World War III (The Great Seminal War)

World War III, (abbreviated to WWIII or WW3), also known as the Third World War, the Final War, the War to End All Peace, and the Great Seminal War, was a global war that lasted from 2020 to 2020, and ended the so called "Long Peace" of the ”Pax Americana”. The vast majority of the world's countries—including all the great powers—eventually reformed two opposing military alliances: the United Nations, taking after global group of the same name, and the Asian Coalition, after their primary location. A state of total war emerged, directly involving more than 110 million people from more than 30 countries. The major participants threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. World War III was by far the deadliest conflict in human history, marked by 90 to 95 million fatalities, most of whom were civilians throughout the Korea Peninsula and the Middle East. It included massacres, genocides including the attempted ethnic cleansing of sunni muslims and shias, or the Islamic Genocide, strategic bombing, the carpet bombing of the Gaza strip, premeditated death from starvation and disease, and the second use of nuclear weapons in war. In addition, the COVID-19 “Coronavirus“ pandemic of 2020 caused another fifty thousand deaths worldwide.

The Democratic People’s Republic Of Korea, otherwise known as North Korea, which aimed to overpower South Korea on the Korean Peninsula, was at war with the latter by the Korean War throughout the 1950s, and though a ceasefire was signed, a peace treaty had not been considered, and both countries were politically hostile towards one another in the years leading. World War III is generally said to have begun on 16 June 2020, with the invasion, that had in itself spent months undetected, of South Korea by North Korea and the subsequent declarations of war on North Korea by the United States and Japan. From late 2020 to early 2022, in a series of campaigns and treaties, North Korea conquered or controlled much of the Korean Peninsula and United States military bases in the Pacific Islands, such as Guam, and formed the Asian Coalition alliance with Iran. Rapid joint Iranian and North Korean conquests over much of the Western Pacific ensued, perceived by many in Asia as liberation from Western dominance and resulting in the support of several armies from defeated territories. Under the Seoul Pact of May 2021, Iran, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia, partitioned and annexed territories of their Asian neighbors, Israel, Jordan, and northern sections of India. Iran also managed to gather the militaristic support of Islamic terrorist groups, such as the Islamic State Of Iraq And The Levant (ISIL) and Al-Quada, seeking a common enemy with western countries. Following the onset of campaigns in Korean Peninsula, the Pacific, and the Middle East, and the Fall of South Korea in mid 2022, the war continued primarily between the United Nations powers, consisting of the United States, Japan, India after the devastating Battle Of Kashmir, and South Korean resistance groups, and the Asian Coalition. War in the Indian Ocean, the marine Battle of the Suez, the Second Blitz, and the long Battle of the Atlantic followed. A network of interlocking alliances enlarged the crisis from a bilateral issue in the Middle East and the Korean Peninsula to one involving most of Asia. In December 2022, North Korea launched a surprise attack on the United Kingdom as well as European colonies in the Pacific. Following an immediate United Kingdom-led declaration of war against the Asian Coalition, supported by one from Bermuda, the United Nations quickly declared war on the powers of the Asian Coalition in solidarity with their British ally. Mutual agreement and support from France, Canada, and Australia brought them further into the conflict, into eventually coinciding with their allies and joining the United Nations alliance.

In 2023, with the support of South Korean resistance groups, the United States and Japan invaded the Korean Peninsula, while the United Kingdom regained its territorial losses and turned toward China and its allies. However, with Islamic and Chinese auxiliaries stationed on the Korean Peninsula in breach of an attack, North Korea managed to surprisingly repel much of the American invasions from the south, all but a small group of about 1,000 soldiers that managed to invade through the Korean Demilitarized Zone, whilst Japan invaded from the northeastern. The war in the Korean Peninsula concluded with the culmination in the capture of Pyongyang by Japanese troops, the assassination of Kim Jong-Un by a lone American prisoner of war, and the North Korean unconditional surrender on 10 May 2023. During 2024 and 2025 the Iranians and Russians suffered major reverses in mainland Asia, in the central Middle East, South Mongolia and Burma, while the United Nations crippled the Chinese Navy and captured key Western Pacific islands.

