The General vs. the President

by H. W. Brands

  Formosa figured centrally in MacArthur’s vision. Employing the imagery he had shared with the joint chiefs two months earlier, he declared, “As a result of its geographic location and base potential, utilization of Formosa by a military power hostile to the United States may either counter-balance or overshadow the strategic importance of the central and southern flank of the U.S. front line position. Formosa in the hands of such an hostile power could be compared to an unsinkable aircraft carrier and submarine tender ideally located to accomplish offensive strategy and at the same time checkmate defensive or counter-offensive operations by friendly forces based on Okinawa and the Philippines.” Recent history, with which some of the veterans were personally familiar, showed that Formosa could readily be used as a springboard for aggression to the south. “Should Formosa fall into the hands of an hostile power, history would repeat itself. Its military potential would again be fully exploited as the means to breach and neutralize our western Pacific defense system and mount a war of conquest against the free nations of the Pacific basin.”

  Taking dead aim at Dean Acheson and the State Department, MacArthur decried diplomacy as a means of determining Formosa’s fate. “Nothing could be more fallacious than the threadbare argument by those who advocate appeasement and defeatism in the Pacific that if we defend Formosa we alienate continental Asia. Those who speak thus do not understand the Orient. They do not understand that it is in the pattern of the Oriental psychology to respect and follow aggressive, resolute and dynamic leadership—to quickly turn on a leadership characterized by timidity or vacillation—and they underestimate the Oriental mentality. Nothing in the last five years has so inspired the Far East as the American determination to preserve the bulwarks of our Pacific Ocean strategic position from future encroachment, for few of its peoples fail accurately to appraise the safeguard such determination brings to their free institutions.” Any other course would undo the good work done so far at such great cost. “It would shift any future battle area five thousand miles eastward to the coasts of the American continents, our home coast; it would completely expose our friends in the Philippines, our friends in Australia and New Zealand, our friends in Indonesia, our friends in Japan, and other areas, to the lustful thrusts of those who stand for slavery as against liberty, for atheism as against God.”

  MacArthur praised President Truman even as he warned him against the unfolding folly of his diplomatic advisers. “The decision of President Truman on June 27”—the decision to defend Korea—“lighted into flame a lamp of hope throughout Asia that was burning dimly toward extinction. It marked for the Far East the focal and turning point in this area’s struggle for freedom. It swept aside in one great monumental stroke all of the hypocrisy and the sophistry which has confused and deluded so many people distant from the actual scene.” MacArthur wanted the vets to know he was the lamp keeper now, battling the hypocrites and sophists even as he fought the communists.

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  WHEN WE FILED into the Oval Office, the President, with lips white and compressed, dispensed with the usual greetings,” Dean Acheson recalled of the meeting that followed Truman’s learning of MacArthur’s message. The secretary of state had never seen the president so angry. MacArthur’s leak of the message to the press guaranteed its publication in all the major papers ahead of the meeting by the Veterans of Foreign Wars and appeared designed to preempt any effort to suppress it.

  What infuriated Truman was not so much what MacArthur said but rather that he arrogated to himself the right to say it. Truman was trying to finesse the issue of Formosa; no more than MacArthur did he wish to see it fall to the communists, yet neither did he want to provoke the Chinese by proclaiming an American protectorate over the island. He guessed he would lose the British if he did so, for they held Hong Kong only on the sufferance of the Chinese. Britain was worth far more to the United States than Formosa would ever be. Nor did Truman intend to give Chiang Kai-shek the carte blanche MacArthur’s statement effectively implied. Further, the president had been struggling to keep the Formosa question separate from the Korea question; MacArthur’s statement, coming from the commander of UN and U.S. forces in Korea, obliterated the separation. And in doing so, it risked blowing up the UN coalition in Korea, for none of the other members had anything like the attachment to the Chinese Nationalists that MacArthur professed. Finally, Truman insisted on the principle that major statements on American foreign policy come from the White House, not from the Dai Ichi Building in Tokyo.

  He looked coldly about the room. He inquired whether any of those present—Louis Johnson, the joint chiefs and Averell Harriman, besides Acheson and members of Truman’s staff—had known of MacArthur’s message in advance. Heads shook all around. Still struggling to keep his temper, Truman declared that MacArthur must be ordered to withdraw his message.

  Johnson nervously objected. The defense secretary judged the general too strong politically to be so publicly reprimanded. MacArthur must be treated with delicacy. “In obvious consternation, Secretary Johnson rose to his feet and stated that he had had no previous knowledge of the MacArthur statement and that he would call MacArthur immediately and request him to cancel the statement in question,” George Elsey recorded.

  Truman’s anger now focused on Johnson. The president refused to “request” anything of MacArthur. But he wanted to make sure others in the Pentagon, namely the joint chiefs, hadn’t known about this. Was Johnson covering for them? “The President swung his chair around, and facing General Collins directly, he asked the General if he had had any knowledge of MacArthur’s statements,” Elsey continued. “General Collins replied that he had not.”

