General MacArthur's firing

MacArthur gets the Axe

April 1951

"This war is about to get hot"

Truman's views:

·     Truman didn’t want to escalate the war in Korea

·     War against China may lead to war against Russia and Truman believed he wasn’t ready so MacArthur needed to be stopped 

MacArthur's views:

He will salute for the camera but not for
the president. Someone has an ego problem 

·     MacArthur still demanded total victory over the communists

·     He saw Truman’s policy as too timid and made this clear

·     MacArthur had great public support, Caesar like, 3 out of 4 disapproved of Truman way of dealing with war 

·     MacArthur wanted to use Nuclear weapons and air strikes against the Japanese

·     MacArthur also thought that the war should be taken into China

conflict between MacArthur and Truman:

No I hate you more, no I hate you more...

·     They suffered disagreements at the Truman-MacArthur meeting at Wake Island, in the end Truman put his foot down and confined the war to the Korean peninsula

·     Truman was focused on Europe whereas MacArthur was focused on China

·     They had similar goals of destroying communism but very different methods, it was the battle between diplomacy and conflict 

·      MacArthur wrote a letter to the House, calling for a new foreign policy, he wanted to unite Korea then bring back Chiang and attack China 

"here we fight Europe's war with arms while the diplomats there still fight with words"- General MacArthur

Political influence into the firing:

"Awfully sorry I seem to have misplaced
my toupee"

·     Attlee flew to Washington to argue against the atomic bombs

·     he demonstrated how the US had detonated 3 bombs against Asians in 5 years 

·     He was a soldier challenging presidential supremacy 

Pulling it off:

·     Truman introduced a new $50bn defence budget which roughly followed the lines of NSC 68: 

1. Two more divisions in Europe

Pull my finger

2. Doubled air groups

3. New bases in Morocco, Libya and Saudi Arabia

4. Doubled army size to 3.5 million

5. Peace treaty with Japan

6. Increases aid to French in Vietnam.

 This reduced an anti-Truman response from the McCarthyites’

·     MacArther challenged containership and as a result a hearing was held in the senate and they agreed he should be dismissed 

·     Truman had to respond to MacAurthur's public opposition of American policy 

·     Truman made a speech outlining that the war should be limited to Korea because:

1.    To save the lives of the army

2.    Not to jeopardise the security of the US and the free world

3.    Prevent WWIII

·     As a result, he dismissed general MacArther as he contradicted the movement towards world peace

·     MacArthur’s dismissal ended the era of trying to united the two Koreas under a democratic government 

·     MacArthur’s position was filled by general Matthew Bridgeway

 “cause of world peace is much more important than any individual”- Harry Truman