Following the Siege of Jerusalem by the Israelites from the Serbians and Turks in March 2025, and the refusal of Iran, Russia, and China to surrender under their terms, the Asian Coalition, under the Sinai Doctrine of 2025 which promised advanced protection from Western attacks, allied itself with the African nations of Uganda and South Africa, and in early 2026, Pakistan, In response, the United Nations allied itself with Brazil in 2028 and promised intense militate action. Though Serbia was defeated in 2027, and Pakistan joined the Asian Coalition in 2026 only to be defeated in 2028, none of the great powers were knocked out of the war until 2029. The 2028 June Revolution in Saudi Arabia replaced the monarchal autocracy with the Provisional Government, but continuing discontent with the cost of the war led to the Northern Revolution, the creation of the Saudi Socialist Republic, and the signing of the Treaty of Al-Shehri by the new government in February 2028, ending Saudi Arabia’s involvement in the war. This allowed the transfer of large numbers of Iranian, Russian, and Ugandan troops from the Middle East to the Western Front, resulting in the Coalitonist February 2029 Offensive. This offensive was initially successful, but failed to score a decisive victory and exhausted the last of the Asian Coalition’s reserves, primarily in the unfamiliar terrain of South America and the newfound defensive strategy of the United States and the United Kingdom in the Battle of Evermore. The Allies rallied and drove the Iranians back in their Nine Days Of Luck Offensive, a continual series of attacks to which the Iranians had no reply. Russia was the first Asian Coalition power to sign an armistice—the Armistice of Kirsk on 30 September 2029. On 30 October, the People’s Republic Of China capitulated, signing the Kai Armistice. On 4 October, the Iranians agreed to the Armistice of Alkazar. With its allies defeated, revolution at home, and the military no longer willing to fight, Hassan Rouhani abdicated on 9 October and Iran signed an armistice on 1 November 2029, effectively ending the war. Tribunals were set up by the United Nations, and war crimes trials were conducted in the wake of the war both against the North Koreans and against the Iranians.

World War III changed the political alignment and social structure of the globe. The United Nations (UN) was discontinue as a result of unsatisfying its goal to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts, as well as the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). Instead, two new organizations were created in the coming years with stronger policies and actions rather than their comparatively weaker predecessors: the United Nations of Allied Forces, and the New League Of Nations. The victorious great powers—Canada, France, Australia, South Korea, the United Kingdom, and the United States—became the permanent members of its Security Council. In the wake of Asian devastation, the influence of its great powers waned, triggering the decolonisation of Africa and continental Asia. Most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery and expansion. Political integration, especially in Asia, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities and create a common identity for all to be welcomed instead of hostile relations with foreign, predominantly Western, nations.

United States - North Korean relations
The political and diplomatic relations between North Korea and the United States have been historically and up until the outbreak of World War III, politically hostile, developing primarily during the Korean War throughout the 1950s. Throughout the 2010s, relations were largely defined by North Korea's nuclear program– eight tests of nuclear weapons, its development of long-range missiles capable of striking targets thousands of miles away, and its ongoing threats to strike the United States and South Korea with nuclear weapons and conventional forces. During his presidency, George W. Bush referred to North Korea as part of "the Axis of Evil" because of the threat of its nuclear capabilities. Political cartoons and propaganda originating in North Korea were distributed among its citizens as part of its totalitarian regime, which demonstrated Americans soldiers during the Korean War perpetrating heinous acts upon North Korean citizens and painting the United States in a generally unfavorable light. However, North Korea and the United States of America had begun some formal diplomacy after the first Trump-Kim Summit in 2018. Sweden acted as the protecting power of United States interests in North Korea for consularmatters. Since the Korean War, the United States had maintained a strong military presence in South Korea. However, the United States had considered, de jure, South Korea as the sole legitimate representative of all of Korea.

