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Editor:
This mess we have with North Korea dramatically illustrates what can happen when politicians get involved in fighting wars.
After World War II, Joseph Stalin demanded that the entire peninsula of Korea come under Soviet influence. Upon the urging of our State Department, influenced by the Communist Alger Hiss, we compromised and divided the peninsula into North Korea and South Korea.
In 1950, North Korea overran South Korea and the situation looked pretty hopeless for the south. Chinese troops crossed North Korea's northern border, the Yalu River and swarmed over the south.
Then General Douglas MacArthur executed his brilliant Inchon landing and outflanked the Reds and put them on the run. He then wanted to cross the Yalu River and bomb the Chinese and take the entire peninsula. Harry Truman fired MacArthur and Korea went back to its former borders.
What has been the result of this fiasco? North Korea has been under an oppressive communist dictatorship that has starved its people and murdered its opposition. It is roughly the size of the state of Ohio and is loaded with natural resources such as coal, iron ore, tungsten, gold and nickel. With a population of 25 million, it has an economy of $40 billion. The average annual income per person is $1,800.
On the other hand, South Korea is much smaller than its neighbor to the north and has few natural resources. Yet it has a ship building industry, huge steel mills, car and truck manufacturing and a technological industry that makes phones and televisions. With a population of 50 million people, it boasts an economy of $2 trillion and an average per capita income of $34,000.
That is the tale of two countries, one under communism and the other under democracy.
Now North Korea is a nuclear missile threat and a menace to the world. How different things would be had we listened to Douglas MacArthur and kept the politicians and ideologues out of the war business.
Lloyd Berresford
Hanoverton