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Biological warfare (also known as germ warfare) is the use of biological toxins or infectious agents such as bacteria, viruses, and fungi with intent to kill or incapacitate humans, animals or plants as an act of war. Biological weapons (often termed "bio-weapons" or "bio-agents") are living organisms or replicating entities (viruses) that reproduce or replicate within their host victims. Entomological (insect) warfare is also considered a type of biological warfare.

Biological weapons may be employed in various ways to gain a strategic or tactical advantage over an adversary, either by threats or by actual deployments. Like some of the chemical weapons, biological weapons may also be useful as area denial weapons. These agents may be lethal or non-lethal, and may be targeted against a single individual, a group of people, or even an entire population. They may be developed, acquired, stockpiled or deployed by nation states or by non-national groups. In the latter case, or if a nation-state uses it clandestinely, it may also be considered bioterrorism.^[1]

There is an overlap between biological warfare and chemical warfare, as the use of toxins produced by living organisms is considered under the provisions of both the Biological Weapons Convention and the Chemical Weapons Convention. Toxins and Psychochemical weapons are often referred to as midspectrum agents. Unlike bioweapons, these midspectrum agents do not reproduce in their host and are typically characterized by shorter incubation periods.^[2]

Overview[link]

Offensive biological warfare, including mass production, stockpiling and use of biological weapons, was outlawed by the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). The rationale behind this treaty, which has been ratified or acceded to by 165 countries as of 2011, is to prevent a biological attack which could conceivably result in large numbers of civilian fatalities and cause severe disruption to economic and societal infrastructure.^{[citation needed]} Many countries, including signatories of the BWC, currently pursue research into the defense or protection against biological warfare, which is not prohibited by the BWC.

A nation or group that can pose a credible threat of mass casualty has the ability to alter the terms on which other nations or groups interact with it. Biological weapons allow for the potential to create a level of destruction and loss of life far in excess of nuclear, chemical or conventional weapons, relative to their mass and cost of development and storage. Therefore, biological agents may be useful as strategic deterrents in addition to their utility as offensive weapons on the battlefield.^[3][4]

As a tactical weapon for military use, a significant problem with a biological warfare attack is that it would take days to be effective, and therefore might not immediately stop an opposing force. Some biological agents (especially smallpox, plague, and tularemia) have the capability of person-to-person transmission via aerosolized respiratory droplets. This feature can be undesirable, as the agent(s) may be transmitted by this mechanism to unintended populations, including neutral or even friendly forces. While containment of biological warfare transmission is less of a concern for certain criminal or terrorist organizations, it remains a significant concern for the military and civilian populations of virtually all nations.

History[link]

Rudimentary forms of biological warfare have been practiced over and over again throughout history. Many examples are recorded from Antiquity.^[5] During the 6th century BC, the Assyrians poisoned enemy wells with a fungus that would render the enemy delirious. In 184 DC, Hannibal of Carthage had clay pots filled with venomous snakes and instructed his soldiers to throw the pots onto the decks of Pergamene ships.

Historical accounts from medieval Europe detail the use of infected animal carcasses, by Mongols, Turks and other groups, to infect enemy water supplies. Prior to the bubonic plague epidemic known as the Black Death, Mongol and Turkish armies were reported to have catapulted disease-laden corpses into besieged cities. The last known incident of using plague corpses for biological warfare purposes occurred in 1710, when Russian forces attacked the Swedes by flinging plague-infected corpses over the city walls of Reval (Tallinn).

The British army at least once attempted to use smallpox as a weapon, when they gave contaminated blankets to the Lenape during Pontiac's War (1763–66). It is suspected, but not confirmed, that biological warfare was used against the Indians at other times as well.

