The Korean War: The Untold Truth

Chapter 2 Translator's Preface (2)
In fact, there is nothing wrong with the concept and method of "self-centered" in the history of war. Historians from all over the world almost do this intentionally or unintentionally, just don't go too far.However, some recent studies on the Korean War in the West intentionally or unintentionally "downplay" China's "role" and role, which is surprising.For example, Canadian scholar Robert Lee's book "The Korean War" in 2001 covered almost all issues related to the Korean War-historical background, current situation inside and outside the Korean Peninsula, McCarthyism in the United States, the situation of the Commonwealth, Stalin's struggle, etc. death, the impact of the war on women in the warring countries, racial and sexually transmitted diseases in the U.S. military, and so on—there is very little written about China.Such a huge country, in the three-year war with extremely simple equipment and at the cost of 36 casualties, was tied with the most powerful military force in the world, but it was almost "extinct" in the pen of this North Korean war expert, as if It is unbelievable that the Korean War was a 16-nation coalition fighting the "shadow".Coincidentally, Cummings' recent book "The Korean War: A History" does not have a chapter about China.The motives of Western historians’ “cold treatment” of China are still unknown. I don’t know whether there is some kind of subconscious thinking among mainstream and non-mainstream people today, “If you can’t win, why don’t you write about it?!”

Among the new round of "China-avoiding" writings in the West, the most incredible is the "Encyclopedia of Political, Social, and Military History of the Korean War" compiled by Spencer Tucker in 2002.In the 102-page "encyclopedia" written by 851 experts, only one author cited the 1995 book "Mao Zedong's Military Romanticism: China and the Korean War, 1950-1953" by Chinese scholar Zhang Shuguang ( 256), and also misspelled Zhang's name.At the same time, Tucker, the editor of this book, also declared that the sudden disappearance of the Volunteers after the first battle is still a mystery, "So far, there is no clear answer to the sudden withdrawal of the Chinese Volunteers" (p. 132).However, Zhang Shuguang described in detail the Chinese strategy of "playing hard to get" seven years ago, luring the coalition forces to continue northward, and finally making it a big mistake (pp. 104-107).Not only that, but the book has very little space for the South Korean army, the allied force of the United States. Most of the descriptions of the South Korean army are in passing, accompanied by an obvious contemptuous tone; But nothing big or small.In fact, the South Korean army has always been the main target of China's attack, especially during the first to fifth battles.It should be pointed out that before the publication of Tucker's Encyclopedia of the Korean War, the three-volume "History of the Korean War" by the Korean Institute of Military History had been translated and published by the University of Nebraska Press.Tucker's so-called "encyclopedia" book is actually full of Western troops in action.This kind of selective "picking" of history (cherry picking history) is at least not very professional.

In fact, Alan Melay's statement in 2010 that the Western historians have "reflected" and "excessively" the Korean War is at least one point untenable, that is, the Western Korean War historians have not yet publicly translated and published Chinese official Korean War history books , That is, "History of the Chinese People's Volunteers' War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea" published by the Academy of Military Sciences in 1988 and "History of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea" published in 2000.For the U.S. military and intelligence community, which has always made China a research focus, this is an incredible strategic "ignorance".Of course, the author does not know whether this "ignorance" was intentional or unintentional, but the feeling I have made with Western publishing houses for many years is that it is almost impossible to translate and publish Chinese history books and memoirs about the Korean War in their original form. .In 2001, a Chinese scholar studying in the United States translated selected chapters of the memoirs of several senior Chinese generals during the Korean War. He encountered various resistances when the publishing house reviewed the manuscript, and the manuscript was once put in the cold by the publishing house.The author participated in the "rescue" work, fought hard and "resurrected from the dead", deeply aware of the various ideological "forbidden areas" that can be understood but hard to express in the American publishing industry.

Whether it is the tendency of "going around China" or "going around South Korea" in the recent studies of the Western Korean War, in fact, it is not necessarily a matter of scholar's methodology and personal likes and dislikes.The late Columbia University professor Edward Said pointed out in his book "Orientalism" (Orientalism) published in 1978 that Western research on the Orient is based on shaping and distorting the Orient into the Orient imagined by the West. above.The reason why Western Orientalists do this is not out of ignorance, but to make the West’s cultural and ideological suppression of the East reasonable and legitimate. Therefore, the distorted image of the East in the eyes of the West is a tool for the West to rule the East.It should be pointed out that the so-called "Orientalism" does not obviously run through all the writings on the Korean War. However, "Orientalism" to varying degrees is ubiquitous.At the policy level, choosing not to understand the opponent due to ideological reasons is a taboo for military strategists.