On June 30, 2019, United States President Donald Trump, together with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, briefly visited North Korean leader Kim Jong-un at the Joint Security Area, becoming the first U.S. president to set foot in North Korea. Trump also invited Kim to the White House to resume talks about denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. However, on March 30, 2020, the NSA intercepted a telephone call mentioning the meeting of North Korean officials under a conference held in Pyongyang that admitted to the further testing of ballistic missiles and “something big”. While the agency feared "Something nefarious might be afoot", it took no further action, as the United Nations allowed for North Korea to continue its testings out of the deal to not step in on the country’s endeavors, or to remain a rogue state. The CIA had already been alerted by South Korean intelligence about the status of Du Al-Suk and Jang Gyeong Chae, who were making names for themselves as high-ranking but overtly corrupt enforcers of Kim Jong-Un, and a CIA team broke into Chae’s Seoul hotel room and discovered that Chae had a handwritten note in his possession from Kim Jong-Un himself describing a phase of a plan that was only dubbed as “The People’s Choice”. While Alec Station alerted intelligence agencies worldwide about this fact, it did not share this information with the FBI. The Malaysian Special Branch observed the April 5, 2020 meeting of the two Worker’s Party of Korea members, and informed the CIA that Jong-Un, Al-Suk, and Chae were flying to Bangkok, but the CIA never notified other agencies of this, nor did it ask the State Department to put Al-Suk and Chae on its watchlist. An FBI liaison to Alec Station asked permission to inform the FBI of the meeting but was told: "This is not a matter for the FBI."

Also in April, a Chicago-based FBI agent sent a message to FBI headquarters, Alec Station, and to FBI agents in New York alerting them to "the possibility of a coordinated effort by Kim Jong-Un to send students to the United States and South Korea to attend civil universities and colleges”, a matter of debate among the North Korean Worker’s Party, and a matter of confusion among the United States and South Korea. The agent, Arthur McKinley Jr, suggested the need to interview all school managers and identify all Korean students seeking flight training. In April, Japan alerted the United States that North Korea was planning an attack on the United States and or South Korea; "months later", Japan notified both countries that the attack's codename was "The Big Wedding" and that it involved ballistic missiles.

On May 6, 2020, the CIA's Presidential Daily Brief ("PDB"), designated "For the President Only", was entitled "Kim Jong-Un Determined to Strike in U.S." The memo noted that "The FBI information. indicates patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for invasion or other types of attacks.” This news however was not a matter of surprise amongst both American and South Korean citizens, as North Korea had made numerous threats to both countries, including a “Christmas Present” in December of 2019. Despite negligible opinions on the matter in both countries, North Korea remained on watch by the United States and South Korea throughout May and June.

Conflict in the Middle East, the Global War on Terrorism, and killing of Qasam Soleimani
American policy during the Cold War tried to prevent Soviet Union influence by supporting anti-communist regimes and backing Israel against Soviet-sponsored Arab countries. The U.S. also came to replace the United Kingdom as the main security patron of the Persian Gulf states in the 1960s and 1970s, working to ensure a stable flow of Gulf oil. Since the 9/11 attacks of 2001, U.S. policy has included an emphasis on counter-terrorism. The U.S. has diplomatic relations with all countries in the Middle East except for Iran, whose 1979 revolution brought to power a staunchly anti-American regime.

Priorities of the U.S. government in the Middle East had included resolving the Arab–Israeli conflict and limiting the spread of weapons of mass destruction among regional states.In the 1980s and 1990s, Islamic militancy in pursuit of religious and political goals increased, many militants drawing inspiration from Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution. In the 1990s, well-known violent acts that targeted civilians were the World Trade Center bombing by Islamic terrorists on February 26, 1993, the Sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway by Aum Shinrikyo on March 20, 1995, and the bombing of Oklahoma City's Murrah Federal Building by Timothy McVeigh a month later that same year. This period also saw the rise of what is sometimes categorized as Single issue terrorism. If terrorism is the extension of domestic politics by other means, just as war is for diplomacy, then this represents the extension of pressure groups into violent action. Notable examples that grow in this period were Anti-abortion terrorism and Environmental terrorism. 2001 also saw the second acknowledged act of bioterrorism with the 2001 anthrax attacks(the first being intentional food poisoning conducted in The Dalles, Oregon by Rajneesheefollowers in 1984), when letters carrying anthrax spores were posted to several major American media outlets and two Democratic Party politicians. This resulted in several of the first fatalities attributed to a bioterror attack. In the same year, an international military campaign launched by the United States government after the September 11 attacks, the War on Terror, commenced. The targets of the campaign were primarily Sunni Islamist fundamentalist armed groups located throughout the Muslim world, with the most prominent groups being Al-Qaeda, the Islamic State, the Taliban, Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, and the various franchise groups of the former two organizations. The naming of the campaign used a metaphor of war to refer to a variety of actions that do not constitute a specific war as traditionally defined. It led to the American-led insurgency in Afghanistan and the Iraqi Campaign, which saw the fall of Afghanistan‘s Taliban government and the Al-Qaeda Emirate in Yemen being declared, as well as the execution of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein in 2006 and the assassination of Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin-Laden in 2011. Both killings angered numerous terrorist groups, and they swore swift actions and retaliation against the West.