The advent of the germ theory and advances in bacteriology brought a new level of sophistication to the theoretical use of bio-agents in war. Biological sabotage – in the form of anthrax and glanders — was undertaken on behalf of the Imperial German government during World War I (1914–1918), with indifferent results.^[6] Use of such bioweapons was banned in international law by the Geneva Protocol of 1925. (The 1972 Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC) extended the ban to almost all production, storage and transport. However, both the Soviet Union and Iraq, at a minimum, secretly defied the treaty and continued research and production of offensive biological weapons, despite being signatories to it. Major public proof of the Soviet program, called Biopreparat, came when Dr. Kanatjan Alibekov, its first deputy director, defected to the U.S. in 1992.^[7])

During the Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945) and World War II (1939–1945), the Special Research Units of the Imperial Japanese Army, such as Unit 731, conducted human experimentation on thousands of Chinese, among others. In its military campaigns, the Japanese used biological warfare on Chinese soldiers and civilians. This employment has been largely viewed as ineffective due to inefficient delivery systems. However, firsthand accounts testify that the Japanese infected civilians through the distribution of plagued foodstuffs and newer estimates suggest over 580,000 victims, largely due to plague and cholera outbreaks.

In response to suspected biological warfare development in Nazi Germany, the U.S., U.K., and Canada initiated a biological warfare development program in 1941 that resulted in the weaponization of anthrax, brucellosis, and botulism toxin. (Fear of the German program turned out to be vastly exaggerated.) The center for U.S. military biological warfare research was Fort Detrick, Maryland.^[8] The biological and chemical weapons developed during that period were tested at the Dugway Proving Grounds in Utah. Research carried out in the U.K. during World War II left Gruinard Island in Scotland contaminated with anthrax for the next 48 years.

Considerable research into biological warfare was undertaken throughout the Cold War era (1947–1991) by the U.S., U.K. and U.S.S.R., and probably other major nations as well, although it is generally believed that such weapons were never used. This view was challenged by China and North Korea, who accused the U.S. of large-scale field testing of biological warfare against them during the Korean War (1950–1953), but this claim has been discredited as wartime propaganda. The U.S. maintained a stated national policy of never using biological warfare under any circumstances since an Executive Decision in November 1969, by President Richard Nixon. In 1972, the U.S., U.K., U.S.S.R., and many other nations signed the BWC, which banned "development, production and stockpiling of microbes or their poisonous products except in amounts necessary for protective and peaceful research." By then, the U.S. and U.K. had transparently destroyed all their bioweapons stockpiles. By 2011, 165 countries had signed the treaty and none are known-though some are still suspected-^[9] to possess any biological weapons.^[9]

Today, according to the U.S. Department of Defense, more than ten countries are suspected to have continuing offensive biological warfare programs, including Russia, Israel, China, Iran, Syria and North Korea. Offensive biological warfare programs in Iraq were dismantled after the first Gulf War (1990–1991). Libya dismantled and disavowed its biological warfare program in 2003. The fate of the vast network of clandestine sites comprising the old Soviet biological warfare program, as well as its many tons of weaponized smallpox, remains undocumented.

Modern biological warfare operations[link]

Offensive[link]

It has been argued that rational people would never use biological weapons offensively. The argument is that biological weapons cannot be controlled: the weapon could backfire and harm the army on the offensive, perhaps having even worse effects than on the target. An agent like smallpox or other airborne viruses would almost certainly spread worldwide and ultimately infect the user's home country. However, this argument does not necessarily apply to bacteria. For example, anthrax can easily be controlled and even created in a garden shed. Also, using microbial methods, bacteria can be suitably modified to be effective in only a narrow environmental range, the range of the target that distinctly differs from the army on the offensive. thus only the target might be affected adversely. The weapon may be further used to bog down an advancing army making them more vulnerable to counter attack by the defending force.

Anti-personnel[link]

The international biological hazard symbol

Ideal characteristics of a biological agent to be used as a weapon against humans are high infectivity, high virulence, non-availability of vaccines, and availability of an effective and efficient delivery system. Stability of the weaponized agent (ability of the agent to retain its infectivity and virulence after a prolonged period of storage) may also be desirable, particularly for military applications.

The primary difficulty is not the production of the biological agent, as many biological agents used in weapons can often be manufactured relatively quickly, cheaply and easily. Rather, it is the weaponization, storage and delivery in an effective vehicle to a vulnerable target that pose significant problems.

