Evening star., 1950-09-28
The Job Ahead in Korea

With the news indicating that Communist
aggressors from the north are now in the process
of being wiped out as an organized fighting force,
the United Nations cannot afford to lose any time
in taking affirmative action on the problem of
Korea'S future.
The problem is one whose magnitude is self
evident. Militarily politically and economically,
it involves questions of the most complex kind,
and the answers-at least in preliminary sense
must be found at the earliest possible moment,
not by the United States alone but Jointly by all
the members of the U. N. now meeting in the
General Assembly.
Militarily if they do not surrender formally,
the aggressor forces will almost certainly be
destroyed in the near future. But remnants of
them probably will continue to operate as guer
rillas for some time to come which means that
special armed units-presumably to be made up of
South Korean troops-will have to be maintained
to deal with them. BY the same token, the
U. N.muSt reckon with the possibility of formal
eapitulation and the immediate steps to be taken
as regards the 38th Parallel-which must be
erased as dividing line-and the occupation
Of the north. ~.s .-.
simultaneously, the U. N. must ready itself
With a program of action in the long range
political and economic sphere. AS has been made
clear by reports from Seoul and other places, the
futile resistance of the aggreSsors has resulted in
such widespread devastation that the Korean
people as whole-much as they may hate the
CommuniStS-muSt find liberation anything but
an unmixed blessing. Their homes, their schools
their churches, their shrines their industries
have been hard hit on large scale, and what
will be needed now is not merely vast amount
Of physical reconstruction but also psychological
rehabilitation of a sort that will spread hope
throughout the country-hope founded on a
realization that this war for freedom has not
been fought in vain
Accordingly in addition to arranging for
peace that will do away with partition and
set up unified and independent country with
reasonable safeguards against further aggression,
the United Nations must undertake an extraor-
binary cooperative effort for the relief and
rebuilding of this tortured land As Secretary
AcheSon has said to the General Assembly, the
cooperation should come from all the members
that have taken their stand against the crime
committed by the northern Reds all So should
contribute generously in various ways they
: should doso.not only to create new and hopeful
Korea, but11 demonstrate to peoples everywhere
that the battle for freedom is worthwhile and
that the non-Soviet world is determined to wage
, it to the full with effective collective action.
AS for our own country whose forces have
.- constituted the-bu of the U.-N.is military
strength against the Red aggressors- -official
policy is against the idea of retaining Korea as
an American base or of keeping most of our troops
over there for occupation duty, duty which other
members of the United Nations could well assume
The only thing the United States seeks in that
region Of the world is peace-peace in country
unpartitioned and free to be its own master
That objective is something that the Kremlin
probably will keep on opposing. But the job that
needs to be done in Korea can and will be done
if there is continuing unity and cooperation on
the part of the SO nations that have joined
together in forging the historic defeat now
overtaking the aggressor