by Bill Fawcett
Between February and late April, the Allied armies pushed into the heart of Germany. By late April, the question was more one of what areas would be occupied rather than of defeating those remnants of the Wehrmacht that were still fighting. There was also concern about rumors of a guerrilla army forming in the south German mountains. These turned out to be false, but it was a worrisome possibility. The big question was, where would Eisenhower push? To the frustration of Patton and other commanders, the decision was made to turn away from Berlin and to actually reverse any penetrations into eastern Europe. This was ordered even as it became more apparent that Stalin had no intention of granting any real elections or giving up one ounce of control in any part of the nations Russia occupied. Word came down from Roosevelt, and the U.S. Army was effectively ordered to concede eastern Europe to the Soviets. The mistake here was not agreeing to the terms at Yalta. The mistake was not being concerned about a final guerrilla retreat in the mountains that never existed. The Americans’ real mistake was adhering to their parts of the treaty when it was already apparent the communists had no intention of honoring any of it.
Had the U.S. president and army been prescient enough to foresee the Cold War, as Churchill did, would Eisenhower have ordered a continued push? His divisions could have gotten to Berlin first, considering how resistance had collapsed. It would have been possible for the highly mobile American mechanized divisions to reach Austria, Berlin, Albania, Bulgaria, and maybe Czechoslovakia. Would, as Patton expected, or maybe hoped, this have resulted in a shooting war between the former allies? It was a war that neither side would have been guaranteed to win. But Russia was a nation as tired of war as the others.
There is no way to know what the world might have looked like had Roosevelt and then Truman risked war and stood up to Stalin. What America did instead was stick to the terms of a treaty that had become meaningless. This mistake resulted in tens of millions of eastern Europeans being condemned to fifty years of communist repression.
86
MISQUOTED
What Sphere of
Influence?
1950
A diplomat’s tool is words, and it is reasonable to assume someone who has risen to be the top diplomat for the United States means what he says. So when Joseph Stalin and Kim Il-sung invaded South Korea, they were shocked and honestly amazed at the vehement reaction from the United Nations (UN) and the United States. They had every right to be, since effectively they had been given permission to attack by the U.S. secretary of state.
Secretary of State Dean Acheson, on January 12, 1950, made a speech to the National Press Club. This was a policy speech and not casual remarks. It seemed likely that the speech was intended to act as a warning to the now-antagonistic communist Russia, China, and their satellites. In this speech, Acheson described the American post-World War II sphere of influence as it extended all over the world. The problem came when he described the U.S. interest in the Pacific and mentioned Japan, but not Korea. Imagine Kim Il-sung’s joy when he heard that coveted South Korea was not protected by the United States.
The problem of mixed signals on Korea was also complicated by politics. President Truman was a Democrat, and the Congress was controlled by the Republican Party. And the Republicans did not like many of Truman’s foreign policies. As a result, when Truman requested $60 million in aid for South Korea, Congress refused to pass it. Then a bill that would finance 500 advisers and training personnel to assist in equipping the South Korean army with modern weapons was defeated in the House by the close vote of 193 to 192. Those in power in Moscow and Pyongyang saw a clear message. America was abandoning South Korea.
An action taken by Truman on April 25, 1950, might have cleared up the matter and put the North Koreans on notice. This was National Security Directive 68, which committed American resources to counter any communist aggression “anywhere in Asia.” It was a strong and clear statement and could have been an equally clear warning. The problem was national security directives are classified top secret.
A public statement by John Foster Dulles, Truman’s special envoy to Asia, likely was intended to put the communists on notice. Unfortunately, he worded his statement in typical diplomatic terms, obscuring the message. The closest Dulles came to a definitive statement was in his speech to the South Korean Assembly. He said that America was “faithful to the cause of human freedom and loyal to those everywhere who honorably support it.” Not exactly fighting words to warn off an aggressor.
North Korean troops poured over the thirty-eighth parallel on June 17, 1950. The poorly armed and disorganized South Korean army was incapable of serious resistance. The few American units in Korea were quickly forced to retreat south. Then the world responded to the invasion.
After all they had heard, it was likely that both Stalin and Kim Il-sung found the adamant reaction by the United States a shock. Had the Soviet Union or China actually expected a military response from Truman, it is likely that they would have not allowed Kim Il-sung to attack. Certainly they would not have let the invasion happen while they were boycotting the Security Council. Because the Russians were not attending the UN Security Council meetings, the council was able to pass a resolution calling for strong military force to support and restore South Korea. Before the conflict ended, 50,000 UN soldiers, mostly Americans, were killed along with many times that number of North Koreans and then Chinese. It was a high price to pay for what was effectively just sloppy language.
87
EGO OVER WISDOM
MacArthur and the
Chinese
1950
The mistake that changed the Korean War and cost more than 10,000 American lives was caused by ego. Not just the ego of one man, though there was a man whose ego was as enormous as his reputation. That man was General Douglas MacArthur. It also involved a bad attack of victory disease by the chief of staff and a good bit of racial prejudice. The problems that resulted from this mistake are still in the news.
