75th Anniversary of the Korean War

June 25th marks the 75th anniversary of the start of the Korean War. 

This conflict is known as ‘the forgotten war’ - it was overshadowed by the Second World War which had ended a few years before, and the Vietnam war which followed. Yet this brutal struggle claimed the lives of millions of North and South Koreans, and resulted in over 100,000 casualties for the United Nations forces involved. 

It was also this conflict which militarised and globalised the Cold War. 

As historian David Reynolds wrote on the 70th Anniversary of this conflict: ‘The decisions taken by Truman and his advisers over the next six months redefined the Cold War. That story is less familiar than some of the European dramas of the time, such as the Marshall Plan and the Berlin Airlift. Yet the Korean War of 1950-53 left legacies with which the world is still wrestling today.’.

https://www.newstatesman.com/writers/320610

For IBDP history students studying the Cold War, the invasion of South Korea by North Korea in 1950 is one of the ‘crises’ that can be studied due to the escalation in tension between the superpowers that this event caused; it is covered on the site here:

Reynold's last point in the quote above that it left ‘legacies with which the world is still wrestling today’ is another reason why this anniversary of the Korean War is also worth exploring with students. The armistice line of 1953 still remains as a heavily fortified border, and North Korea and South Korea are defined by the events of 1950 to 1953. See this article by historian Benjamin Young for an analysis of the legacy of the war:

80th Anniversary of the United Nations

June is also the 80th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations; again, this is worth discussing with all students given the perilous state that the UN is currently in with the key global powers ignoring the UN over key conflicts - and undermining the ideals which originally underpinned its founding.

Curriculum update

Site Update

This is the time of year when many of your first year IB students will be getting started on IAs and Extended Essays. With this in mind, we have uploaded a new IA and a new EE to the exemplar pages;

History in the news

Last month, a new statue of Stalin was unveiled in Moscow's metro causing controversy in some quarters, and highlighting the attempt by Putin to rehabilitate Stalin and the legacy of the Soviet Union. This is part of a trend; in 2023, new history textbooks were introduced in schools which also show Putin's attempt to control the historical narrative of this period and - as BBC's Russian correspondent Steve Rosenberg argues -  to 'reshape Russia's past to justify the present'.

In the following video clip, Steve Rosenberg examines the significance of the statue and Putin's recent comment that, in fact, the Soviet Union was never dissolved. ‘The past [in Russia]’, Rosenberg says, ‘is constantly changing’.

A good topic to discuss in TOK!