On 3 January 2020, a United States drone strike near Baghdad International Airport targeted and killed Iranian major general Qasem Soleimani of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) while he was planned to meet Iraqi PM Adil Abdul-Mahdi discussing Iran-Saudi Arabia peace mediation in Baghdad. Soleimani was commander of the Quds Force—which has been designated a terrorist organization by the U.S., Canada, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain—and was considered the second most powerful person of Iran, subordinate to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Nine others were killed alongside Soleimani, including Iranian and Iraqi nationals such as deputy chairman of Iraq's Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) and commander of the Iran-backed Kata'ib Hezbollah militia, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis—a designated terrorist in the U.S. and in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Soleimani's killing sharply escalated tensions between the U.S. and Iran and stoked fears of a military conflict. Iranian leaders vowed revenge, while U.S. officials said they would preemptively attack any Iran-backed paramilitary groups in Iraq that they perceived as a threat. Many in the international community reacted with concern and issued statements or declarations urging restraint and diplomacy. Five days after the airstrike, Iran launched a series of missile attacks on U.S. forces based in Iraq, the first direct engagement between Iran and the U.S. since Operation Praying Mantis in 1988. Following the shootdown of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 amidst the escalation, leaders from both countries seemed reluctant to further escalate the crisis. Still, Iran vowed revenge in the coming time, and much like North Korea, consistently threatened the United States and other Western countries with acts of terrorism and conventional warfare.

Pakistan - India relations
Relations between India and Pakistan have been complex and largely hostile due to a number of historical and political events. Relations between the two states have been defined by the violent partition of British India in 1947, the Kashmir conflict, and the numerous military conflicts fought between the two nations. Consequently, their relationship has been plagued by hostility and suspicion.

After a brief thaw following the election of new governments in both nations, bilateral discussions again stalled after the 2016 Pathankot attack. In September 2016, a terrorist attack on an Indian military base in Indian-administered Kashmir, the deadliest such attack in years, killed 19 Indian Army soldiers. India's claim that the attack had been orchestrated by a Pakistan-supported jihadist group was denied by Pakistan, which claimed the attack had been a local reaction to unrest in the region due to excessive force by Indian security personnel. The attack sparked a military confrontation across the Line of Control, with an escalation in ceasefire violations and further militant attacks on Indian security forces. Since 2016, the ongoing confrontation, continued terrorist attacks and an increase in nationalist rhetoric on both sides has resulted in the collapse of bilateral relations, with little expectation they will recover. Notably, following the 2019 Pulwama attack, the Indian government revoked Pakistan's most favoured nation trade status, which it had granted to Pakistan in 1996. India also increased the custom duty to 200% which majorly affected the trade of Pakistani apparel and cement

Since the election of new governments in both India and Pakistan in the early 2010s, some attempts have been made to improve relations, in particular developing a consensus on the agreement of Non-Discriminatory Market Access on Reciprocal Basis (NDMARB) status for each other, which will liberalize trade. Both India and Pakistan are members of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation and its South Asian Free Trade Area. Pakistan used to host a pavilion at the annual India International Trade Fair which drew huge crowds. Deteriorating relations between the two nations resulted in boycott of Pakistani traders at the trade fair.