  When none of the other chiefs volunteered, Truman accepted Collins’s statement on behalf of the chiefs as a group.

  Now Averell Harriman, whose opinion of MacArthur’s integrity was declining rapidly, weighed in. “Harriman spoke up in emphatic tones about the catastrophe that would attend the release of MacArthur’s statement,” Elsey wrote. “The President concurred.”

  Acheson took the same view. The secretary of state said that MacArthur’s message was at “complete variance” with the position of the American government. The message must be withdrawn. Again Truman agreed.

  That seemed to settle the matter. “The meeting broke up with the promise by Secretary Johnson that he would instruct MacArthur to cancel the message,” Elsey recorded.

  —

  CHARLIE ROSS, TRUMAN’S press secretary, didn’t think this sufficient. Ross had been around Washington and around the Pentagon, and he trusted Johnson hardly more than he trusted MacArthur. He returned to the president’s office half an hour later to say that MacArthur should be ordered in writing to withdraw the message, and not merely instructed orally, as he suspected Johnson would try to do. There must be a paper trail, Ross said. Truman approved the recommendation.

  But the order took shape only slowly. Ross was right; Johnson didn’t agree with Truman’s decision and sought to circumvent it. He started by working on Acheson. Johnson called the secretary of state to express his concern. He said an order to MacArthur to withdraw the message would cause “a great deal of embarrassment.” He said he and the joint chiefs preferred telling MacArthur that if he went ahead with the message, the administration would have to release a separate statement declaring that “it is one man’s opinion and is not the official policy of the Government.”

  Acheson judged this grossly insufficient and told Johnson so. “Secretary Acheson said he thought that the matter raised the issue as to who is the President of the United States,” Lucius Battle, Acheson’s aide, recorded. “MacArthur had made a statement contrary to what the President and Austin”—Warren Austin, the U.S. representative at the United Nations—“have stated was our position on Formosa. Simply to say that the statement is one man’s views gets the President and the Government into complete confusion as to what parts of the statement are not the Government’s policy; as to whether the Government knew about t
he statement before it became public; why it is not our policy, etc., etc. The Secretary said he thought there was nothing to do but for the President to assert his authority, and in this way make it clear that the President’s stated position on Formosa stood.”

  Johnson was still nervous. “Secretary Johnson at this point asked Secretary Acheson if he thought ‘we dare send him a message that the President directs him to withdraw his statement,’ ” Battle wrote.

  Acheson judged they had better dare. “Secretary Acheson said he saw nothing else to do.”

  Johnson claimed that his memory of the morning meeting was that the president had not definitively decided to order MacArthur to withdraw the message.

  Acheson asserted positively that the president indeed decided. He said Averell Harriman had made the recommendation and Truman had accepted it. Acheson said he would call Harriman and settle the matter.

  Harriman remembered things the way Acheson did. But this didn’t end the debate. Steve Early had been Roosevelt’s press secretary and was currently deputy secretary of defense. Besides owing his job to Johnson, Early considered himself an authority on the dissemination of news. He contended that it was too late to have MacArthur withdraw his message. The major newspapers had received copies, either directly from MacArthur or from the Veterans of Foreign Wars, whose leadership was known to favor the general over the president. Early got on the telephone with Acheson and said that the secretary’s recommendation was too far behind the event. “It seemed to him that the directive of the President asked the impossible,” Lucius Battle recalled Early saying. “It was not mechanically possible to withdraw the statement, because it had been received by the VFW, which is a hostile group; it has been given world-wide distribution by them. Its withdrawal would never, in his opinion, prevent its publication or answer the issue. A directive to MacArthur to withdraw the statement, not being possible of accomplishment, would add fuel to the fire, when the statement is issued.” Better to stick with the explanation that MacArthur spoke only for himself and that in America everyone was allowed his opinion.

  Acheson disagreed strongly. He understood that the president couldn’t stop MacArthur’s statement from becoming public. The question was: How would it be interpreted? “The Secretary again outlined the confused position we would be in if there was simply a repudiation of the statement if made by MacArthur, with no directive not to do so; whereas if it comes out after the order to withdraw has been sent, the President has asserted his authority, and the position of the U.S. in relation to other governments will be maintained.”

  Early still thought his approach would risk less trouble. He wondered if Truman could talk on the phone with MacArthur.

  Acheson rejected this idea at once. “This would put the President in the position of a supplicant,” he said.

  Most of the debate took place out of Truman’s earshot. After Charlie Ross learned that Johnson was dragging his feet, he called Early to ask if the order to MacArthur had been sent. Early said it had not and that he and Johnson were working on a statement to the effect that if questions arose in Washington about MacArthur’s message to the VFW, the White House would say that the administration had no previous knowledge of it.

  “Ross told Early that was emphatically not enough,” George Elsey recorded, “and that it was not in accord with what Johnson had promised the President to do.” Ross resolved to make the order happen. “Ross sent out an alarm for Averell Harriman, and Harriman and Ross together went in to see the President. Ross told the President that Defense seemed to be weak and indecisive.”

