Korean War

Korean War. . , Arlington During the Conflict , By the mid-20th century, there was an overwhelming housing and transportation problem in Arlington County as the population more than doubled from 57,040 in 1940 to 135,449 in 1950. Thousands moved to Arlington to work with and provide services for the Federal Government in Washington, D.C., and its agencies here in the County. To provide for these new residents, Arlington began to make civic enhancements and improve its infrastructure. For the national capital region, connectivity became ever more important as acres of farmland were converted to single-family housing and middle-income garden apartment complexes. In 1952, Congress passed the National Capital Planning Act to identify opportunities for the development and movement of people and goods in the congested Washington, D.C., region. President Dwight D. Eisenhower championed the creation of a network of interstate highways including Interstate 81, which was slated to run through Virginia with an auxiliary branch, Interstate 66 (I-66), running from Front Royal to the nation's capital and cutting through Fairfax and Arlington counties. However, Arlington civic advocates filed a lawsuit with the Federal District Court to block the I-66 project due to local concerns about health and environmental impacts., The Korean War's Impact , After years of diplomatic negotiations on the Korean peninsula and a military stalemate that hovered around the 38th parallel, the conflict that the U.S. joined in 1950 ended with an armistice in 1953. Bombings of North Korea, guerilla-type warfare, and mass violence against civilian populations all contributed to a very high civilian death rate. As many as five million civilians and service members died in the three-year period. In 2000, the Department of Defense stated that 36,516 U.S. service members were killed in action and 100,000 were wounded during the conflict. Deaths of United Nations (U.N.) forces were just over 3,000 with 11,000 wounded., Casualties included some of the 120,000 officers and enlisted women who served as cryptographers, air traffic controllers, radar operators, analysts, and, in combat zones, as nurses. In 1948 President Harry S. Truman issued an order allowing women to obtain permanent military status. Even though most women had been discharged from service following World War II (world war two), those who had been in the Reserves during and after the war were summoned for active duty for the Korean conflict. This was the first time in U.S. history that women had been called involuntarily into service., Stories of Some Who Served , During world war two, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802, which outlawed discrimination based on race in military contracts and resulted in the desegregation of thousands of jobs and training programs. This was the precursor for President Truman's Executive Order 9981 in 1948, which formally desegregated the U.S. military. However, integration was slow in practice and segregation still was markedly visible during the Korean War. Many troops continued to serve in the roles that they had held during world war two, which for African Americans had been largely as soldiers. Sergeant Dewitt Betz, for example, who had served with his brothers Carl and Paul in segregated infantry units during world war two, was a member of the 24th Infantry Regiment, 25th Infantry Division and died in action in South Korea on May 6, 1951. Ground assault played a major role in the Korean War due to the unforgiving terrain, with casualties including Army Infantrymen Private First Class (PFC) Lawrence Harris, Jr., and PFC James Martin. Harris, Jr., enlisted at the age of 18 and was reported missing in action only a few months later in North Korea on November 27, 1950, with the Company L, 3rd Battalion, 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division. Martin, a 21-year-old field artillery operations chief for the 57th Field Artillery Battalion, was killed in action on January 11, 1953., Lieutenant Colonel Burt Coers and Major Frederick Winter, of the 9th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Infantry Division, were taken prisoner in North Korea on December 1, 1950. Coers, a military doctor, a veteran of world war two, and a graduate of the University of Mississippi and the University of Tennessee, was captured while tending to his comrades' wounds and survived until March 25, 1951. Winter, a 1934 graduate of the University of Missouri, died on July 10, 1951, seven months after his capture., In addition to ground assault, aerial strikes played a large role in combat, and anti-aircraft weaponry resulted in an extensive death toll among the U.S. and U.N. pilots, most of whom were white and whose bodies were rarely recovered. First Lieutenant Lucius Prewett Walton, while piloting a B-26B Invader bomber, was hit by anti-aircraft fire and crashed one mile north of Hangju on October 3, 1950. Captain Emmett Napoleon Long, a decorated veteran of world war two, flew with the 25th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron during the Korean War. He was killed when enemy artillery hit his plane on a strafing mission to Chinnampo, North Korea, on August 20, 1951. Commander Denny Phillips, a 1940 U.S. Naval Academy graduate and world war two veteran, was the Commanding Officer of Fighter Squadron 11 aboard the aircraft carrier USS Kearsarge. While on a reconnaissance mission along the main supply route north of Wonsan, North Korea, on January 23, 1953, his F2H-2 Banshee jet fighter crashed after being hit by anti-aircraft fire., All of Arlington's Korean War servicemen on the American Legion War Memorial were awarded the Purple Heart, the Korean War Service Medal, the United Nations Service Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, and other awards depending on their roles in the conflict. Second Lieutenant David Shute, for example, who was killed by an enemy land mine on May 28, 1952, also received the Bronze Star for his leadership and valor., [Captions:] , Arlington County Courthouse, since demolished, ca. 1954. The American Legion Memorial can be seen in its second location to the right., Washington National Airport (renamed Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in 1998), 1950s., Rear elevation of Stratford Junior High School, ca. 1951. In February 1959, Stratford (renamed Dorothy Hamm Middle School in 2018) was the first public school to be desegregated in the Commonwealth of Virginia., A 1953 aerial photograph near the intersection of Lee Highway and North Glebe Road showing the proliferation of planned residential development in Arlington County in the mid-20th century., Parade in Lee Heights in the 1950s from the Ernest E. Johnson photograph collection. Johnson was the head of the County's segregated Parks and Recreation Department and then head of all County recreation centers after 1962., The intersection of Wilson and Washington boulevards looking northeast ca. 1950. The American Legion War Memorial was relocated near this intersection in 1986., Sergeant Dewitt Betz's world war two draft card, 1940. Betz later served in Korea, where he was killed in 1951.