It all began because the North Korean Army (NKA) attacked South Korea. (The diplomatic mistakes that caused this are discussed on pages 335-337.) In the first few weeks after their surprise attack, the NKA forced the few South Korean and American divisions into a small area in a southern corner of the Korean peninsula that became known as the Pusan Perimeter. Then, on September 5, in a bold move, MacArthur landed 70,000 men at Inchon. The successful landing was above and behind the bulk of the North Korean Army. Within days, the Americans had taken back Seoul and fought their way across Korea. At the same time, United Nations forces in the Pusan Perimeter broke out and swept north. Cut off from retreat, not to mention food, ammunition, and fuel, while pressed from two sides, the NKA simply collapsed.
North Korea was a communist country, and it was known that it got support from Red Premier Mao’s China. When it was apparent that there were no longer substantial North Korean forces left to even slow MacArthur should he push above the old border at the thirty-eighth parallel, the Chinese asked the Indian ambassador to notify Washington that it would be considered an unacceptable threat to the People’s Republic of China for North Korea to be occupied. This was tantamount to a public promise to attack. Unfortunately, the CIA designated the ambassador as an unreliable source and ignored China’s message.
There were no aircraft overflying China and Manchuria. MacArthur and his staff had been in the habit of depending on the radio intelligence of the Armed Forces Security Agency (AFSA) to keep them informed about the Chinese. But the signal intelligence agency was unable to break the Chinese codes and were reluctant to admit so. What intelligence did come in, before MacArthur’s troops continued north, came from the CIA. Unfortunately, what they provided was more analysis that conformed to their own general beliefs instead of real intelligence. By their own later analysis of their efforts in 1950, they reported, “While full-scale Chinese Communist intervention in Korea must be regarded as a continuing possibility, a consideration of all known factors leads to the conclusion
that barring a Soviet decision for global war, such action is not probable in 1950.”
So while the Chinese felt that they had publicly warned the United States to stop, no one got the message. Regardless, the Chinese communists had put the world on notice, and not responding strongly would have been a terrible loss of face for Mao’s relatively new government. Former admiral and the Japanese ambassador to the United States, Kichasaburo Nakamura, warned the Truman government that China would be required to react strongly if MacArthur continued, but again, the message was ignored. Nor would such a warning have been welcomed. Buoyed by his Inchon victory, MacArthur’s attitude might be characterized as: They wouldn’t dare.
MacArthur, urged by the South Korean leader Syngman Rhee, launched his two corps north, sending the Ten Corps up along the southern coast and the Eight Corps to land at a port 100 miles north of the thirty-eighth parallel. Both forces then advanced against little resistance. The operations could be best characterized as a cleanup. As both corps approached the Chinese border, they began to capture first individual and then entire Chinese units. Still everyone on the U.S. side refused to believe the Chinese would attack.
The CIA had information that they simply refused to believe as of October 13. It correctly placed 498,000 Chinese combat troops and 370,000 additional security and support troops on the Korean border. Daily summary reports were issued by the CIA. Their report for October 13 said that “China had no intention of entering the war in any large-scale fashion.” The three-quarters of a million soldiers were explained as being on the border within miles of the invading UN forces “to protect the hydroelectric plants along the Yalu River that provide power to the Manchurian industrial area.”
On November 24, the CIA stated that even though they had identified twelve Chinese divisions inside Korea and that China did have the capability for a large-scale offensive, they did not appear to be preparing to launch one. Before this CIA analysis could reach MacArthur’s headquarters, his two corps were under attack by 300,000 Chinese. The Eighth Army took 4,000 casualties as it made a fighting retreat and the Tenth Corps First Marine Division was surrounded and survived only by making one of the most heroic fighting withdrawals in history.
The Chinese had told everyone they were going to attack. Then they stated that, having done so, they had to attack if MacArthur’s offensive continued. Next they left a half million men along the border for weeks. Then the Chinese sent smaller units into Korea that were seen, and some Chinese soldiers were captured by the advancing American forces. And still no one of authority from MacArthur to the CIA analysts believed that, even after they had repeatedly said they would, the Chinese would actually attack. The cost of this arrogance was two more years of war, tens of thousands of UN casualties, and perhaps a million Korean dead. There is still no peace treaty between North and South Korea.
88
DIRTY TRICK
Staying Clean
1953
Scientists at 3M in Minnesota were trying to make a better formula for synthetic rubber. The rubber shortages of World War II had made such research important even into the 1950s. As sometimes happens, one of the lab assistants spilled an ounce or so of one of the many compounds onto the tennis shoe of scientist Patsy Sherman. Trying to redeem himself, the lab assistant worked hard to remove the substance from the shoe. Nothing worked, not soap, alcohol, or water. In fact the stained area repelled everything he tried. Sherman and another researcher, Sam Smith, began working with the spilled substance. Between them, they refined the chemical and, in 1956, 3M began selling Scotchgard.