For example, Bacillus anthracis is considered an effective agent for several reasons. First, it forms hardy spores, perfect for dispersal aerosols. Second, this organism is not considered transmissible from person to person, and thus rarely if ever causes secondary infections. A pulmonary anthrax infection starts with ordinary influenza-like symptoms and progresses to a lethal hemorrhagic mediastinitis within 3–7 days, with a fatality rate that is 90% or higher in untreated patients.^[10] Finally, friendly personnel can be protected with suitable antibiotics.

A large-scale attack using anthrax would require the creation of aerosol particles of 1.5 to 5 microns: larger particles would not reach the lower respiratory tract, while smaller particles would be exhaled back out into the atmosphere. At this size, conductive powders tend to aggregate because of electrostatic charges, hindering dispersion. So the material must be treated to insulate and neutralize the charges. The weaponized agent must be resistant to degradation by rain and ultraviolet radiation from sunlight, while retaining the ability to efficiently infect the human lung. There are other technological difficulties as well, chiefly relating to storage of the weaponized agent.

Agents considered for weaponization, or known to be weaponized, include bacteria such as Bacillus anthracis, Brucella spp., Burkholderia mallei, Burkholderia pseudomallei, Chlamydophila psittaci, Coxiella burnetii, Francisella tularensis, some of the Rickettsiaceae (especially Rickettsia prowazekii and Rickettsia rickettsii), Shigella spp., Vibrio cholerae, and Yersinia pestis. Many viral agents have been studied and/or weaponized, including some of the Bunyaviridae (especially Rift Valley fever virus), Ebolavirus, many of the Flaviviridae (especially Japanese encephalitis virus), Machupo virus, Marburg virus, Variola virus, and Yellow fever virus. Fungal agents that have been studied include Coccidioides spp..^[11][12]

Toxins that can be used as weapons include ricin, staphylococcal enterotoxin B, botulinum toxin, saxitoxin, and many mycotoxins. These toxins and the organisms that produce them are sometimes referred to as select agents. In the United States, their possession, use, and transfer are regulated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Select Agent Program.

Anti-agriculture[link]

Anti-crop/anti-vegetation/anti-fisheries:
Biological warfare can also specifically target plants to destroy crops or defoliate vegetation. The United States and Britain discovered plant growth regulators (i.e., herbicides) during the Second World War, and initiated an herbicidal warfare program that was eventually used in Malaya and Vietnam in counter insurgency. Though herbicides are chemicals, they are often grouped with biological warfare as bioregulators in a similar manner as biotoxins.^{[citation needed]} Scorched earth tactics or destroying livestock and farmland were carried out in the Vietnam war (cf. Agent Orange)^[13] and Eelam War in Sri Lanka.^{[citation needed]}

The United States developed an anti-crop capability during the Cold War that used plant diseases (bioherbicides, or mycoherbicides) for destroying enemy agriculture. It was believed that destruction of enemy agriculture on a strategic scale could thwart Sino-Soviet aggression in a general war. Diseases such as wheat blast and rice blast were weaponized in aerial spray tanks and cluster bombs for delivery to enemy watersheds in agricultural regions to initiate epiphytotics (epidemics among plants). When the United States renounced its offensive biological warfare program in 1969 and 1970, the vast majority of its biological arsenal was composed of these plant diseases.^{[citation needed]}

Biological weapons also target fisheries as well as water-based vegetation.

Anti-livestock:
In 1980s Soviet Ministry of Agriculture had successfully developed variants of foot-and-mouth disease, and rinderpest against cows, African swine fever for pigs, and psittacosis to kill chicken. These agents were prepared to spray them down from tanks attached to airplanes over hundreds of miles. The secret program was code-named "Ecology".^[11]

Attacking animals is another area of biological warfare intended to eliminate animal resources for transportation and food. In the First World War, German agents were arrested attempting to inoculate draft animals with anthrax, and they were believed to be responsible for outbreaks of glanders in horses and mules. The British tainted small feed cakes with anthrax in the Second World War as a potential means of attacking German cattle for food denial, but never employed the weapon. In the 1950s, the United States had a field trial with hog cholera.^{[citation needed]} During the Mau Mau Uprising in 1952, the poisonous latex of the African milk bush was used to kill cattle.^[14]

Unconnected with inter-human wars, humans have deliberately introduced the rabbit disease Myxomatosis, originating in South America, to Australia and Europe, with the intention of reducing the rabbit population – which had devastating but temporary results, with wild rabbit populations reduced to a fraction of their former size but survivors developing immunity and increasing again.