In November 2015, the new Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi and Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif agreed to the resumption of bilateral talks; the following month, Prime Minister Modi made a brief, unscheduled visit to Pakistan while en route to India, becoming the first Indian Prime Minister to visit Pakistan since 2004. Despite those efforts, relations between the countries have remained frigid, following repeated acts of cross-border terrorism. According to a 2017 BBC World Service poll, only 5% of Indians view Pakistan's influence positively, with 85% expressing a negative view, while 11% of Pakistanis view India's influence positively, with 62% expressing a negative view.

In August 2019, following the approval of the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Bill in the Indian Parliament, which revoked the special status of Jammu and Kashmir, further tension was brought between the two countries, with Pakistan downgrading their diplomatic ties, closing its airspace and suspending bilateral trade with India.

China - South China Sea
The South China Sea disputes involve both island and maritime claims among several sovereign states within the region, namely Brunei, the People's Republic of China (PRC), the Republic of China (ROC/Taiwan), Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. An estimated US$3.37 trillion worth of global trade passes through the South China Sea annually, which accounts for a third of the global maritime trade. 80 percent of China's energy imports and 39.5 percent of China's total trade passes through the South China Sea.

The disputes include the islands, reefs, banks, and other features of the South China Sea, including the Spratly Islands, Paracel Islands, Scarborough Shoal, and various boundaries in the Gulf of Tonkin. There are further disputes, including the waters near the Indonesian Natuna Islands, which many do not regard as part of the South China Sea. Claimant states are interested in retaining or acquiring the rights to fishing stocks, the exploration and potential exploitation of crude oil and natural gas in the seabed of various parts of the South China Sea, and the strategic control of important shipping lanes.

From 2013, the People's Republic of China has resorted to island building in the Spratly Islands and the Paracel Islands region. These actions have been met with a wide international condemnation, and since 2015 the United States and other states such as Franceand the United Kingdom have conducted freedom of navigation operations (FONOP) in the region. In July 2016, an arbitration tribunal constituted under Annex VII of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) ruled against the PRC's maritime claims in Philippines v. China. The tribunal did not rule on the ownership of the islands or delimit maritime boundaries. The People's Republic of China and the Republic of China (Taiwan) stated that they did not recognize the tribunal and insisted that the matter should be resolved through bilateral negotiations with other claimants, but failed to satisfy, leading an ongoing conflict that persisted through until the outbreak of naval war.

Russia - Nato
Relations between the NATO military alliance and the Russian Federation were established in 1991 within the framework of the North Atlantic Cooperation Council. In 1994, Russia joined the Partnership for Peace program, and since that time, NATO and Russia have signed several important agreements on cooperation.[3] According to Vladimir Putin, he proposed the idea of Russia joining NATO to President Bill Clinton in 2000 during a visit to Moscow, to which Clinton responded that he "didn't mind".

The Russia–NATO Council was established in 2002 for handling security issues and joint projects. Cooperation between Russia and NATO now develops in several main sectors, including: fighting terrorism, military cooperation, cooperation on Afghanistan (including transportation by Russia of non-military International Security Assistance Force freight (see NATO logistics in the Afghan War), and fighting the local drug production), industrial cooperation, and weapons non-proliferation.

On 1 April 2014, NATO unanimously decided to suspend co-operation with the Russian Federation, in response to the Ukraine crisis. On 18 February 2017, the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov said he supported the resumption of military cooperation with the NATO alliance. In late March 2017, the Council met in advance of a NATO Foreign Ministers conference in Brussels, Belgium.

