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View Full Version : He chose stalemate over an all out effort to win the Korean War. Was he right?



thedrifter
12-11-02, 08:51 PM
HARRY S. TRUMAN

He chose stalemate over an all out effort to win the Korean War. Was he right?

The following paragraphs are excerpts from an article entitled "Lessons from Korea" by Donald Johnston who served with the 45th Infantry Division during the Korean War and was awarded the Bronze Star. The article appeared in the September 2000 edition of "The American Legion Magazine".

Truman became president after Franklin D. Roosevelt's death in April 1945. George Marshall, then secretary of state, and Dean Acheson, undersecretary of state, quickly planned a Western-oriented government for South Korea in which that country would become a trade partner with Japan (occupied by the United States). This would create a powerhouse of capitalism in Asia that hopefully would prove to be a more dynamic economic force than communism. In theory, this partially capitalistic Asia would then spread to become an all-capitalistic Asia with Japan, organized by the United States, at its center.

To thwart such a plan, Stalin plotted the invasion and takeover of South Korea, which triggered America's response.

A War By Any Other Name. In an effort to make the United States' move appear sanctioned by the rest of the world, Truman had taken the issue not to Congress, as required by the Constitution, but to the U. N. Security Council, which unanimously approved the motion. (The Soviet Union was staging a protest over another matter and had earlier walked out of the Security Council. Its delegation was not present to use its veto power.)

Truman and his supporters used semantics to defend the decision not to ask for a declaration of war.

If the word "war" was not employed, the Truman administration tacitly argued, a president could send troops anywhere in the world for any purpose. Korea would be a "police action", the first of many such undeclared wars. And the constitutional system would be irrevocably altered.

By November 1950, the North Korean army had been obliterated and the war was basically over - all in just five months. There was even talk of the troops returning home by the Christmas holidays.

But two decisions would make that impossible. The first was made in Washington. "I have ordered the 7th Fleet to prevent any attack on Formosa," Truman said two days after the invasion of South Korea. "As a corollary of this action, I am calling on Formosa (Taiwan) to cease all air and sea operations against the mainland. The 7th Fleet will see that this is done."

That decision enabled China to move the major portion of its military might away from the southeastern coast, since there was no fear that the forces under Chiang Kai-shek would make incursions from Formosa.

The other decision was made in Beijing. No longer concerned by attack from the nationalists on Formosa, the Chinese decided to intervene in Korea.

That decision enabled China to move the major portion of its military might away from its southeastern coast, since there was no fear that the forces under Chiang Kai-shek would make incursions from Formosa. The other decision was made in Beijing. No longer concerned by attack from the nationalists on Formosa, the Chinese decided to intervene in Korea.

When the Communist Chinese forces came out of hiding from the remote mountain ravines in North Korea to attack U.N. forces Nov. 25, 1950, this signaled the start of a new war: the Chinese army against the U.N. forces.

As the Chinese crossed the Yalu River, the border between China and North Korea, they received protection from an unexpected source: Washington. MacArthur had ordered the bridges on the Yalu River to be destroyed by the U.S. Air Force to stop the invasion of Chinese troops, but he was shocked to find his orders were countermanded by Gen. George C. Marshall, secretary of defense.

Truman and Marshall feared that escalation in Korea and China would force America to shift forces from Germany to Asia, thus leaving a weakened defense in Europe against possible moves by Stalin. After the Chinese intervention, there was also .

Fighting for Stalemate. MacArthur was fighting to win in Korea. Truman wanted to maintain the status quo. This was an unprecedented conflict of attitudes regarding the definition of war. Should the objective be MacArthur's "no substitute for victory" or a more limited, politically sensitive policy?

The answer remains in dispute even today, but after three years of limited war and stalled negotiations, one thing is clear: Truman's war strategy created untenable situations for the men who fought and died in Korea.

Armistice talks began in July 195l. By Oct. 28, agreement on a line of the demarcation between North and South Korea was determined. On Nov. 12, Ridgeway ordered Lt. Gen. James Van Fleet, commander of the 8th Army, to halt offensive operations and commence active defense of the U.N. front. For the first time in U.S. history, our armed forces were deliberately practicing stalemate while the negotiators floundered at Panmunjom.

U.N. forces had been ordered to establish a holding position along the agreed-upon truce line. With the exception of extremely bloody battles such as the capture of the Korean hill, Old Baldy, by the 45th Infantry Division in June 1952, the war became a stalemate. It was punctuated by nightly firefights and patrols to reconnoiter enemy positions for information.

The question heard with the greatest frequency was simply, "Why are we here?" There seemed no purpose to this static war - other than to kill and wait to be killed.

The treaty talks that had started in July 1951 dragged on until President Eisenhower (sworn into office in January 1953) removed the 7th Fleet blockade of Formosa and gave notice to the Chinese government that the United States was going to attack bases in China and might use the atomic bomb. Two weeks later, July 27, 1953, the treaty was signed.

Many surviving personnel came home bitter, emotionally altered and with minimal trust in their government. Marine Cpl. Frank Bifulk's sentiments were shared by many other Korean veterans: "Truman really slapped us in the face," Bifulk concluded in 1950. "He called Korea a police action. Here we were in Korea fighting and dying, and our president says that. Some thanks."

Aside from such human and emotional costs of the war, there were long-term political consequences.

Executive powers were markedly expanded. The boldest assumption of power was the assigning of U.S. troops to military action in Korea without prior congressional consent. With the semantic twist of calling the Korean War a "police action" instead of what it was - a war - future presidents would send troops anywhere in the world for any purpose without approval, using the Korean precedent as their justification.

Vietnam, Kosovo, Bosnia, a number of mini-wars and even the Gulf War indicate that Truman's methods have been repeatedly embraced by his successors.

In the wake of the Truman-MacArthur standoff, the tradition that obliged presidents to defer to field commanders during times of war came to an end. Truman-style micromanagement has reared its head in nearly every conflict since.

Finally, the role of the U.S. military was changed. Formerly, its function was to defend the United States and its citizens from foreign danger. In Korea, that role was expanded to include peacekeeping for the United Nations. What Truman did in this regard in Korea was imitated by other presidents in Lebanon, the Persian Gulf, Somalia, Bosnia and scores of other U.N. missions.

MacArthur concluded that Truman's decision to prevent the bombing of the bridges between Korea and China "foreshadowed a future tragic situation in Korea." In the same manner, Korea itself foreshadowed the future tragedy of undeclared wars.




Another point to consider. . . .



Article 43 of the UN Charter reads:

All Members of the United Nations ... undertake to make available to the Security Council, on its call and in accordance with a special agreement or agreements, armed forces, assistance, and facilities, including the rights of passage, necessary for the purpose of maintaining international peace and security.

But nothing in U.S. law allowed anyone to transfer U.S. troops to the UN -- until December 1945, that is. That was when Congress passed the UN Participation Act, which grants the President authority to carry out the provisions of the UN Charter's Article 43. Incredibly, it further states that the mi"the President shall not be deemed to require the authorization of the Congress to make available to the Security Council on its call"millitary forces of this nation. Congress may have passed such a bill, but it in no way was ever constitutionally authorized to do so.


Sempers,

Roger