The Korean War (25 June 1950 – armistice signed 27 July 1953[28]) was a military conflict between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China (PRC), with military material aid from theSoviet Union. The war was a result of the physical 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 Japan from 1910 until the end of World War II. Following the surrender of Japan in 1945, American administrators divided the peninsula along the 38th Parallel, with United States troops occupying the southern part andSoviet troops occupying the northern part.[29]
The failure to hold free elections throughout the Korean Peninsula in 1948 deepened the division between the two sides, and the North established a Communist government. The 38th Parallel increasingly became a political border between the two Koreas. 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.[30] It was the first significant armed conflict of the Cold War.[31]
The United Nations, particularly the United States, came to the aid of South Korea in repelling the invasion. A rapid UN counter-offensive drove the North Koreans past the 38th Parallel and almost to the Yalu River, and the People's Republic of China (PRC) entered the war on the side of the North.[30] The Chinese launched a counter-offensive that pushed the United Nations forces back across the 38th Parallel. The Soviet Union materially aided the North Korean and Chinese armies. In 1953, the war ceased with an armistice that 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 buffer zone between the two Koreas. Minor outbreaks of fighting continue to the present day.
With both North and South Korea sponsored by external powers, the Korean War was a proxy war. From a military scienceperspective, it combined strategies and tactics of World War I and World War II: it began with a mobile campaign of swift infantryattacks followed by air bombing raids, but became a static trench war by July 1951.
(from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_War)
PTSD:
Posttraumatic stress disorder (also known as post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD) is a severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to any event that results in psychological trauma.[1][2][3] This event may involve the threat of death to oneself or to someone else, or to one's own or someone else's physical, sexual, or psychological integrity,[1] overwhelming the individual's ability to cope. As an effect ofpsychological trauma, PTSD is less frequent and more enduring than the more commonly seen acute stress response.
Diagnostic symptoms for PTSD include re-experiencing the original trauma(s) through flashbacks or nightmares, avoidance of stimuli associated with the trauma, and increased arousal – such as difficulty falling or staying asleep, anger, and hypervigilance. Formal diagnostic criteria (both DSM-IV-TR and ICD-10) require that the symptoms last more than one month and cause significant impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.[1]
Military experience
Schnurr, Lunney, and Sengupta[40] identified risk factors for the development of PTSD in Vietnam veterans. Among those are:
- Hispanic ethnicity, coming from an unstable family, being punished severely during childhood, childhood asocial behavior and depression as pre-military factors
- War-zone exposure, peritraumatic dissociation, depression as military factors
- Recent stressful life events, post-Vietnam trauma and depression as post-military factors
They also identified certain protective factors, such as:
- Japanese-American ethnicity, high school degree or college education, older age at entry to war, higher socioeconomic status and a more positive paternal relationship as pre-military protective factors
- Social support at homecoming and current social support as post-military factors.[52] Other research also indicates the protective effects of social support in averting PTSD or facilitating recovery if it develops.[53][54]
There may also be an attitudinal component; for example, a soldier who believes that they will not sustain injuries may be more likely to develop symptoms of PTSD than one who anticipates the possibility, should either be wounded. Likewise, the later incidence of suicide among those injured in home fires above those injured in fires in the workplace suggests this possibility.[citation needed]
(from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ptsd)
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