  Truman listened to their story and agreed. He at once called Johnson and told him he wanted MacArthur commanded, in no uncertain terms, to withdraw the message. He proceeded to dictate what he wanted Johnson to say.

  Johnson had no choice. He cabled MacArthur: “The President of the United States directs that you withdraw your message for National Encampment of Veterans of Foreign Wars, because various features with respect to Formosa are in conflict with the policy of the United States and its position in the United Nations.”

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  MACARTHUR PROFESSED ASTONISHMENT. He had never intended to cause the president any trouble, he replied to Johnson. Quite the contrary. “My message was most carefully prepared to fully support the President’s policy decision of 27 June 1950, reading in part as follows: ‘The occupation of Formosa by Communist Forces would be a direct threat to the security of the Pacific area and to United States forces performing their lawful and necessary functions in that area.’ ” MacArthur said he had simply aimed to be helpful. “My remarks were calculated solely to support and I am unable to see wherein they might be interpreted otherwise. The views were purely my personal ones and the subject had been freely discussed in all circles, Governmental and private, both at home and abroad.”

  Yet implicitly acknowledging that his message to the veterans had boxed the president in, the general continued, “The message has undoubtedly been incorporated in the printed agenda for the Encampment and advance press releases thereof have already reached world-wide centers of circulation. Under these circumstances I am sure that it would be mechanically impossible to suppress the same at this late date, and I believe to attempt it under such conditions would be a grave mistake.” MacArthur asked Johnson to take the matter to the president again. “Please therefore present my most earnest request to the President for reconsideration of the order given me in your message, as I believe that repercussions resulting in compliance therewith would be destructive and most harmful to the National Interest.”

  Should the president insist on withdrawal, however, MacArthur said, he would of course accede. But he would make clear that the decision was not his. He asked Johnson, in the event the president did not change his mind, to tell the head of the VFW, “I regret to inform you that I have been directed to withdraw my message.”

  Johnson declined to approach Truman again, and he relayed MacArthur’s statement to the VFW.

  The result was an immediate clamor. No one could recall a time when the president of the United States and his commanding general had been so publicly at odds over a critical matter of policy. Editorial pages sizzled with opinions on what this meant for American policy and for future relations between the president and the general.

  Truman and MacArthur, for their own separate reasons, initially refused to say who had directed MacArthur to withdraw the message. Truman didn’t want to reveal that he couldn’t rely on his own secretary of defense, and MacArthur didn’t want to admit that he had been reprimanded by the president.

  Yet reporters soon discovered that the reprimand came from Truman himself, and the revelation encouraged Truman’s critics, quiet since the start of the Korean fighting, to tear into the president again. The VFW registered its strong preference for MacArthur by voting loudly and unanimously to affirm its “complete confidence in his integrity and ability.” Congressional Republicans immortalized MacArthur’s provocative message by inserting it into the Congressional Record. Joseph Martin, the Republican leader in the House, called Truman’s decision “another flagrant example of the incredible bungling by the administration over the past five years, bungling which delivered Manchuria and most of China to the Communists and which culminated in the Korean conflict.”

  Reporters pressed the White House regarding the rift between the president and the general. One asked Charlie Ross if MacArthur was going to be fired.

  “The President regards the incident as closed,” Ross replied.

  “Isn’t it a fact that General MacArthur has disregarded instructions and policy a number of times since the outbreak of aggression in Korea?”

  The questioner was fishing. Rumors had been circulating of tension between Truman and MacArthur, but nothing of substance had surfaced until now. Ross refused the bait. “No comment on that.”

  So what was going on? the reporters demanded.

  A White House spokesman who declined to be named—quite possibly
Ross—tried to tamp down the furor. “The President’s action in directing the withdrawal of General MacArthur’s message was an effort to preserve the clarity of the position of the United States,” he said blandly.

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  “THAT’S THE DAY I should have fired him,” Truman later declared of MacArthur’s VFW message. The president said he told Acheson, Johnson and the joint chiefs he wanted to fire MacArthur and replace him with Omar Bradley. “But they talked me out of it. They said it would cause too much of an uproar, and so I didn’t do it.”

  Truman remembered too much. No one at the meeting recalled the president’s speaking of firing MacArthur. Yet his anger had been evident enough. And some of those present might well have concluded what Truman subsequently put into words: “After that day, I knew it was only a matter of time before there’d be a showdown.”

  21

  MEANWHILE HE HAD another problem. Several months earlier Truman had appointed Francis Matthews secretary of the navy. The appointment filled certain political needs, in that Matthews was a high-profile Irish Catholic and Irish Catholics, long stalwarts of the Democratic party, were being lured to the Republicans by Joseph McCarthy. Matthews, moreover, hailed from Nebraska and tugged back at Midwesterners drawn to the Wisconsinite McCarthy. Matthews knew Washington from service in and around government during the 1930s and 1940s. But he didn’t know foreign policy, and he didn’t know how to keep his foot out of his mouth.