[-]. China: keep pace with the times and face the future

Compared with Western centralism, China's research on the Korean War has been more open in recent years. Take the "History of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea" published by the Academy of Military Sciences in 2000 as an example. The book is richer and deeper than the 1988 edition of "History of War", and to a considerable extent more objective than its American counterparts.To give an example, in the Korean War Memorial Hall completed in Dandong in the early 90s, the root cause of the outbreak of the Korean War was defined as the civil war that broke out in 1948. The official positioning of the outbreak of the Korean War still continues the Cold War saying that the communist system means aggression.

Echoing the openness and inclusiveness of China’s research on the Korean War, China’s policy on the Korean Peninsula is also advancing with the times. Over the past 30 years, China's policy on the Korean Peninsula has gradually shaken off the shadow of history.The framework of the China-North Korea alliance remains, while China's policy toward the Korean peninsula abandons ideology and is increasingly neutral.In fact, as early as the 70s, Mao Zedong persuaded Kim Il Sung, who was once again hot-headed after the reunification of Vietnam in 1975, not to send troops south again.

Since the 80s, China's policy of impartiality and keeping pace with the times towards the Korean Peninsula has been established on the basis of profound reflection on history.The most profound lesson of the Korean War for China is at the strategic level. At the beginning of 1950, out of wariness against the CCP, which was independent of the Soviet Communist Party, Stalin finally agreed to the Kim Il Sung regime supported by the Soviet Union to go south to maintain and even expand the interests of the Soviet Union in Northeast Asia; he tried to get China to send troops to the United States through the Sino-Soviet alliance. Afterwards, it will assist North Korea to avoid direct confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States.North Korea's insistence on going its own way and the Soviet side's selfishness finally escalated the Korean Civil War into a historic confrontation between China and the United States.Although China stabilized the front line at the 38-degree line under extremely difficult circumstances, the results achieved and the price paid were huge.During the war, the upper and lower limits of the alliance between China and the Soviet Union and China and North Korea were greatly impacted, highlighting the contradictions and conflicts at the level of national interests, and paving the way for the future split between China and the Soviet Union.

In view of this, insisting on independence and formulating peninsula policy based on the merits and fundamental interests of the country is probably the most valuable experience given to China by the Korean War. In the early 80s, China began to pursue an independent foreign policy.On the North Korean issue, China opposes any behavior that undermines the stability of the peninsula, regardless of who it comes from; at the same time, it is committed to developing economic and trade relations with the North and the South and normal state relations. Since 2003, the six-party talks on the North Korean nuclear issue led by China have long gone beyond China’s own interests, and have taken regional stability and nuclear proliferation prevention as a higher pursuit goal; at the same time, they have created conditions to replace the armistice agreement with a peace agreement, so as to promote the US-DPRK Normalize the relationship.

In the world of the 21st century, the two poles end, one superpower dominates, and multiple poles loom. However, the situation on the peninsula is still confusing and dangerous.For China, which is realistic and future-oriented, how to interact with the United States, North Korea, and South Korea, which are still living in the past tense, and how to find a balance point in history, reality, and the future that not only safeguards China's interests, but also takes into account the glory and dreams of other countries is still an issue. A challenge to the intelligence and capabilities of China's political and intellectual elite.

30. Watch "Korean War: The Unrevealed Truth" after [-] years

Thirty years ago, when we began translating Joseph Gulden's just-published book, The Korean War: The Untold Truth, the international community was still bipolar, and the Cold War was not only continuing but intensifying: the Soviet Union Invaded Afghanistan in the last week of the 30s; on March 70, 1983, US President Reagan declared the Soviet Union an "Evil Empire", and on March 3 announced the implementation of the "Star Wars" plan aimed at gaining absolute nuclear superiority; on September 8 of the same year On the 3st, the Soviet Far East Homeland Defense Air Force shot down a Korean Air Boeing 23 passenger plane that entered the airspace of the Soviet Far East, killing all 9 passengers and crew members on board. At the end of the same year, NATO decided to deploy medium-range ballistic missiles in Europe.Gorbachev, the "Terminator of the Empire" of the Soviet Union, had to wait two years to enter the Kremlin, while the current Russian President Vladimir Putin had just entered the KGB school in Moscow.None of the politicians, scholars, and military intelligence figures in the West predicted that the Soviet "empire" would fall into crisis and collapse rapidly in the next few years.In Northeast Asia, China, which has just stepped into reform and opening up, has begun to undergo subtle changes in its attitude towards the Korean Peninsula.China is committed to maintaining political and economic relations with Pyongyang, but after the Yangon bombing on October 1, 747, China began to distance itself from North Korea on similar "international" issues.At the same time, China began to pay attention to South Korea's economic development model, and China-South Korea entrepot trade was also launched in 269.

