Origins
The Uniting for Peace resolution was initiated by the United States, and submitted by the "Joint Seven-Powers" in October 1950, as a means of circumventing further Soviet vetoes during the course of the Korean War (25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953). It was adopted by 52 votes to 5, with 2 abstentions.
In the closing days of Assembly discussions leading up to the adoption of 377 A, US delegate to the UN, John Foster Dulles, made specific reference to the Korean War as a chief motivator in the passage of the resolution:
"Then came the armed attack on the Republic of Korea and it seemed that the pattern of 1931 had in fact begun to repeat itself and that the third world war might be in the making. And that might have been—and I think it would have been—had it not been for a series of accidental circumstances which made it possible to improvise collective resistance to that aggression."
The principal accidental circumstance referred to by Dulles was that the Soviet Union was boycotting the Security Council at the time of the outbreak of hostilities in Korea, and had been since January 1950, owing to its discontent over the UN's refusal to recognize the People's Republic of China's representatives as the legitimate representatives of China, returning only on 1 August 1950 to assume the rotating role of Council President, for that month. This circumstance had meant that the Security Council was able to adopt its resolutions 83, of 27 June 1950, and 84, of 7 July 1950, thereby establishing a UN-mandated force for South Korea "to repel the armed attack" from the North. Had the Soviet Union been seated at the Council during the months of June and July, the relevant draft resolutions would almost certainly have been vetoed, and the United States was well aware of this, as evidenced by the above statement.
Read more about this topic: United Nations General Assembly Resolution 377
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