What is the significance of the 38th parallel?
After the surrender of Japan in 1945, the parallel was established as the boundary between the Soviet (north) and American (south) occupation zones in Korea, as Dean Rusk and Charles Bonesteel had earlier suggested. The parallel divided the peninsula roughly in the middle. In 1948, the dividing line became the boundary between the newly independent countries of North and South Korea. At the end of the Korean War (1950-1953), a new border was established through the middle of the Demilitarized Zone, which cuts across the 38th parallel at an acute angle, from southwest to northeast.
