SIXTY YEARS AGO - AT 8:16 A.M. ET:  We note that the Korean War began 60 years ago today, with the Soviet-sponsored North Korean invasion of South Korea.  And the North Koreans still haven't learned.

President Truman's vigorous response to the invasion was a critical element in setting the tone for the Cold War – that we would in fact resist aggression.  Ah, those were the days, when the Democratic Party was a national-defense party. 

Historian Arthur Herman has an excellent retrospective on Korea here.  He observes:

...above all Korea had shown that America would stand by its commitments, even through a seething maze of obstacles and setbacks. Korea was the worst possible place for a war, one Truman advisor, Averell Harriman, observed; but "no weakness of purpose here." It's a powerful lesson for another worst possible place for a war, Afghanistan, 60 years later.

The Berlin Wall is gone, but the DMZ on the 38th parallel remains, the dividing line between totalitarianism and freedom, between the Stalinist darkness of North Korea and prosperous and open society of South Korea. Thirty-six thousand Americans gave their lives to establish it, and 28,000 Americans are holding it there still.

COMMENT:  The war was brought to a close in 1953 by the new president, Dwight D. Eisenhower, who threatened to use nuclear weapons if the North Koreans, and, by extension, their Soviet sponsors, did not agree to a reasonable armistice.  They did agree.

We have a very different Democratic Party today, weighed down by its irrational, adolescent left wing.  Harry Truman wouldn't recognize this party, but he'd have a few choice words to say about it.

June 25,  2010