The firing of General Stanley McCrystal by President Barack Obama on June 23, 2010 has been compared to President Harry S. Truman’s firing of General Douglas MacArthur on April 11, 1951. Political Science Professor Mason Drukman, in his biography of Senator Wayne Morse, refers to the conflict between Truman and MacArthur as, “a constitutional crisis of monumental proportions.” In his 1954 autobiography, Senator Tom Connally writes that MacArthur “believed he could act independently of his commander-in-chief.”
The President and the General Differ over Asian Policy
The Korean War was predicted to be short in duration. Initially, General MacArthur, commanding a United Nations force consisting primarily of U.S. troops, crossed the 38th parallel and forced the North Koreans to the northern border. The United Nations mandate, however, had been to “repel the armed attack and to restore international peace and security in the area.” MacArthur wanted to go beyond those objectives.
President Truman met with MacArthur October 15, 1950 on Wake Island. MacArthur convinced Truman that the war would be over soon. He also predicted that Communist China would not enter the conflict. MacArthur always believed that there was “no substitute for victory,” a position at odds with Truman.
Truman was concerned that the Soviet Union might be drawn into the conflict or that the war might influence Soviet policy in Europe. Toward that end, the president rearmed Germany, reestablished selective service, and vastly increased the defense budget. Provoking Communist China into a war, however, was to be avoided. MacArthur disagreed.
China Enters the Korean Conflict
In November 1950 the North Koreans, with substantial assistance from Chinese “volunteers,” broke through MacArthur’s lines and pushed the Americans south, beyond the 38th parallel. MacArthur, however, rallied and by January 1951 was forty-five miles from the 38th parallel.
President Truman, in consultation with America’s European allies, initiated a peace process focused on status quo ante bellum. Additionally, 200,000 – 300,000 South Koreans would be trained and equipped to protect the south. MacArthur, however, attempted to sabotage the peace negotiations. In a public statement, General MacArthur said, “The decision of the UN to depart from its tolerant effort to contain the war to the area of Korea through expansion of our military operations to the coastal areas and interior bases will doom Red China to the risk of imminent military collapse.”
MacArthur’s Letter and Loss of Command
A week after making inflammatory statements regarding China, MacArthur sent a letter to the Republican Minority Leader of the House, Joseph Martin. The letter stated that Chiang Kai-shek, leader of the Chinese Nationalist government in Formosa (now Taiwan) should be unleashed on China’s mainland. The general had exceeded his authority, attempting to usurp the foreign policy prerogatives of the president.
President Truman relieved MacArthur and ordered him home. MacArthur returned to America and was given a hero’s welcome. Many Americans wrote their representatives and Senators in support of MacArthur. Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, in an interview, suggested that Truman “should be impeached.” Others cited MacArthur’s military achievements and compared them to Truman’s. Truman had been a captain in the Missouri National Guard, but had fought in France during World War I.
MacArthur an Independent General
Senator Connally wrote that as the top commander based in Japan, MacArthur “lived like a king in Tokyo…The servility of all the Japanese leaders, including the emperor himself…exalted his ego.” Congress convened a special committee to determine if Truman should be impeached for relieving the general. Senator Morse, however, rose in the Senate and declared, “God help the American people if the day ever comes when we fail to retain civilian control over the military establishment.”
Historians Stephen Ambrose and Douglas Brinkley conclude that MacArthur’s chief disagreement with the Truman administration was over the policy of Containment. MacArthur, focusing on Asia, wanted to go beyond containment to defeat Communism and liberate the peoples beyond the Bamboo Curtain.
Recalling the events of the firing, Senator William F. Knowland believed that Truman’s peace negotiations would lead to “a Far Eastern Munich,” referring to the appeasement policies employed to contain Hitler in the late 1930s in Europe. According to Knowland, “MacArthur had shown sufficient independence that they feared he would let go with a blast when the facts became known.” Thus, the general had to be replaced.
References:
- Stephen E. Ambrose and Douglas G. Brinkley, Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy Since 1938 (Penguin, 1997)
- Senator Tom Connally, My Name is Tom Connally (NY: Thomas Y. Crowell Co., 1954)
- Mason Drukman, Wayne More: A Political Biography (Oregon Historican Society Press, 1997)
- Gayle B. Montgomery and James W. Johnson, One Step From the White House: The Rise and Fall of Senator William F. Knowland (University of California Press, 1998)
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