Korea Divided: From Japanese Rule to Two Rival States (1910-1948)

Japan formally annexed Korea in 1910 through the Japan-Korea Annexation Treaty, ending the centuries-old Joseon dynasty and beginning thirty-five years of direct colonial rule. Colonial administration imposed forced cultural assimilation, including a ban on the Korean language in schools from the 1930s, the sōshi-kaimei policy compelling Koreans to adopt Japanese names, and the imposition of State Shinto. Colonial industrialization concentrated in the mineral- and hydroelectric-rich north of the peninsula, while the south remained predominantly agricultural and marked by deeply unequal landownership. Korean resistance was neither passive nor uniform: the March First Movement of 1919 was a massive, peaceful independence uprising that Japan crushed with violent repression, and that same year a Korean provisional government was established in exile in Shanghai, with figures such as Syngman Rhee among its leaders.