The
Beginning of Military Exchanges among the U.S., South Korea, and South
Vietnam in the 1950s"
Haruka Matsuda, Fox International Fellow, Yale Center for International
and Area Studies, Yale University; Ph. D. Candidate, Department of Area
Studies, The University of Tokyo
The
Republic of Korea (South Korea) engaged its army in the Vietnam War from
1964 to 1973. The number of participating South Korean soldiers was 30,000,
the second largest number among "Free World" participants. Also,
The People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) sent its 200 Air Force fighters
secretly to help North Vietnam. Previous studies on the South Korea's
involvement into the Vietnam War have referred to its initial proposal
to commit itself to this war and its motivation to obtain economic and
military support from the United States. In order to fully understand
the South Korea's involvement in the Vietnam War, this paper will focus
on the military exchanges among the U.S., South Korea, and South Vietnam
in the 1950s by studying U.S. and Korean primary sources such as Foreign
Relations of the United States (FRUS), Documents of the National Security
Council (microfilm), and Hankuk Uegyo Munso [Korean Diplomatic Correspondence,
microfilm]. After the outbreak of the Korean War (1950-1953), the U.S.
government became increasingly interested in Southeast Asia, discussing
its direct involvement in the first Indochina War after the end of the
Korean War. It had been invested Korean involvement since Syng-man Rhee
had proposed to dispatch his army. The U.S. ended up its involvement of
the U.S. with Korea in 1954 primary because France had disagreed with
the participation of the two countries, and it also assumed that it would
not be able to obtain domestic support. The U.S., however, did not rule
out the future possibility of its involvement.
Actually, studies argued that Syng-man Rhee took a positive attitude toward
dispatching the South Korean army. The U.S. government, however, subsequently
examined the possibility of dispatching Korean troops to Indochina. It
searched for "united actions" with other countries including
South Korea in order to get approval from the Congress after the U.S.
had declined Rhee's first suggestion to dispatch the Korean army. So,
it is difficult to say that only Syng-man Rhee was positive about the
prospects of sending his troops. The U.S. had attempted to dispatch the
Korean army, but it never realized this goal in the 1950s. Although the
U.S. had declined the proposals by Rhee, military relations between South
Korea and South Vietnam began after that. For example, the two nations
started inspections of each other's troops in 1954. Soon after South Vietnam's
establishment in 1955, South Korea and South Vietnam established diplomatic
relations with each other. In the 1950s, the military exchanges between
two countries, which the U.S. mediated, had deepened, though it never
became a military alliance. Such exchanges are also one factor for South
Korean involvement into the Vietnam War.
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