Entomological warfare[link]

Entomological warfare (EW) is a type of biological warfare that uses insects to attack the enemy. The concept has existed for centuries and research and development have continued into the modern era. EW has been used in battle by Japan and several other nations have developed and been accused of using an entomological warfare program. EW may employ insects in a direct attack or as vectors to deliver a biological agent, such as plague or cholera. Essentially, EW exists in three varieties. One type of EW involves infecting insects with a pathogen and then dispersing the insects over target areas.^[15] The insects then act as a vector, infecting any person or animal they might bite. Another type of EW is a direct insect attack against crops; the insect may not be infected with any pathogen but instead represents a threat to agriculture. The final method uses uninfected insects, such as bees, wasps, etc., to directly attack the enemy.^[16]

Defensive[link]

Research and development into medical counter-measures[link]

This section requires expansion.

In 2010 at The Meeting of the States Parties to the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and Their Destruction in Geneva^[17] the sanitary epidemiological reconnaissance was suggested as well-tested means for enhancing the monitoring of infections and parasitic agents, for practical implementation of the International Health Regulations (2005). The aim was to prevent and minimize the consequences of natural outbreaks of dangerous infectious diseases as well as the treat of alleged use of biological weapons against BTWC States Parties.

Role of public health and disease surveillance[link]

It is important to note that all classical and modern biological weapons organisms are animal diseases, the only exception being smallpox. Thus, in any use of biological weapons, it is highly likely that animals will become ill either simultaneously with, or perhaps earlier than humans.

Indeed, in the largest biological weapons accident known– the anthrax outbreak in Sverdlovsk (now Yekaterinburg) in the Soviet Union in 1979, sheep became ill with anthrax as far as 200 kilometers from the release point of the organism from a military facility in the southeastern portion of the city (known as Compound 19 and still off limits to visitors today, see Sverdlovsk Anthrax leak).

Thus, a robust surveillance system involving human clinicians and veterinarians may identify a bioweapons attack early in the course of an epidemic, permitting the prophylaxis of disease in the vast majority of people (and/or animals) exposed but not yet ill.

For example in the case of anthrax, it is likely that by 24–36 hours after an attack, some small percentage of individuals (those with compromised immune system or who had received a large dose of the organism due to proximity to the release point) will become ill with classical symptoms and signs (including a virtually unique chest X-ray finding, often recognized by public health officials if they receive timely reports). By making these data available to local public health officials in real time, most models of anthrax epidemics indicate that more than 80% of an exposed population can receive antibiotic treatment before becoming symptomatic, and thus avoid the moderately high mortality of the disease.

Identification of bioweapons[link]

The goal of biodefense is to integrate the sustained efforts of the national and homeland security, medical, public health, intelligence, diplomatic, and law enforcement communities. Health care providers and public health officers are among the first lines of defense. In some countries private, local, and provincial (state) capabilities are being augmented by and coordinated with federal assets, to provide layered defenses against biological weapons attacks. During the first Gulf War the United Nations activated a biological and chemical response team, Task Force Scorpio, to respond to any potential use of weapons of mass destruction on civilians.

The traditional approach toward protecting agriculture, food, and water: focusing on the natural or unintentional introduction of a disease is being strengthened by focused efforts to address current and anticipated future biological weapons threats that may be deliberate, multiple, and repetitive.

