be in.
Besides, Stalin agreed to Kim's plan only under the premise that the US wouldn't intervene, which also proves that Stalin didn't hope the US would enter the war.
In addition, after the war broke out, the Soviet Union was slow to openly react, which shows they were caught off-guard by events. It wasn't appropriate to veto the UN's decision, signaling their support of North Korea, or to agree, which would have been seen as treachery by North Korea.
