Korean War Veterans

Defence USA

July 26, 1985

A commemorative postage stamp on the Veterans Korea :

Issued by United States of America

Issued on Jul 26, 1985

Design : The U.S. stamp honoring America’s Korean War veterans was designed by Robert Anderson of Lexington, Massachusetts. Mr. Anderson also designed the 1985 stamp honoring Sylvanus Thayer.

Type : Stamp, Postal Used

Denomination : 22 cents

About :

The United Nations police action, more commonly called the Korean War, was the first war in which a world body was a military participant. It lasted for 37 months, at one time involving more than 480,000 U.S. servicemen in ground, sea and air operations.
The war began on June 25, 1950, when troops from Communist-ruled North Korea stormed across the 38^th parallel into South Korea. Two days later, President Truman ordered American forces in Japan to come to the aid of South Korea. He also ordered the Pacific 7^th Fleet into the Formosa Strait to protect the island of Taiwan from possible invasion by Red China.
During the period of the war, more than 5 million U.S. regulars, reservists, National Guardsmen and draftees served in the armed forces. Of these, only a limited number actually saw Korean combat. Most were stationed at strategic locations around the world, to be used if the Korean War escalated into a global conflict.
Army and Marine veterans who did see action in Korea fought with distinction. They won a decisive victory against North Korea, driving the enemy back to the Yalu River, the boundary between North Korea and Manchuria. At that point, hordes of Chinese suddenly entered the battle. The Americans executed an orderly retreat and regrouped south of Seoul, the South Korean capital, to retake the initiative. Bravely and doggedly, they regained lost ground and held firm at the 38^th parallel until the truce was signed on July 27, 1953. Under the terms of the peace, a buffer zone was established along the final battle line to separate the two sides. South Korea gained about 1,500 square miles of new territory.
Most Korean War veterans returned to the United States and resumed their civilian lives. However, for the more than 3,500 Americans who were prisoners of war, negotiations dragged on through the summer. It was not until September that they were finally released.