The growing threat of biowarfare agents and bioterrorism has led to the development of specific field tools that perform on-the-spot analysis and identification of encountered suspect materials. One such technology, being developed by researchers from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), employs a "sandwich immunoassay", in which fluorescent dye-labeled antibodies aimed at specific pathogens are attached to silver and gold nanowires.^[18]

In the Netherlands, the company TNO has designed Bioaerosol Single Particle Recognition eQuipment (BiosparQ). This system would be implemented into the national response plan for bioweapons attacks in the Netherlands.^[19]

Researchers at Ben Gurion University in Israel are developing a different device called the BioPen, essentially a "Lab-in-a-Pen", which can detect known biological agents in under 20 minutes using an adaptation of the ELISA, a similar widely employed immunological technique, that in this case incorporates fiber optics.^[20]

Synthetic biological warfare[link]

Theoretically, novel approaches in biotechnology, such as synthetic biology could be used in the future to design novel types of biological warfare agents.^{[21][22][23][24]} Special attention has to be laid on future experiments (of concern) that:^[25]

1. Would demonstrate how to render a vaccine ineffective;
2. Would confer resistance to therapeutically useful antibiotics or antiviral agents;
3. Would enhance the virulence of a pathogen or render a nonpathogen virulent;
4. Would increase transmissibility of a pathogen;
5. Would alter the host range of a pathogen;
6. Would enable the evasion of diagnostic/detection tools;
7. Would enable the weaponization of a biological agent or toxin

Most of the biosecurity concerns in synthetic biology, however, focused on the role of DNA synthesis and the risk of producing genetic material of lethal viruses (e.g. 1918 Spanish flu, polio) in the lab.^[26][27][28]

List of biological warfare institutions, programs, projects and sites by country[link]

Today, according to the U.S. Department of Defense, more than ten countries are suspected to have continuing offensive biological warfare programs, including Russia, Israel, China, Iran, Syria and North Korea. Offensive biological warfare programs in Iraq were dismantled after the first Gulf War (1990–1991). Libya dismantled and disavowed its biological warfare program in 2003.

United States[link]

• Fort Detrick, Maryland
  • U.S. Army Biological Warfare Laboratories (1943–69)
    • Building 470
    • One-Million-Liter Test Sphere
    • Operation Whitecoat (1954–73)
  • United States Army Medical Unit (1956–69)
  • U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID; 1969–present)
  • U.S. entomological warfare program
    • Operation Big Itch
    • Operation Big Buzz
    • Operation Drop Kick
    • Operation May Day
  • National Biodefense Analysis and Countermeasures Center (NBACC; Projected: 2008)
• Project Bacchus
• Project Clear Vision
• Project SHAD
• Project 112
• Horn Island Testing Station
• Fort Terry
• Granite Peak Installation

United Kingdom[link]

• Porton Down
• Gruinard Island
• Nancekuke
• Operation Vegetarian
• Operation Harness off Antigua, 1948–1949.
• Operation Cauldron off Stornoway, 1952. The trawler Carella accidentally sailed through a cloud of pneumonic plague bacilli (Yersinia pestis) during this trial. It was kept under covert observation until the incubation period had elapsed but none of the crew fell ill.^[29]
• Operation Hesperus off Stornoway, 1953.
• Operation Ozone off Nassau, 1954.
• Operation Negation off Nassau, 1954-5.

Soviet Union and Russia[link]

• Biopreparat (18 labs and production centers)
  • Stepnagorsk Scientific and Technical Institute for Microbiology, Stepnogorsk, northern Kazakhstan
  • Institute of Ultra Pure Biochemical Preparations, Leningrad, a weaponized plague center
  • Vector State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology (VECTOR), a weaponized smallpox center
  • Institute of Applied Biochemistry, Omutninsk
  • Kirov bioweapons production facility, Kirov, Kirov Oblast
  • Zagorsk smallpox production facility, Zagorsk
  • Berdsk bioweapons production facility, Berdsk
  • Bioweapons research facility, Obolensk
  • Sverdlovsk bioweapons production facility (Military Compound 19), Sverdlovsk, a weaponized anthrax center

• Institute of Virus Preparations
• Poison laboratory of the Soviet secret services
• Vozrozhdeniya
• Project Bonfire
• Project Factor

Japan[link]

• Unit 731
• Zhongma Fortress

Iraq[link]

Main articles: Iraqi biological weapons program and Iraq and weapons of mass destruction (passim)

• Al Hakum
• Salman Pak facility
• Al Manal facility

South Africa[link]

• Project Coast
• Delta G Scientific Company
• Roodeplaat Research Laboratories
• Protechnik

List of people associated with biological warfare[link]

See also[link]

