It will probably be useful to the uninformed reader, as I was when first told of my destination to provide an overview of, and to write a little about Korea where I was to fight and the Korean War in which I was destined to serve. It was a war that few people in the UK knew about at the time and even less today are aware that it was fought. Sad but true. It was too at a time when the Cold War was at its height and whatever way one looked at it the international situation was exceedingly perilous with Russia fomenting trouble in the west and Communist China in the east where the Chinese Army was along the border with the British colony of Hong Kong. To an extent it could be said that the Korean War was a trial of strength and of will between the communist led countries and the democracies.
Korea is a country in Asia occupying the peninsula projecting southwards from Manchuria having the Yellow Sea on the West and the Sea of Japan on the West. The north is largely mountainous the south less so. It has a long history dating back to about 2,000 B.C. and in which the Japanese had an interest, invading it as early as the 16th century and laying it to waste. They returned in 1910, annexed it, and colonized it. Industry was introduced in the north intensive agriculture in the south. Overall it retained its peasant like culture. The principal town in the north was Pyongyang and Seoul in the south. The climate is intensely cold in winter exceedingly hot and humid in the summer.
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