Доклады Международного конгресса ИИСАА. Т. 1

III. Far East, South and South-East Asia / Дальний Восток, Южная и Юго-Восточная Азия Доклады Международного конгресса по источниковедению и историографии стран Азии и Африки. Т. 1. 2020 347 employed to develop contingency plans based on worst-case scenarios without having to account for their conclusions that failed to materialize; thus, such an opinion appearing in once-classified documents is not necessarily surprising. That Cold War scholars have also adopted similar conclusions as historical fact without attempting to verify their degree of truth is a different matter. 1 This question of Soviet short- and long-term plans for Korea represents a critical issue for our understanding of the distressing history that Koreans has endured as a result of the Commission’s failure, a legacy that brought a devastating civil war, the separation of a people including families, and strengthened a national division that delivered totalitarian administrations to both sides of the demilitarized zone. This short paper has attempted to offer tentative conclusions for what it sees as a collective responsibility for this unfortunate history. That is, it first sees responsibility for failure in the inability of both delegations to find a middle ground of compromise to complete their tasks, as assigned by the Moscow Decision. Additionally, it considers the responsibility of self-serving activities perpetuated by certain Korean groups who at times violently opposed this process. And finally, it ponders the role that factors independent of Korean matters played in disrupting this process. Might the growing Cold War divisions between Moscow and Washington have blocked the materialization of any meaningful agreement that the two delegations might have forged in their Joint Commission meetings? Developing research into these areas requires the collective efforts of scholars from the states of the concerned peoples. References Primary Sources 1. British National Archives. London: United Kingdom. 2. Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS). Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1971. 3. Ichǒng Pak Hǒn’yǒng chǒnjip / Ichǒng Pak Hǒn’yǒng chǒnjip p’yǒnjip wiwonhoi. [Pak Hǒn’yǒng. Collected Works / Editorial board of “Pak Hǒn’yǒng’s Collected Works”]. 9 vols. Seoul: Yŏksa pip’yŏngsa, 2004. (In Korean). 4. National Archives Record Administration (NARA). College Park, MD. RG 43. 5. Paekbom Kim Ku chǒnjip / Kim Ku chǒnjip p’yǒch’an wiwonhoi. [Kim Ku. CollectedWorks / Editorial board of “The CollectedWorks of KimKu”]. 12 vols. Seoul: Namamch’ulp’an, 1999. (In Korean). and Diplomacy. URL: http://www.secretintelligencefiles.com/Content/swwf.cab158/0001/009 (accessed 14.09.2019). 1 Uk Heo and Terence Roehrig in their The Evolution of the South Korean-United States Alliance. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2018. P. 56, conclude that “the Soviets were committed to the permanent division of [the Korean peninsula].”