Biological warfare portal

• Antibiotic resistance
• Asymmetric warfare
• Biosecurity
• Discredited AIDS origins theories
• Ethnic bioweapon
• Exotic pollution
• Ten Threats
• Yellow rain
• Smallpox blankets
• John W. Powell

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Alibek, K. and S. Handelman. Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World– Told from Inside by the Man Who Ran it. Delta (2000) ISBN 0-385-33496-6
• Appel, J. M. Is all fair in biological warfare? The controversy over genetically engineered biological weapons, Journal of Medical Ethics, Volume 35, pp. 429–432 (2009).
• Crosby, Alfred W., Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900–1900 (New York, 1986).
• Dembek, Zygmunt (editor), Medical Aspects of Biological Warfare; Washington, DC: Borden Institute (2007).
• Endicott, Stephen and Edward Hagerman, The United States and Biological Warfare: Secrets from the Early Cold War and Korea, Indiana University Press (1998). ISBN 0-253-33472-1
• Keith, Jim (1999), Biowarfare In America, Illuminet Press, ISBN 1-881532-21-6 
• Knollenberg, Bernhard, "General Amherst and Germ Warfare," Mississippi Valley Historical Review 41 (1954–1955), 489–494.
• Mangold, Tom and Goldberg, Jeff (1999), Plague Wars: a true story of biological warfare, Macmillan, London, ISBN 0-333-71614-0 
• Maskiell, Michelle, and Adrienne Mayor. "Killer Khilats: Legends of Poisoned Robes of Honour in India. Parts 1 & 2.” Folklore [London] 112 (Spring and Fall 2001): 23–45, 163–82.
• Mayor, Adrienne, Greek Fire, Poison Arrows & Scorpion Bombs: Biological and Chemical Warfare in the Ancient World. Overlook, 2003, rev. ed. 2009. ISBN 1-58567-348-X.
• Orent, Wendy (2004), Plague, The Mysterious Past and Terrifying Future of the World's Most Dangerous Disease, Simon & Schuster, Inc., New York, NY, ISBN 0-7432-3685-8 
• Pala, Christopher (19??), Anthrax Island
• Preston, Richard (2002), The Demon in the Freezer, New York: Random House.
• Rózsa, Lajos 2009. The motivation for biological aggression is an inherent and common aspect of the human behavioural repertoire. Medical Hypotheses, 72, 217–219.
• Woods, Lt Col Jon B. (ed.), USAMRIID’s Medical Management of Biological Casualties Handbook, 6th edition, U.S. Army Medical Institute of Infectious Diseases, Fort Detrick, Maryland (April 2005).
• Zelicoff, Alan and Bellomo, Michael (2005), Microbe: Are we Ready for the Next Plague?, AMACOM Books, New York, NY, ISBN 0-8144-0865-6 

External links[link]

• Biological weapons and international humanitarian law, ICRC
• WHO: Health Aspects of Biological and Chemical Weapons