While "looking ahead" to the Korean Peninsula issue, Chinese military historians have also begun to look back at the Korean War that ended 30 years ago.However, throughout the 80s, there were very few memoirs of generals, or other works and translations about the Korean War; the Korean War archives of various countries, including the Soviet Union, were still unpublished.This situation changed fundamentally in the 90s, and a large number of memoirs and works came out one after another.After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, some archives were released one after another, and scholars from all over the world went to "seek gold" one after another, and the study of the Korean War entered a golden age.

Gulden's "Korean War: The Unrevealed Truth" was published in 1982, just at a time when China and the world's research on the Korean War was gaining momentum but was inactive. This is also the background and background for our immediate translation power.As an early work of the Western "revisionist school", it provides readers with a brand new perspective covering politics, strategy and battlefield "interaction", and the large number of newly declassified internal US files it uses provide China's research on the history of the Korean War. some original material.Gulden's own critical discourse also differs from Western and American "orthodoxy". Today, 30 years later, when the academic circle of American Korean War history seems to have returned to the "orthodox school" and began to praise the war that could not be won and could not be let go (including Obama himself), Gulden's book is even more prominent. value.

Gulden's account is not perfect. His words often reveal contempt and even resentment towards the Volunteers. Some well-intentioned actions of the Volunteers, such as the release of prisoners of war, are denounced as "propaganda" in the standard "caliber" of the US military.In the first edition of PLA Press in 1990 (published in-house, titled The Korean War: The Untold Story), many of these "undesirable" elements were removed from Gulden's book.Under the historical conditions at that time, this approach was understandable. Today, 23 years later, China’s steady rise is irreversible; at the same time, China’s Korean war research and publishing system is also prolific, and a growing and mature Chinese readership is more tolerant of the future and history strength and self-confidence.Gulden's American concept is actually not surprising; it would be puzzling to expect Gulden to sort out the Korean War completely according to the Chinese side.In view of this, when republishing after 23 years, we try our best to maintain the style and viewpoint of the original work, which is also our trust and respect for the readers' perception.

[-]. Some notes about the first public publication of this book

More than 20 years later, Tan Feng, one of the original translators, and the author have both worked and lived overseas for many years, and have a more accurate understanding of some slang and professional terms in English, especially military terms.Tan Feng undertook most of the workload for proofreading this time.He is rigorous in his studies and never tired of writing. More than 30 years ago, when I was a graduate student in the International Journalism Class of the Graduate School of the Academy of Social Sciences, I benefited a lot from the co-translation of "Lippmann's Biography" with him;Li Mo and Zhang Qingli, editors-in-charge of Motie Books, are role models for the younger generation in the publishing industry with their high sense of responsibility, excellent professional quality and unique attention to detail.The re-proofreading and translation of this book also benefited from the various assistance provided by Mr. Ni Qisheng, the responsible editor of the internal edition of the People's Liberation Army Publishing House.Through the concerted efforts of this team, we believe that the quality of the manuscript has been greatly improved, the translation is more accurate, and the expression is more Chinese.Not only that, but the retranslated version has added more than 5 words, including the lives of people such as Rhee Syngman and Kim Il Sung, and for the first time included two chapters describing MacArthur's trip back to China after his dismissal.The details of the activities of these famous figures not only highlight their personalities, but also provide a dynamic social and political panorama for recreating the history of the Korean War.

Twenty-three years have passed, but the current situation in the peninsula is still unpredictable, and there are many differences in the discourses of various parties, which brings various inconveniences to the further "localization" of this book.In the re-editing process, we have tried to respect the uniqueness of the original book.Such as "North Korea" (Korea) and "North Korea" (North Korea), "Republic of Korea/South Korea" (ROK) and "South Korea" (South Korea), "Soviet Union" and "Russia" (Russia), "Manchuria" (Manchuria), etc., are all translated from the original text.In addition, place names such as "Seoul" and "Andong" all retain the old names under a specific historical environment. I hope this will help readers gain a deeper understanding of this tragic "limited war", which not only dominated the second half of the 23th century. The current situation in Northeast Asia is still hampering the multilateral interaction between China, the United States, Japan, Russia, North Korea and South Korea.

The Korean War, which ended 60 years ago, is drifting away after all.Today, the division between North and South is still there, and things are right but people are not.However, those 18 volunteers who will forever sleep in the three thousand miles of mountains and rivers in North Korea and the black waters of China's Baishan Mountains, those millions of heroes who forced the powerful US war machine to stop at the 60th parallel with primitive equipment and flesh and blood, As well as all the founders of the Republic, their great dedication in the "limited war" [-] years ago is an eternal monument in the hearts of younger generations.

Yu Bin

Professor of Political Science, American Cultural University

Senior Fellow, Shanghai American Society

Visiting Scholar, Institute for Strategic Studies, U.S. Army War College

Completed in Carlisle, PA on October 2013, 10
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