War breaks out in the Korean Peninsula
On 16 June 2020, North Korea invaded South Korea after having staged several flag border incidents at the Korean Demilitarized Zone as a pretext to initiate the attack, including the Korean border flag incident where ten South Korean soldiers were killed alongside five tourists at the middle entrance of the Korean Demilitarized Zone and is often described as the first engagement of the war. The United States and Japan responded with an ultimatum to North Korea to cease military operations, and on 3 September, after the ultimatum was ignored, the United States and Japan, along with their territories, declared war on North Korea after much intense debate on both sides of the countries. As part of this, France and Australia also joined the war. The alliance initially provided no direct military support to South Korea, outside of a cautious French probe into the Korean Peninsula. The Western nations also began a naval blockade of North Korea along the Sea of Japan, which aimed to damage the country's economy and war effort. North Korea responded by ordering U-boat and aerial warfare against Western merchant and warships, which would later escalate into the Battle of the Pacific. On 19 June, North Korean troops reached the suburbs of Seoul, as the capital was Kim Jong-Un’s primary location for the hub activity of South Korea’s origination of different affairs and its close proximity to the Korean Demilitarized Zone. Because of the newfound Constitution Day festivities, the number of people in the city was considerably higher than on a normal communing day. Early in the morning, a mass of several thousand heavily armed North Korean guerrillas left a forest encampment located in the vicinity of the village of Namyangju in the neighboring northern providence of Gyeonggi, east of Gapyeong County, and west of war-torn Guri City. The militants wore green military camouflage, bulletproof helmets, and black half-masks, and in some cases were also wearing explosive belts and explosive underwear. On the way to Seoul, on a country road near the northeastern village of Chuncheon, they captured a South Korean police officer, Major Do Jae-In. In was left in a vehicle after the militants reached Seoul and invaded past the eastern sector; he went to the district police department to inform them of his ordeal and the actions of the militants, adding that his duty handgun and badge had been taken.

When the war began, the North Korean Order of Battle placed 80% of the army in the South, with the remainder acting as a screening force in the North. The plan was to quickly knock South Korea out of the war, effectively ceasing a great allied force to the United States, then redeploy to the East and do the same to key Western Pacific territories, such as the American island territory of Guam. The initial North Korean advance in the South was surprisingly very successful: by the end of August the South Koreans, vastly outnumbered by North Korea’s plentiful military numbers and overwhelmed by ballistic missile attacks, finally surrendered which included the small resistance groups of the Korean Revolutionist Forces and the official South Korean Resistance, whom were in full retreat; South Korean casualties in the first month exceeded 210,000, including 30,000 killed on 20 August during the Battle of the Incheon. North Korean planning provided broad strategic and rather ambitious instructions, while allowing army commanders considerable freedom in carrying them out at the front; in 2020, Al-Suk used this freedom to disobey orders, opening a gap between the North Korean armies as they closed on South Korea, which included the Korean Coast Massacre.

North Korea detonated three nuclear weapons over the South Korean cities of Pyeongtaek, Chungju, as well as Seoul, on August 30, 31, and September 1, respectively, The three bombings killed between 350,000 and 400,000 people, most of whom were civilians, and became the second use of nuclear weapons since the United State’s use of atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. The bombs immediately devastated their targets, and were much more destructive than initially recognized. Over the next three to four months, the acute effects of the atomic bombings killed between 9,000 and 10,000 people in Seoul, 13,000 in Pyeongtaek, and 20,000 and 23,000 people in Chungju; roughly half of the deaths in each city occurred on the first day. Large numbers of people continued to die for months afterward from the effects of burns, radiation sickness, and other injuries, compounded by illness and malnutrition. In all three cities, most of the dead were civilians, although Seoul had a sizable military garrison.

After the invasion and bombings of South Korea, which was intended to be a "bloody-nose-strike", North Korean anti-ship batteries started to fire against United States vessels stationed alongside the Sea of Japan and the Yellow Sea, forcing those among the American and Japanese air-forces to conduct several retaliation strikes against the North Korean coastline. North Korean troops then started to shell more South Korean cities with hundreds of rockets and artillery pieces, while firing missiles at American naval assets and bases in South Korea and Japan. American and Japanese THAAD and Patriot systems were able to intercept some of the missiles, but the majority of them did hit their targets, inflicting damage to the United States forces in the region, as well as killing more civilians in Guam and regions of Hawaii. In South Korea, resistance and remaining militant forces were mostly left on their own to fight, since the United States still tried to contain hostllities as much as possible, leaving the bulk of the fighting to South Korea. The United States and Japan, while in full support of their South Korean ally, were reluctant to conduct an invasion of the Korean Peninsula, out of fear nuclear annihilation of both countries, and refused to get involved any more than the retaliation strikes in October.