Korean War

At a glance

Dates: 1950-06-25 – 1953-07-27.

Place: Korea Strait, North Korea.

Type: war.

Key figures / parties: South Korea, North Korea, United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Turkey, Australia, and Ethiopia.

What came before

Part of: Cold War.

Background Japanese colonization (1910–1945) Main article: Korea under Japanese rule Korea was a colony ruled by the Empire of Japan from 1910 to 1945. The Empire of Japan diminished China 's influence over Korea in the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–95). [ 1 ] A decade later, after defeating Imperial Russia in the Russo-Japanese War , Japan made the Korean Empire its protectorate with the Eulsa Treaty in 1905, and then annexed it with the Japan–Korea Treaty of 1910 . [ 2 ]

Timeline

Course of the war This section may be too long to read and navigate comfortably . When this tag was added, its readable prose size was 7,000 words. Consider splitting content into sub-articles, condensing it, or adding subheadings . Please discuss this issue on the article's talk page . ( September 2025 ) Territory often changed hands early in the war, until the front stabilized.    Chinese and Soviet forces    North Korean forces  

What happened

The Korean War was an armed conflict fought on the Korean Peninsula between North Korea and South Korea and their allies. North Korea was supported by China and the Soviet Union, while South Korea was supported by the United Nations led by the United States under the auspices of the United Nations Command (UNC).