Korean War 한국전쟁(韓國戰爭) 조선전쟁(朝鮮戰爭) Part of the Cold War Clockwise from top: U.S. Marines retreating during the Battle of Chosin Reservoir; U.N. landing at Incheon harbor, starting point of the Battle of Inchon; Korean refugees in front of an American M26 Pershing tank; U.S. Marines, led by First Lieutenant Baldomero Lopez, landing at Incheon; F-86 Sabre fighter aircraft. Date Full-scale: 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (&100000000000000030000003 years, &1000000000000003200000032 days) Low-level: 27 July 1953 – present (&1000000000000005800000058 years, &10000000000000335000000335 days) Location Korean Peninsula Status Cease-fire armistice North Korean invasion of South Korea repelled U.N. invasion of North Korea repelled Chinese invasion of South Korea repelled Korean Demilitarized Zone established, little territorial change at the 38th parallel border, essentially uti possidetis Territorial changes Korean Demilitarized Zone established; both sides gained little border territory at the 38th parallel Belligerents  Republic of Korea  United Nations  United States of America  United Kingdom (U.N. Resolution 84) Combat support Australia  Belgium Canada  Colombia Ethiopian Empire  France Kingdom of Greece  Luxembourg Netherlands  New Zealand Philippines South Africa  Thailand  Turkey Medical support  Denmark  India  Italy  Norway  Sweden  Democratic People's Republic of Korea  People's Republic of China 22x20px Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Medical support People's Republic of Bulgaria Czechoslovak Socialist Republic[1] People's Republic of Hungary People's Republic of Poland Romanian People's Republic Other support People's Republic of Mongolia Commanders and leaders Rhee Syngman Chung Il-kwon Paik Sun-yup Shin Sung-mo Son Won-il Douglas MacArthur (Commander of the UNC) Matthew Ridgway (Commander of the UNC) Mark Wayne Clark (Commander of the UNC) Current Lee Myung-bak Kim Kwan-jin Jeong Seung-jo Kim Sang-ki Choi Yoon-hee Park Jong-heon James D. Thurman Kim Il-sung Pak Hon-yong Choi Yong-kun Kim Chaek Mao Zedong Peng Dehuai 22x20px Joseph Stalin Current Kim Jong-un Jang Sung-taek Kim Yong-Chun Ri Yong-ho Strength 600,000 302,000[2] 14,200[2] 6,150[2] 5,460[2] 3,972[3] 2,280[2] 1,500[2] 1,390[2] 1,290[2] 1,270[2] 1,260[2] 1,120[2] 1,070[2] 900[2] 300[2] 170[2] 105[2] 100[2] 72[2] 70[2] 44[2] Total: 941,600 Current 653,000 28,500 Total: 681,500 260,000 1,350,000[4] 22x20px 26,000 Total: 1,636,000 Note: The figures vary by source; peak unit strength varied during war. Current 1,106,000 Casualties and losses  Republic of Korea:[2] 137,899 dead 450,742 wounded 24,495 MIA 8,343 POW  United States of America: (US sources):[2] 36,940 dead 92,134 wounded 3,737 MIA 4,439 POW (PRC-DPRK estimates): 397,543 in total[5]  United Kingdom:[2] 1,078 dead 2,674 wounded 179 MIA 977 POW  Turkey:[2] 741 dead 2,068 wounded 163 MIA 244 POW Commonwealth of Australia: [6] 339 dead 1,216 wounded 43 MIA 26 POW Dominion of Canada:[2] 312 dead 1,212 wounded 1 MIA 32 POW  France:[2] 262 dead 1,008 wounded 7 MIA 12 POW Kingdom of Greece[2] 192 dead 543 wounded 3 POW  Colombia:[2] 163 dead 448 wounded 28 POW  Thailand:[2] 129 dead 1,139 wounded 5 MIA Ethiopian Empire[2] 121 dead 536 wounded Netherlands:[2] 120 dead 645 wounded Philippines:[2] 112 dead 229 wounded 16 MIA 41 POW  Belgium:[2] 99 dead 336 Wounded 4 MIA 1 POW Union of South Africa[2] 34 dead 9 POW  New Zealand:[2] 23 dead 79 wounded 1 MIA  Norway:[2] 3 dead  Luxembourg:[2] 2 dead 13 wounded Total: 776,360–1,093,839[5] Democratic People's Republic of Korea: 215,000 dead 303,000 wounded 120,000 MIA or POW[7] People's Republic of China: (Chinese sources):[8] 152,000 dead 383,500 wounded 450,000 hospitalized 4,000 missing 7,110 captured 14,190 defected (U.S. estimate):[7] 400,000+ dead 486,000 wounded 21,000 POW 22x20px Union of Soviet Socialist Republics: 282 dead[9] Total: 1,545,822–1,648,582 Total civilians killed/wounded: 2.5 million (est.)[2] South Korea: 990,968 373,599 killed[2] 229,625 wounded[2] 387,744 abducted/missing[2] North Korea: 1,550,000 (est.)[2]

