jun 27, 1950 - Truman orders US military intervention in Korea

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"It took only hours to decide that the US would come to the defense of South Korea, and that it would do not so just on its own authority, but under that of the UN as well.

It was able to do so quickly for two reasons. The first was that an American army was conveniently stationed nearby, occupying Japan – a fact Stalin seems to have overlooked. The second – another oversight on Stalin’s part – was that there was no Soviet representative present in the Security Council to veto United National action: he had been withdrawn, some months earlier, as a protest against the organisation’s refusal to seat the Chinese communists.

With UN approval, then, the international community mobilized within days to counter this new threat to international security, yet another response that Moscow had not anticipated. (Gaddis 2006, p. 43)

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