The Korean War - A History of the Cold War

In the first hours after the crisis broke out on June 25th, Stephen Casey writes, it was the second ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that asked whether the battle in Korea was a communist assault egged on by the Russians. Bruce Cummings: The event that appears to have precipitated the full-scale war was the declaration by Sigmund-Reeze government of the independence of the South. If allowed to stand, that action, as Kim Il-sung clearly understood, would have prevented unification. He regarded it as an act of war. He was ready for war."