On MacArthur’s Dismissal
Smithsonian.com has an article up purporting to tell the “true” story about General Douglas MacArthur’s dismissal by Harry Truman after the UN Command’s / 8th U.S. Army’s defeat in North Korea at the hands of the Chinese and subsequent retreat back to South Korea in 1951.
Essentially, it makes the claim that the ‘limited war’ restrictions that MacArthur was publicly chafing under were actually benefitting the U.S. side.
I’ve no brief for MacArthur OR Truman, but I don’t buy this article, particularly with regard to the notion that the People’s Liberation Army Air Force was staying its hand and thus keeping America from disaster in Korea.
Why? The PLAAF had forty aircraft in 1949. Mao was begging Stalin for air support (which was grudgingly provided.) If the Soviet AF had deployed its full force to Korea, sure, there would have been some serious problems for the UN Command….but that would’ve meant Stalin was showing his hand, and he was risking war in Europe, too, by doing so.
It wasn’t the PLAAF that was staying its hand, it was Stalin — and he had good reasons to do so, even when 8th Army was occupying Pyongyang.
I suspect Bradley and the JCS had no desire to pay the price of crossing the President for the sake of winning in Korea, because, frankly, a “win” in Korea for the USA was restoring the status quo ante — liberating the North was just bonus and unnecessary on a strategic level, regardless of what Syngman Rhee thought. So, sure, they could give a story about how the “Chinese” AF could’ve wiped us out to Congress as a way to get them to shut up about further escalation…but to do so they have to blur the line between Chinese and Soviet aircraft.
Granted, most Americans had ideological blinders on at the time and would’ve swallowed the idea that the Sovs and PRC were acting 100% in concert….But we know now this wasn’t the case (there were already cracks in the alliance even then) and the fact that the author ignores these facts tells me that he has some sort of axe to grind about something.