89
MYTH OF THE DECISIVE BATTLE
Cards, Spades, and the
High Ground
1953
One of the most socially and militarily traumatic events in
American history was the U.S. involvement in Vietnam. The failures there left scars that affect military decisions even into the twenty-first century. The United States had to and did make a lot of mistakes to lose their part of that war, but the real mistake that started it all wasn’t one any American made. It was made by a Frenchman. A French general to be exact. His name was Henri Navarre, and he hated to lose. Normally that is a good trait in a general, but in this case it led him to make a mistake that cost thousands of French lives and later ensured there would be tens of thousands of American and Vietnamese dead.
General Navarre was in charge of the pacification of Vietnam after World War II. When that war had ended, the French returned to their former colony of French Indochina after the defeated occupying Japanese departed. There was some expectation by the French who returned that things would go back to normal when the French plantation owners and managers returned home. But times had changed. There was no normal to return to.
The Japanese had not only defeated but also embarrassed the European nations, taking away the entire subcontinent with impressive ease. During the war, the Allies had encouraged local guerrilla movements to resist the Japanese, training a few and arming many. The communists joined in this, fielding their own resistance movements. When the French returned, the Vietnamese refused to trade the new master for the old one. The French resisted. After nine years of insurrection, the French government accepted that they were not going to turn back the clock. Also, until Navarre made his mistake, there was a good chance that Võ Nguyên Giáp, leader of the Viet Minh, would accept a coalition government or similar compromise so long as it gave Vietnam self-rule. Though the Viet Minh likely had a further expectation of taking over once the French were gone.
It was a fact that both sides had started talking and that actually spurred General Navarre to look for his own victory. He may even have seen the talks as a sign of his failure. His job had been to reassert total French control and that had not happened. He had not done his job. Navarre certainly realized that once the diplomats had reached any agreement, there would be no way for him to retrieve the situation. But a major victory that dramatically broke the rebellion would not only vindicate his efforts and the sacrifices his soldiers had made already but would also ensure a favorable settlement. What Navarre wanted is a phrase that has appeared before: He sought a decisive battle that would win his war. Unfortunately, to quote a cartoon squirrel popular at that time, “that trick never works.”
The problem with fighting any insurgency is how to bring them to battle. Navarre needed the Viet Minh to fight him in a standup battle. But they had so far been wiser than to do that. With air support, artillery, and tanks, there was every expectation that the French would dominate any conventional fight. But the French general thought of a way to force just such a battle. And he was correct: The plan worked and the battle occurred, just not how and when he expected.
The idea was to set up a target that was such a challenge and so enticing that Giáp had to take the bait. To offer this, the French established a base near the town of Dien Bien Phu. This was in the far western part of Vietnam, near nothing except the Laotian border and across trackless jungle from just about anything else. Then, to sweeten its appeal as a target, Navarre built his base in a valley surrounded by steep mountains and did not occupy the mountains. Then Navarre moved most of his army there.
This location seemed to so favor the Viet Minh that they had to attack or lose credibility. Navarre also thought that it really favored him. He saw the battle in his mind and was sure how Giáp would react. Since the French flew in all of their supplies and reinforcements, it wasn’t too inconvenient to be far from everyone else. But the French general’s expectation was that the dense jungles and distances would limit Giáp to troops armed with only what they could bring with them. This would be men with rifles and little else. It was a long walk.
The Vietnamese had shown a liking, as they later did against the Americans, for human wave attacks. Navarre expected Giáp to rush thousands of his rifle-armed guerrillas in suicidal charges at the base to be slaughtered by his planes, tanks, and artillery. Then, once the strength of the Viet Minh had been wa
sted, Navarre’s army could easily pacify the rest of the country. His decisive battle would win the war, retrieve French honor, and provide an ideal position for the negotiators. And it would work if Giáp did as expected.
But of course Giáp did not do what Navarre wanted. He did summon every Vietnamese he could muster, but not for suicidal attacks. For months, the French would get glimpses of the guerrillas in the mountains around them, but they would vanish before the French airplanes could be called in for a strike. Viet Minh snipers regularly took shots into the camp, most at maximum range. But other than harassment, nothing happened for months at the French base in Dien Bien Phu.
What General Henri Navarre did not see was that during all those months of seeming inactivity, tens of thousands of peasants and guerrillas were hauling on their backs ammunition, artillery pieces broken down into parts, and everything else needed to win a modern battle against the arrogant French in the valley. Villagers would put one artillery shell weighing seventy or eighty pounds in a sling and spend weeks carrying it along jungle paths, which were invisible under the trees, to deliver them to caves cut into the mountains. Finally, the heights on every side of Dien Bien Phu were covered with dug-in artillery and mortar positions. Shells were stockpiled, and when the rainy season arrived, Giáp was ready.