WORLD HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -38th parallel, popular name given to latitude 38° N that in East Asia roughly demarcates North Korea and South Korea. The line was chosen by U.S. military planners at the Potsdam Conference (July 1945) near the end of World War II as an army boundary, north of which the U.S.S.R.

Detailed explanation-2: -The 38th parallel of latitude was chosen in 1945 by the USA and USSR as a convenient borderline for their divided military occupation of the Korean peninsula. Under this divided occupation, Korea rapidly developed two ideologically different regimes, a socialist state in the North and a liberal state in the South.

Detailed explanation-3: -Since U.S. policy toward Korea during World War II had aimed to prevent any single power’s domination of Korea, it may be reasonably concluded that the principal reason for the division was to stop the Soviet advance south of the 38th parallel.

Detailed explanation-4: -Why Korea was split at the 38th parallel after World War II. North and South Korea have been divided for more than 70 years, ever since the Korean Peninsula became an unexpected casualty of the escalating Cold War between two rival superpowers: the Soviet Union and the United States.