v t e Korean War North Korean Offensive Operation Pokpoong Chuncheon Gorangpo Kaesong-Munsan Korea Strait Ongjin Uijeongbu Suwon Airfield Air Campaign Andong Chumonchin Chan Osan Pyongtaek Chonan Chochiwon Taejon Sangju Yongdong Hwanggan Hadong Notch Pusan Perimeter Masan P'ohang-Dong Taegu 1st Naktong Bulge Bowling Alley Battle Mountain Kyongju Haman Nam River Ka-San Tabu-Dong Yongsan 2nd Naktong Bulge United Nations Counteroffensive Haeju Inchon 2nd Seoul Hill 282 12 October 1950 Sariwon Yongju Kujin Chongju Chinese Intervention Onjong Unsan Pakchon Ch'ongch'on River Wawon Chosin Reservoir 3rd Seoul 1st and 2nd Wonju Operation Thunderbolt Twin Tunnels Hoengsong Chipyong-Ni 3rd Wonju Chuam-Ni Wonsan Operation Killer Operation Ripper Maehwa-San Operation Courageous Operation Tomahawk Operation Rugged Operation Dauntless 5th Seoul Imjin River Yultong Kapyong Soyang River Stalemate Bloody Ridge Heartbreak Ridge Han River Operation Commando 1st Maryang San 2nd Maryang San Sunchon Hill Eerie Sui-Ho Dam Old Baldy Operation Blaze White Horse Triangle Hill Pork Chop Hill Hook Outpost Harry Kumsong Samichon River Post Armistice D.M.Z. Conflict Blue House Raid EC-121 Incident Gangneung Border Incidents Yosu 1st Yeonpyeong 2nd Yeonpyeong Daecheong 3rd Yeonpyeong

The Korean War (Korean: 한국전쟁 or 조선전쟁, Hanja: 韓國戰爭 or 朝鮮戰爭; 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953^[10][a]) was a war between the Republic of Korea (supported primarily by the United States of America, with contributions from allied nations under the aegis of the United Nations) and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (supported by the People's Republic of China, with military and material aid from the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics). The Korean War was primarily the result of the political division of Korea by an agreement of the victorious Allies at the conclusion of the Pacific War at the end of World War II. The Korean Peninsula was ruled by the Empire of Japan from 1910 until the end of World War II. Following the surrender of the Empire of Japan in September 1945, American administrators divided the peninsula along the 38th parallel, with U.S. military forces occupying the southern half and Soviet military forces occupying the northern half.^[12]

The failure to hold free elections throughout the Korean Peninsula in 1948 deepened the division between the two sides; the North established a communist government, while the South established a capitalist one. The 38th parallel increasingly became a political border between the two Korean states. Although reunification negotiations continued in the months preceding the war, tension intensified. Cross-border skirmishes and raids at the 38th Parallel persisted. The situation escalated into open warfare when North Korean forces invaded South Korea on 25 June 1950.^[13] It was the first significant armed conflict of the Cold War.^[14] In 1950 the Soviet Union boycotted the United Nations security council, in protest at representation of China by the Kuomintang / Republic of China government, which had taken refuge in Taiwan following defeat in the Chinese Civil War. In the absence of a dissenting voice from the Soviet Union, who could have vetoed it, the United States and other countries passed a security council resolution authorizing military intervention in Korea.

The United States of America provided 88% of the 341,000 international soldiers which aided South Korean forces in repelling the invasion, with twenty other countries of the United Nations offering assistance. Suffering severe casualties, within two months the defenders were pushed back to a small area in the south of the Korean Peninsula, known as the Pusan perimeter. A rapid U.N. counter-offensive then drove the North Koreans past the 38th Parallel and almost to the Yalu River, when the People's Republic of China (PRC) entered the war on the side of North Korea.^[13] Chinese intervention forced the Southern-allied forces to retreat behind the 38th Parallel. While not directly committing forces to the conflict, the Soviet Union provided material aid to both the North Korean and Chinese armies. The active stage of the war ended on 27 July 1953, when the armistice agreement was signed. The agreement restored the border between the Koreas near the 38th Parallel and created the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), a 2.5-mile (4.0 km)-wide fortified buffer zone between the two Korean nations. Minor outbreaks of fighting continue to the present day.

With both North Korea and South Korea sponsored by external powers, the Korean War was a proxy war. From a military science perspective, it combined strategies and tactics of World War I and World War II: it began with a mobile campaign of swift infantry attacks followed by air bombing raids, but became a static trench war by July 1951.