Saved by the Korean War

The Korean War broke out on 25 June 1950 and had an immediate and dramatic impact on the geopolitics of East and Southeast Asia and the economic fortunes of the region. Some analysts of Asia’s economic success acknowledge the importance of the Korean War to the process of creating the ‘miracle’ economies. In particular, those who seek to explain the success of the Asian economies in terms of the exercise of US hegemony have recognized the Korean War as marking the beginning of US involvement in the region (e.g. Cumings 1984a). Similarly, early analysts who employ the neoclassical economic explanation and some who adopt a statist perspective in accounting for the success of the original seven ‘miracle’ economies note the significance of American economic and military aid in helping to get the economies of Japan, Taiwan and later South Korea on their feet after the devastation of the Second World War and its aftermath (e.g. Cole 1980; Johnson 1982).